I’m fat. I know it. I’m not ignoring the fact that my weight is incredibly unhealthy and probably will cause a myriad of problems with my organs and glands if I don’t rectify it sooner rather than later. I haven’t been living under a rock, so I’ve read all the studies showing how much obesity costs in the long run in healthcare costs and how life expectancy suffers for those who are unhealthy. I’m lucky so far that I haven’t been diagnosed with diabetes or any number of other disorders that afflict the obese.

Body acceptance is a way of telling myself that I am not a worthless piece of shit. It’s a way of accepting that this is how I am at this moment, and that I am a worthwhile human being, even though I haven’t made the best choices for myself in the last seven years or so. This wasn’t an overnight journey, and I know that. So, I am endeavoring to accept my body for what it is. It is a reflection of the last seven years of my life, and the choices that I made during those seven years. I  can’t deny that it happened, but I can choose to try not to hate myself for it. Hate and self-loathing in the past have only led m into a deeper spiral of poor decisions. It’s hard to decide to do anything positive for yourself when you hate how you look and think you’re worthless because you can’t manage to make good and healthy choices.

So, I have chosen to embrace body acceptance. I am embracing myself for what I am and also for what I can and will be. I’m making better choices for myself and for my future. I am a worthwhile human being despite my fat. I am beautiful and feminine. I am also obese. That last bit? That’s the one that has to go. The rest can stay. But I’m accepting the obesity along with the rest of it. They say the first step toward recovery is admitting that you have a problem. I’ve already done that. Now I’m remembering that beneath the problem is a person. That person is a human being just like any other. She’s one who has problems with portion control, a penchant for junk foods and a massive sweet tooth. Yep. Those are there, too. I’m me, and I’m learning to accept my bad along with my good.

What this message of personal body acceptance should not be misconstrued as is fat apology. I am not making excuses for why I got fat. I got fat because I made bad decisions. I am not saying that obesity is good in any way, shape or form. I have experienced many hardships as a result of being obese. I can’t shop in regular stores and half the time have to shop online. This leads to headaches for returns if things don’t fit or if the wrong item is sent. It’s not fun, let me assure you. I have to have a seatbelt extender on an airplane and in most theaters, I spend at least 30% of my attention trying not to encroach on anyone else’s space. It’s not fun, and I’ve ruined a number of situations for myself by sheer merit of being fat. I am not unapologetically fat. I understand that my fat has ramifications for myself as well as for others.

Fat apology has a tendency to be somewhat abrasive. It’s fat people fighting back against the public shaming that many of us have endured for (often) years and years. I’m not saying it’s okay to react in such a way, but it’s similar to other groups reacting negatively, defensively and abrasively to similar situations. These people have become so sick of being shamed for their fat that they have decided to buck the trend and instead of fighting against it, they accept it. They say, “It’s okay to be fat. It’s my choice after all, isn’t it?” I can’t get behind this mentality, even though I can understand some of the reasoning behind it. It is a form of body acceptance, but not, in my opinion, a very healthy one.

It’s not easy to be fat. Obesity rates are rising exponentially in western civilizations. We are getting fatter faster and younger. There is a huge backlash against those who are fat, as if we are somehow mentally deficient. Most of us have an unhealthy relationship with food; that much is obvious. The fat shaming that tends to go on from people who are thin either by their own volition (hard work in the form of exercise and calorie restriction) or by the blessing of biology does not help most of us abolish this unhealthy relationship with food. Teasing me or ridiculing me because I’m fat really only makes me feel worse about myself. As I feel worse about myself, I feel less like I’m worth the effort it would take to change the cycle of obesity. And then I get fatter. This tactic is not helping people. Walking around degrading fatties and teasing people who are fat is ignorant. Who are you to know what these people are doing?

I am obese. Yep. But in the last month, I’ve changed my diet and begun to exercise. I’ve started drinking more water and keeping an eye on the nutrients that I take in. If  I were to pass someone on the street, he or she might choose to ridicule me for being fat without knowing the changes that I’ve made. The fat didn’t go on quickly, so I know it won’t come off quickly. It’s a slow process, particularly since I’m actively trying not to over-fatigue myself or injure myself. Many of the fat people who are shamed could be making poor decisions. They may have already started making the change. Perhaps they’ve changed from a diet of fast food and junk to one involving lots of fresh vegetables and lean meats. Maybe they’ve already lost 20 pounds. There’s no way for a stranger to know that.

The looks that come with being fat are not easy to take. It’s embarrassing to have someone see me and cringe, as if I am a behemoth made of fat and ugliness, as if there are no redeeming qualities about me. I know there are, and the stranger does not, of course. But what if I were to look at them with the same disgust? That’s not okay. Of course it’s not okay. I don’t know them, or their story, just like they don’t know mine. The only part of my story that they know is that I’ve made some unhealthy choices about food and that I’m not, perhaps, as active as I should be. The very idea that a person deserves the right to judge me for that without knowing me is offensive. The fact that these people can judge me and think that I’m not doing anything for myself or that I think the fat is okay or even great is offensive. The very idea that body acceptance is the same as fat acceptance is offensive to me.

I am accepting my body in its current form. I accept it for all of its flaws and for all of its fat. I acknowledge that I am unhealthy. I acknowledge that my unhealthiness has ramifications for others. I am beautiful despite these things. My body is okay the way it is, but it can be much, much better. From here forward, I am making the decision to do better for myself and my body for the sake of longevity and a more active lifestyle. It’s hard to be active after not being active for so long, so I’m taking baby steps toward being able to walk around Walt Disney World all day without feeling like I’m ready to keel over at the end of the day.

