Language: it’s a funny thing, emerging from within a culture, so the natives can communicate with each other.
CrossFit has a language unto itself. We talk about the WOD and cleans and pulling under the bar and achieving triple extension. There are snatches and Turkish Get-ups and sweat angels and working out in a box. Some of the phrases are from the Olympic lifting world or the powerlifting culture or the kettlebell clan, but some are just natural creations from CrossFit itself.
In a way, these words we use are like the secret dialect that you spoke with your buddies in the treehouse when you were 10. When you thought you were so super-cool and that, maybe, with enough plastic garbage bags and duct tape, you could create a cape that would allow you to fly off the roof and land without breaking both legs.
Maybe we’re still trying to jump off that roof. Maybe that’s why we’ve got school teachers snatching and engineers split jerking and florists making sweat angels. I sure hope so. Trade in those garbage bags for an Olympic bar and meet me at the box.
The old tree house looks a little different but it’s still a place where you’re safe to dream and folks will give you a hand up if you need one.
The rules are still the same as they were in the treehouse when you were 10: No spitting on the floor, holler loud if you see my mom coming, and if you know any cool new swear words, you have to share them. Ally Ally Oxen Free.
