Working Out

I’m all about healthy lifestyles. If you want to awaken early in the morning, eat a breakfast of grapefruit, kale and herbal tea, and go for a brisk run in the crisp air before joining your well-toned friends in the park for yoga, be my guest. I will watch from my window, tightly ensconced in a duvet, with drowsy eyes and a stack of full-gluten pancakes. Most of the time. Sometimes, when I have spent many days being sedentary, and I feel the blobbiness creeping in, I get these wild notions that exercise is a good idea. Last time this happened was in May. I recklessly decided to run with my mom and aunt on a day when I had a show, and I really thought I was going to have to call the dance school and tell them I could not perform in the recital that afternoon because my legs had been worn down to stumps due to overexertion.

Despite this bad experience, I somehow found myself running again today. And not even from a bear. I ran exclusively for exercise. I can assure you, I never intended it to go this far. It started out innocently enough. You see, my sister, Elizabeth, took up running yesterday. I think that’s just grand. She got herself some cute workout clothes and some Nike sneakers that she LITERALLY WILL NOT SHUT UP ABOUT and her very own running plan. Wanting to support her new endeavor without exerting myself, I decided to follow her in the car and blast some workout jams.

Both of us were pleased with this arrangement, but man is a giddy thing, and can never seem to leave things as they are.

Today, I shed the car and ran alongside her on my own two legs. The running plan dictated that we run for two minutes then walk for thirty seconds. Only we had to do that SIX TIMES. So here’s how it went:

1st set: Wow! This isn’t so bad! I can feel the endorphins coursing through me! I am fit! I am health incarnate! Let’s go eat quinoa!

2nd set: Whoo, still rockin’ it! Feel those leg muscles activating!

3rd set: I am not okay.

4th set: Please, Lord, lend to me your strength. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.

5th set: Flesh is still weak, spirit is no longer willing.

6th set: No internal monologue. I blacked out and the heavens opened and the angels descended and dragged me across the finish line.

So, I’ve had my fix now, and if all goes well, I shouldn’t be tempted to work out for another three months. We did crunches too, so if I don’t wake up tomorrow morning with washboard abs, I shall be very put out.