Don’t You Think?
Toronto, Ontario
It’s been about ten years since I hopped on to that Krishna Youth Bus Tour. While driving through the Midwest of the US and beyond we came upon Mount Rushmore where you have these 5 former presidents of America with their faces carved in mammoth scale on the side of the mountain. At one of the tourist buildings, you can put a check mark by the name of your favourite president. The tally thus far goes in favour of Abraham Lincoln (1809 – 1865).
We all know he was a towering figure. What most people don’t know is that he was an avid walkier wherever he went. Apparently he had a unique style of walking. A friend of his wrote, “When he walked he moved cautiously but firmly; his arms and giant hands swung down by his side. He walked with an even tread, the inner sides of his feet being parallel. He put the whole foot flat down on the ground at once, not rising from the toe, and hence he had no spring to his walk… The whole man, body and mind, worked slowly, as if it needed oiling.”
It came quite so coincidentally that when I read a little bit about Abe Lincoln, and in particular about his way of moving, that I had been observing closely, more than usual, the various styles of walking by pedestrians. It’s interesting to note the various speeds, springs, and splits that go into the leg mechanics of humans. It’s especially easy to see with the skin tight clothes of today. During Abe’s time women had those billowy skirts and men donned baggy pants and long coats.
In George Harrison’s famous song, “Something”, the lyrics start like this, “Something in the way she moves attracts me… “ He was referring to Krishna’s moving or Krishna’s walking. He only changed the gender to ‘she’ in order to make the song more conventionally appealing. So sometimes I imagine how Krishna walked, that’s a nice meditation, don’t you think?
7 KM
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