Uncoordination

~ Geoff Stamper

I comically failed the health test of standing on one foot for ten seconds, nearly doubling my risk of death in the next ten years according to research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. The increased risk stems from deaths of people like me stupidly trying to balance on one leg while watching Good Morning America publicize this dangerous stunt. Unlike many people, I do want to pinpoint time of my death. I am heartened that science is narrowing this down for me. I need the advance notice so I can locate and destroy incriminating evidence. And it will take time to coordinate and complete my life finale jumping trifecta involving bungee cords, parachutes, and deep ends.

I do not remember if I ever could stand on one foot for ten seconds but I no longer put on my pants from a standing position. And I know I cannot stand on my two hands for ten seconds because I have tried that in the swimming pool. That failing has apparently doubled my chance of drowning.

I was distressed at my wife’s amazement when I could not perform the simple one footed maneuver. She made no attempt to contain her mirth as I flailed even though I am dealing with Stage Four Balance Cancer. However, I was most devastated when she demonstrated how easily she could stand on one foot (either one) for more than ten seconds. But she has been practicing as part of a health routine which includes brushing her teeth on one foot. My doctor says I was born with One Addled Foot syndrome and confirmed that practicing was not cheating and could help. My spell checker says I invented the word “uncoordination.” Perhaps they will name that word after me.

92 thoughts on “Uncoordination”

  2. Oh, how mystifying! The partner and I were just talking about this, and practising balance immediately before I opened WordPress and saw your post. I am optimistic that this can be cultivated/retrained, like any skill!

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    1. I heard about this regularly and I wonder why it is so important to be able to stand on one foot. There must be a reason. And yes, uncoordination is a more practical word than coordination, considering how often we are uncoordinated…

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      1. Once you have that mastered, try it with your eyes closed. It’s not as difficult as it sounds. The trick is to pay attention to your inner sense of balance.
        Then I had someone ask if a blind person could balance on a unicycle. One wheel instead of one foot. After a couple of attempts I concluded that it is possible. By the way, I’m not blind, I just tested it with my eyes closed.
        Happy balancing.

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  3. Hmmm…. “uncoordination” sounds like a great word for a clever epitaph on a headstone. (FYI “uncoordination” has now been added to my computer’s dictionary. I no longer will see that pesky wiggly red line. Once your brilliant word is accepted by Oxford or Cambridge or the Queen or whoever does that nobody else will either.)

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  4. Uncoordinated is a word that I can see using. Thanks to you, Geoff. You’ll definitely be mentioned every time it’s used. And why would one stand on one foot when two feet are more stable? We have two for a reason. I’m sure you’ll be writing this blog for many more years to come and hopefully while sitting down. 🙂

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  7. Interesting test – is from a study of 1700 people in Brazil, aged 51 to 75, (where the average life expectancy is 76.6). Of those who failed the test, a higher proportion were obese, and/or had heart disease, high blood pressure, unhealthy blood fat profiles, and type 2 diabetes. Not being able to stand like a flamingo was the least of these people’s worries…

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  9. Your wife laughing at you? Oh how dare she, LOL! That is why we get married you know, so that we can be amused by our spouse. 🙂
    I think being uncoordinated will only shorten your life if you are standing on a high roof. So stay away from high places.

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  10. That must have been the ten seconds of Good Morning America between the cackles. George: “Well, sidewalks are made of cement” Baaaahahaha cackle cackle bawuck uck uck. I once sampled that show and used the audio as the effect for a disturbed chicken coop. Buk buk buk bukAWWW, buk buk buk bukAWWW… Jesus.
    My wife still takes ballet class three times a week. She hasn’t got the grip to open a tube of toothpaste or the eyesight to read the directions on instant mashed potatoes, but she can put one foot on the kitchen counter and say “owwww… that feels good.” Whereas I hired someone to tie my shoes.

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  12. maybe if you held a 20 foot pole out in front of you while trying to balance. it world for the Great Wallendas. well, most of the time.

