The episode of Hogan Knows Best featuring this touching ode to l'amour has already aired, but J and I are still fascinated by this bit of poetry.
Seriously, we've been discussing it for weeks!
Here's a transcript to aid in your study:
The first time I saw you
I saw your feet first, then I saw you
So I did a knee bend
So we would stay together 'til the end
I love you too
So what you want to do
J and I have been studying this sestet with the zeal for enlightenment of a doctoral student poring over the works of Eliot. Our conversations go something like this:
"At first, I thought he was talking about his daughter Brooke, that maybe she was a breech birth." I do love the look on Brooke's face as her dad reads this insane poem. That's some great "WTF??" there.
"Yeah, the foot thing is weird... although the breech birth theory might explain a thing or two about Brooke, if she had her air supply cut off in the womb or something."
"Why did he see her feet first?" I find this oddly disturbing. "Is the Hulkster a foot fetishist? Was he looking for a contact lens, maybe... or pretending to look for one while surreptitiously sneaking a peek at shoes?"
"Maybe he was passed out and just as he came to, Linda walked up! You can't top that for romantic."
"Maybe he first saw her as she was wheeled in on a gurney. Or maybe she was aiming a kick at his head?"
"And what's with the knee bend? That's where he completely loses me. How on God's green earth can a knee bend have any impact on courtship?!"
We puzzle over this for a while, until J comes up with a plausible theory combining the knee bend with the foot viewing: "Maybe he was doing a squat and looking down, and just then she walked up, and he completed the bend to see what was on top of those feet." This could totally work.
I did a little research and came up with another possible interpretation, although I'm still not sure it works any better than the squat theory. According to onlinedictionary.com, a knee bend looks like this. Could the Hulkster have used "knee bend" to mean proposing to Linda on bended knee? Is he really that much of a musclehead?
And even if he was referring to his proposal as a "knee bend," would Linda know that? Or would she be right there with the rest of us, grunting plaintively in confusion?
"You know," I volunteer, "the first time Mojo saw me, he saw my feet first, and then he saw me. And since he was hiding under one of those low-slung futons, he was actually doing a knee bend at the time!"
"Awwww, so you'll be together 'til the end!"
"Or until Emily turns us all into her zombified minions."
"Whichever comes first."
I'm going for the knee bend = proposal theory, especially since he used the "so we would stay together 'til the end" line immediately afterwards.
I have no idea what he was doing that he saw her feet first. I didn't see the show, but I really wish they'd elaborate on that one!
Posted by: Mindi | July 24, 2007 at 02:28 PM