Sob. I hurt. I hurt from my toes, where I have a nasty, painful-looking blister on my little bitty piggy toe (right foot) to my calves and shins and all the way to my butt, where every muscle is screaming for mercy. Why?, you ask. Why are you in such pain, Robyn? Why, oh why? Because, dear readers, I got cocky. For something like two months now, I’ve been doing the WalkAerobics tapes from hell, led by Satan McCruel herself, Leslie Sansone. At the end of each exercise session with Leslie, I would be dripping sweat and proud of myself. "I’m kicking ass!" I would inform myself proudly. "I’m a WalkAerobics ass-kickin’ fool!"
Two months, five days a week is an awfully long time to spend with one exercise guru, though, and as I was at the end of mile 2 on Tuesday, as Leslie perkily proclaimed that mile 3 was coming up, I suddenly became aware that if I had to look at her perky, happy, laughing fucking face ("We’re gonna let Jo lead, ’cause she used to be A BALLERINA OR SOMETHIN’!" she shrieks gleefully in mile 3, and I hear that "OR SOMETHING’!" in my nightmares, people) for one more instant, I would cross that thin line between Well and Unwell that I am so fond of straddling, and I would grab Spanky who was making his rounds of the house, howling mournfully at the walls for no apparent reason, and I would make him into a hat, and Tubby into a matching skirt, and perhaps Mr. Fancypants into a kicky pair of fancy gloves, and I would attach a collar and leash to Miz Poo, and I would parade around the front yard, smiling and waving at everyone who went by until the men in the white coats came to carry me away, and I would spend the rest of my natural life on the Psych ward in a small scary Southern town named something like Muscle Shoals or Tuscaloosa.
In other words, Leslie was beginning to bore me.
But that’s okay! That’s fine! I thought to myself. Am I not an ass-kicking WalkAerobics diva? Am I not? I certainly am! Therefore, I did what any self-respecting WalkAerobics diva would do when, say, the vcr is broken or looking at Leslie’s VERY FUCKING HAPPY face for one more instant makes them want to drive to Pennsylvania and hunt her down and bellow "OR SOMETHIN’!" over and over into her ear until she’s screaming and not at all happy and sobbing like a little girl.
In other words, I decided to taking my walking self outside, where I would walk quickly to the end of the street and back (a distance of 1.2 miles) a couple of times. No sweat, not for the WalkAerobics diva, not a care in the world. Well, maybe one care in the world – what if it wasn’t much of a workout? I decided, then, that I would walk in one direction for 15 minutes, and then turn around and walk home, which – in theory at least – would make a half-hour walk. And if I still didn’t think I’d exercised enough, why, I’d just do some calisthenics or pop in that Advanced Tae Bo tape.
At exactly 8:00 am, after a quick warmup, with my sneakers on my feet, my walkman tucked into my shirt pocket, and my watch on my wrist, I set out for my walk. It was a lovely, overcast day, with enough of a breeze to keep it a tad cool. How I enjoyed walking.
Lawdy, I thought to myself after a long while, It must be juuuust about time to turn around. I have an excellent sense of time, you know, and if it felt like 15 minutes had passed, I was pretty sure it was so. But I’d brought the watch for a reason, and so I double-checked myself.
To my dismay, it had only been five minutes. Apparently, time slows down when you’re walking, and no one bothered to tell me. A moment later, I felt a somewhat stabbing sensation in my shins, and afraid I’d been attacked by killer bees, I let out a high-pitched scream and did a mid-air leap, then bent over to inspect my shins, which were killer bee free. I blushed slightly and shot a dirty look at the gentleman sitting in his lawnchair in the middle of his driveway, who was laughing and pointing at me.
I reached the end of the street exactly twelve minutes after leaving the house. I stood at the end of the sidewalk, looking across the busy road located there, gasping for air and wiping the sweat from my face, trying to loosen up my suddenly tight calf and thigh muscles, while trying to look as though I were simply standing there contemplating the mysteries of the universe. I decided, instead of crossing that busy road to go another three minutes down that road, only to turn around and come back, I’d head for home, and take a side street or two to stretch out the trip a bit.
Thirty-five minutes after leaving the house, I was rounding the corner and heading up the small hill in front of my house. My right piggy toe was throbbing, and I could feel the blister growing by the moment. I stumbled into the garage and through the door, to be met by the very concerned Miz Poo and Spanky. I collapsed on the couch and may have even passed out for a few minutes.
As yesterday went on, my muscles began throbbing. It started with my shins and went to my calves, and then up my body. This morning, I attempted a stretch and almost screamed when the muscles in my ass sent out a stabbing pain.
Did I learn my lesson? Hell, no. I went out and did it all over again today.
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09/07/2000