Regionals
rds3wave
For years women were banned from official running competitions. Their bodies were too frail, it was said. The stress and strain might somehow damage their ability to bear children (which, after all, was considered a woman’s primary function). Yet women ran anyway.
Even when women were finally allowed (and how insulting is it that they were ‘allowed’) to enter running competitions, they were often actively discouraged from doing it. Competitive running was considered immodest, unladylike, unbecoming. Yet women ran anyway.
I’m not a runner. I don’t claim to understand the runner’s mindset. I don’t know why anybody chooses to run. But I know this with absolute certainty: what we’re seeing here is good, and healthy, and beautiful. Tell these young women they’re too frail to run, I dare you. Tell them running is unladylike, tell them it’s unbecoming, tell them…well, never mind. They’ve already run by you.
Blog photograph copyrighted to the photographer and used with permission by utata.org. All photographs used on utata.org are stored on flickr.com and are obtained via the flickr API. Text is copyrighted to the author, greg fallis and is used with permission by utata.org. Please see Show and Share Your Work
