Somersaults

I love the way children play together.  The vantage from my porch is perfect.  Today I watched one girl try to teach another how to do a somersault.  The first was trying to lift the other's legs and fling them over, but the body resisted, and they both ended up in a heap laughing.  Then they tried and tried again - NOT to succeed, I am sure, but to go through the same flawed process so that they ended up all entwined and giggling. 

Next they spent a couple minutes touching each other's hair.  Bopping the pom pom balls on one and feeling the silky length of the other.  

After a while, this: one would tell the other to raise her arm, then the first would tickle the second in her armpit and they would crack up.  And, just like with the somersaults, there was repetition.  Each time the giggling got louder, and by the end, they were laughing for no reason at all.  Before bedtime, they just walked around the sidewalk paths holding hands. 

No one touched me today. 

I take that back.  One handshake.  No leg flinging, head bopping, armpit tickling, baby snuggling, hand holding.  Just me, in my own skin.  Twenty-two square feet of an empty plain.  When did I lose that, I wonder?  The natural inclination to seek company?  Tactile sensation?  When, more importantly, are we told to back away from that?  To maintain and protect our personal space?

A few weekends ago, I went to regatta and I loved the way the teenagers laid all over each other in the team tents.  Heads on bellies.  Fixing each other's hair. Elbow to elbow, sharing the same phone. Jumping and bumping into each other to grab for a frisbee.  Guys, girls.  All pals, teammates.  It was so good to see. 

(I'm starting to feel uneasy about this post, as if my words might be misconstrued.  That's how weird we have become about touching.  I am even afraid to write about it.)

One of the hardest things about being single is the silence.  Another is the lack of base interaction. 

CNN reports "Recently, researchers measured immune function in healthy adults who got either a 45-minute Swedish massage or 45 minutes of lighter touch. The massaged group had substantially more white blood cells -- including natural killer cells, which help the body fight viruses and other pathogens -- and fewer types of inflammatory cytokines associated with autoimmune diseases.

The act of embracing floods our bodies with oxytocin, a "bonding hormone" that makes people feel secure and trusting toward each other, lowers cortisol levels, and reduces stress.

Twining your fingers together with your one-and-only is enormously calming. James Coan, PhD, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, discovered this when he administered functional MRIs to 16 married women while telling them they might experience a mild shock.

The resulting anxiety caused the images of their brain activity to light up like Christmas trees. But when the women held hands with one of the experimenters, that stress response subsided -- and when they held hands with their husbands, it really quieted down. "There was a qualitative shift in the number of regions in the brain that just weren't reacting anymore to the threat cue," Coan says.

Even more intriguing: When you're in a happy relationship, clasping hands reduces stress-related activity in a brain area called the hypothalamus -- which lowers the levels of cortisol coursing through your system -- as well as in the part of the brain that registers pain, which actually helps keep you from feeling it as much."

I don't really now how to end this, other than to say, hug your sweetie tonight.  Or pet your dog.  Read aloud to your child snuggled close.  Watch TV hip to hip.  Let your children tumble all over each other. There's something deeply healing about touch.

And, if you happen to see me in the next few days, give me hug for no reason at all.  I'll be thankful, that's for sure. You might even realize you need a hug back. We'll just call it cortisol control.  Deal?