the wrong outfit
| |
Let's not mince words. To play pool, you have to get into
a pool-playing stance. This involves a kind of lunge, which
in turn means leaning over and sticking your arse out. If
you cannot do this in the outfit that you are wearing, you
will not feel like a proper pool player and you will not play
like a proper pool player.
As a respectable modern woman, your brain is already crammed
with body-image baggage from reading women's magazines and
watching tv. When you are taking your shot you need to be
focusing on your shot, not on what your bum looks like or
whether your hairy armpits are showing. If you are wearing
a short skirt that shows your undies when you lean over, or
if you wear a pencil skirt that sticks your legs together,
or if you wear the type of trousers where you already feel
that your bum looks enormous, you'll be forced into an awkward
upright stance, which will be quickly followed by a loss of
self-respect and a feeling of general adequacy. And you will
miss the ball.
Rule number 1: wear an outfit that allows you to lean
over, stick your bum out, and spread your legs without a feeling
of sweaty self-loathing.
[A note on shoes. The official rules of the Billiards
Congress of America actually mention shoes. They say in no
uncertain terms, that 'foot attire must be normal in regard
to size shape and manner in which it is worn.' Normal? Does
that mean that our shoes should accord with the current fashions?
Are platforms outlawed or OK? What is a deviant shoe? Are
there moral implications? The questions are many, the answers
are few. And yet, without even consulting the rules, it's
not hard to determine that shoes have an impact on pool stance.
Platforms make you uniformly taller, whereas high-heels raise
you up at an angle. Needless to say, this is an area where
women have more flexibility than men. Do your worst. Find
the shoe height and angle that works for your game, and wear
them with gay abandon, but be prepared to defend your shoe
selection if interrogated. For this, a current knowledge of
semiotics, a survey of Foucault's major works, and a close
reading of Volume 3 of Capital should suffice.]
|
