I Won't Like it!

       I'm already deep into my second day of planned exercise, and I haven't done it yet.  I've showered and dressed, I have make-up on, I've eaten breakfast and lunch.  Surely I should have put in my 15 minutes already. But no...

       Just like the dreaded bed-making during my month of cleaning like Martha, rather than doing the task, I am finding myself thinking about my childhood.  

       The fact is that I never liked exercise. When kids were asked what their favorite class was in school, and they answered "Gym!" or worse, "Recess!", I always thought they were losers.  As for myself, in my early years, I much preferred spelling. Spelling I was good at. I was great, even. It was easy, and there was a certain satisfaction in knowing an answer was right. In those days, after the end of a spelling test, we passed our paper forwards or backwards to be marked by another classmate, and later were asked to raise our hand to signify what score we had earned.  20 out of 20? Yes! My hand went up nearly every time. And, in my superiority, I even sometimes changed the answers of the person whose paper I was marking, to help them get a better score.

       In gym, my successes were rather more limited.  Take climbing the heavy, clunky rope, for example, that was hanging from the 30-foot ceiling.  Not only could I not climb the rope, I also didn't want to. I could feel I didn't have the strength for it. Why on earth would I want to climb up higher when my obviously precarious hold could fail at any point and I would plummet to the ground?  The same was true of the very huge and frightening "climbing apparatus" which was installed sometime in Grade 2, and which remained my nemesis all the way through school.  

       As for sports, I wasn't much better.  I was scared of hurtling balls, which made me lousy at volleyball and baseball.  Although I was not the last one picked for teams, I was close enough to the end that I felt sorry for the poor sad sacks who were picked after I was. 

       My point is that I never learned to like physical exercise.  There are those who swear they get a "high" from their exertion.  For me, it has nearly always been something to be dreaded. There have been a few exceptions.  I was pretty good at basketball, and there was a time when I enjoyed running. But that was very long ago. When I think of exercise today, I continue to wish I could get a note from my parents, excusing me -- like the lucky girl who wore a brace on her back.  

       But for this month at least, I have committed to giving it a try -- for 15 minutes a day. And I will do it today. I really will. But I won't like it...