    I think George Bush may have used the word uncoordination, or at least it sounds like a word he would have used…

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  13. Hmm, I am left trying to figure out how one gets a word named after hisself? (That is MY word, btw, so don’t try to steal “hisself.”) But if the word “uncoordinated” is named after you, what will we say: Geoff is “stampered?” How would this be an improvement? And will anyone besides us “stamperites” (also MY word!) know what we mean?
    What a conundrum. (You can have THAT one.)

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  14. There’s a one-legged cashier at my corner store and he uses crutches to stand at the register. Does giving up on this test amplify the odds of dying in the next 10 years? For every failed attempt, is there a compounding of this increased likelihood of death? I just want to know whether I should expect this guy to keel over mid-transaction when this freight train of increased odds catches up to him.
    But I’m damn sure gonna ask him how he brushes his teeth next time I see him!

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    1. Oh, on a different note: why uncoordinated instead of noncoordinated or discoordinated? What’s the prefix rule here? I’m routinely nonplussed and disenchanted and prefer keeping my prefixes constructive like that, reserving my un for consciousness.

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      1. All are negative prefixes. That’s a long story about English, German Latin and French. Bottom line is what and how we’re used to hearing negative prefixes. Disconscious is a perfectly acceptable use. As is disnocuous or inplussed, uncontinent, indiarrhea, ilsatifactory… I like the sound of disstoppable. Don’t ask me why. Here’s to a dismarred by bozos rest of the weekend.

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      3. Now that I’m thinking about it, have you ever hear “cedent” used without a prefix? Me neither, always with the pre or ante, never once alone. I say we start working that into the daily lingo.

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  20. Uncoordinated implies that you once were coordinated and now you have been un-coordinated. If, like me, you have never possessed coordination, you have honed the skills necessary to deal with it and will probably live long past the time you would rather not.

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    1. Yes, I have always been uncoordinated. My Kindergarten report card said I lacked “small finger dexterity,” my awkward stage lasted long past the teenage years, and now my natural shakiness is mistaken for motor skill decline in the elderly.

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      1. we all have our moments of glory, whenever and wherever they happen. like the guy that invented the sticky note when trying to create an industrial glue.

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  26. I found this very entertaining, not least due to the fact that I can no longer balance on one foot, & reading this I can completely relate. My partner also has no issues balancing, I tend to be the butt of many a joke!

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  27. Why is it “coordination” The “co” seems to be a prefix itself. Wouldn’t coordination be two guys being made priests in the same ceremony? And uncoordination- does it mean only one guy becomes a priest? Or that nobody becomes a priest at all? Any decent word has alternate meanings, so I think your new word is still in the beta testing phase.

    As far as standing on one foot, I now have the goal of brushing my teeth on one foot and brushing my teeth with one foot at the same time. A foot with nothing to do seems so wasteful.

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    1. I follow and congratulate you on the insight that co-ordination is the ordination of two priests (tri-ordination would presumably accommodate three candidates). But I get lost in the possibilities for unordinations! If you can brush your teeth with your foot, you are clearly going to live forever.😎

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  28. Is it normal for your wife’s feet to have teeth? I found that more impressive than her ability to stand on one leg which again is quite baffling, for we stand on one foot but not one leg how does one even stand on their own leg in a standing position?

    I can put my boxers on in a standing position, but not my trousers but hell l have to sit down for the morning pee these days … my father when he was alive would have called me a pansy for doing so, as he was adamant that one had to remain standing upright when peeinto in to the toilet bowl. Yet in his last days he too had to sit to pee, l reminded him of that a couple of months before his passing not his passing of urine but of life.

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    1. Yes, my wife has feet with teeth. She calls them toenails but they are teeth. I take my right foot and use it to stand on my left food. Old age is very humbling indeed and I expect my three sons will also be rubbing my face in many of my pronouncements.

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      1. No worries. We can create our own words. No law against it. And… we might even become famous! I’m not really interested in fame, though. I saw what it did to Scooby Doo.

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