All Hail Martha Stewart’s Big Quarantine Energy
Martha Stewart got a new piece of exercise equipment recently and she posted about it this week on Instagram. It’s a Tonal, which, for the uninitiated, is a “connected” strength training machine, kind of a cross between a Bowflex and a Mirror. It costs about $3,000 plus a monthly subscription fee, so you can tune into the trainers on a screen who will take you through routines. Martha tells us that she’s going to use it alongside her Peleton bike and her DB Method at-home squat machine.
All this exercising is happening at Martha Stewart’s home—a 153 acre farm in Bedford, New York—where she is sheltering in place with her gardener, her driver, and her housekeeper. (“We make a nice dinner every night. We have a cocktail. We play cards after dinner,” she told Seth Meyers recently.)
That’s the extent of her staff at the moment, as she informs her Instagram followers. These exercise machines are “Revolutionizing exercise at home while we have no personal trainers No masseurs No yoga instructors,” she writes. “If these do not keep me in shape nothing will except maybe ten hours in the garden!!! Every day!!!”
Are you wondering if this drives me crazy? My life is nothing like Martha’s in the best of times. And now, though I am healthy and employed (in other words: very, very lucky), I don’t have acreage or staff or a single exercise machine, all of which might ease the rigors of social distancing, the constant low-grade panic, the mounting grief.
But I am not annoyed. Quite the opposite—Martha Stewart's personal instagram account is my favorite place on the internet. I relish every detail, savor every video.
All hail Martha Stewart and her big quarantine energy.
Martha is unapologetic in her approach to this crisis—as she is in all things. She’s baking bread (with an heirloom starter, of course, though with a flour she rates as less-than-desirable), she’s growing vegetables, she’s taking care of herself, she’s taking care of animals, she’s taking care of her gardener.
There’s no false modesty about her resources, no smug odes to how blessed she is, no glibness about the importance of self-care.
Martha is not trying to influence me. She’s not suggesting I order a Tonal or start raising baby geese or plant half a dozen daffodil varietals in order to be more like Martha Stewart. It is quite obvious to everyone that that there can be only one Martha Stewart.
She’s sharing because she knows her 704,000 followers are interested and because she has wisdom to impart. In Martha Stewart’s world, everything worth doing is worth doing well. Not everything must be elaborate, but everything must be done with rigor. Case in point, these instructions for a pared down quarantine beauty routine, posted April 3rd:
Martha’s standards may be far too high for most of us mortals (I am eating too many cookies and I don't see that changing anytime soon), but she’s right: "We will survive this newest life challenge I know it is painful and hurtful and difficult But it is not war It is a virus We know what we have to do. Do it!"
Resilience takes work, regardless of who you are. (Add to the list of things I love: That she clearly typed this caption herself, irregular spacing, 14 exclamation points, and all. She’s Martha—she’s incredible, but she's not perfect.)
Martha recently appeared on the Dr. Oz show (I know, I know) and he asked her about her “goals” for her time in quarantine. “What do you hope to accomplish… how are you going to be a better Martha Stewart when this is over?”
“I am going to scream and break every window within 10 miles if you say you get better with this kind of challenge,” came her reply. “I find that it’s the kind of person you are to start with. It’s hard to get better with such a disaster.”
Martha is the kind of person who eats well every night, who accidentally drinks a $400 bottle of wine while playing Gozo with the staff, who raises animals and enjoys her wealth and avoids self pity. She is not the kind of person to tell you to get better during a global pandemic.
And honestly: who could even imagine a better Martha Stewart?
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