My body is okay the way it is. It could be much better, and it will get much better. I’m awesome the way I am. And now it’s time to become even more awesome.

The first bout was full of really slow jams. They started further back and did a lot of jostling for the best strategic positioning. Strategy was top dog, so things seemed to move a little slower and definitely required a lot more attention and understanding to figure out what was going on. Johnathan’s mom was with us, and while we gave her a basic idea of how roller derby is played, it’s hard to explain all of the aspects when you’re relatively new to the sport yourself. I decided to root for the Hellbombers because they had sparkly red shorts and because I like red better than pink. Yes, it was that arbitrary, but considering they’re all excellent athletes, it was hard to make a legitimate choice as to which team with whom to align my loyalties. The women on the Hellbombers did not disappoint! Sparkles was the stand-out for me. She was able to bust out of the pack with incredible ease. She was light on her feet – er, skates – and ended up, at one point, amassing 25 points in a single jam. I was super impressed. Honorable Mention: The Eduskater (who, according to Johnathan’s mom is A+ – she could only see the number, not the skater’s name; I thought it was amusing). It was quite inspiring watching them weave through a group of other skaters whose job is to try to keep them from passing through.  Some of the girls took really hard falls, and some were hurt enough not to be able to skate for the rest of the bout. That’s a bit scary, but I also know it’s part of the sport. I took a bit of a battering when I played water polo, too (although nothing quite as bad as falling wrong at such a high speed). It’s part of the sport.

The second bout was the Rolling Pin-Ups versus the Cleveland Steamers. I rooted for the Pin-Ups because I liked their uniforms better. The match was more exciting than the first as the teams got much faster starts. There were more falls but fewer injuries, and the score was a lot closer and lower than in the first bout. I felt like the teams were pretty closely matched, though for the first period, the Steamers were consistently out-skating the Pin-Ups, which gave them a considerable edge and a modest lead. The second period was wicked exciting, though. The Pin-Ups brought their A-game and tied up the score, even pulling ahead at one point. Eva Lucien was a skater of note in that bout – she was so versatile and skilled it was hard not to watch just her while she was on the track. The second period of that bout was the most exciting. It all ended up coming down to the final bout, as the Pin-Ups were ahead by 1 point. The Steamers pulled out a two point jam to win by one point, but it was super exciting up to the last second. (I still like the uniform for the Pin-Ups better. Yellow is just not a good color for most people.)

Ultimately, what happened after my first experience with live roller derby is that I definitely want to play. It looks challenging, of course. It also looks like a wicked amount of fun, and I know there’s a huge community surrounding roller derby. I’ve been thinking about it for about a month so far, and started even getting into shape for it. I may even learn to like lunges some day. (Don’t hold your breath.) We’re looking into getting inexpensive skates that would work outdoors – starter skates, really. It’ll probably be at least a year before I can start boot camps with the local league, and probably even longer before I can do it well enough to actually make it. That’s okay. It’s something to work toward long-term. In the meantime, I’m going to hone my skating skills and get into much, much better shape. Step 1 is already in progress as we’ve cleaned up our diet and started exercising lately. I can already feel the difference. It should only get better from here!

Roller derby, man. I’m gonna play it someday.

The most heated topic on the MFP board is regarding “starvation mode.” There are people who believe that all women, regardless of height, weight or body type, should be eating a minimum of 1200 calories, and men should eat no fewer than 1500. This is, of course, one of those general rules for which there are always exceptions. Obviously someone who is 4’11″ would not need the same amount of fuel as someone who is 5’11″. A person with a small frame would need less fuel than someone with a bulky frame. But this is a good rule of thumb for beginners to pursue. It can be difficult to ascertain without the assistance of a licensed nutritionist and doctor how much food one should eat per day to accomplish weight loss. And, let’s face it, bodies are not mathematically perfect. What might work for me one day is not necessarily going to work the next day or long term. It’s just how it goes.

This 1200/1500 baseline is in place so that people can avoid going into so-called “starvation” mode. This is when your body stops consuming fat and instead stores it, because it is not getting enough nutrients and believes it is heading into a time of less available food. As such, it will put up stores just in case things get worse. This does happen to some. It can stall weight loss or even create weight gain, even though people are eating relatively little food. What can also occur when eating too few calories is that the body will consume fat and muscle, thereby giving weight loss, but the metabolism has slowed to a point of being able to accommodate the smaller amount of calories. Then, when these folks who have been eating so little start to eat an amount that should help them maintain the weight loss, it piles back on. The body has been sabotaged into believing that this new amount of food is excess, and therefore stores it as fat for the next time that food is scarce. It’s a biological response to aid in ultimate survival. Our brains might know that we’re well-off enough to be able to get a meal next time we’re hungry, but the bits of the body that control the weight loss are not that “smart.” They do what they’re biologically programmed to do.

We can’t know at what point our body is going to start storing instead of burning. Height and weight are a good way of estimating how much a person should eat for weight loss, but all the same it’s difficult to know where that line is. Even an expert nutritionist with the assistance of a doctor and a myriad of tests may not be able to ascertain that. Bodies are fickle things. The drama comes because what is right for one person is not necessarily right for everyone. But, when people seek to give advice, they most often draw on their own experience. It was that way for them, so it must work this way for everyone, right? I would wager that a majority of the people giving advice on MFP are not experts in any way. And if they are, they’re not posting their qualifications. This leads me to believe that they are not. (Just like me!) So, advice in these cases should be taken with a grain of salt, as each person’s experience is different and can’t possibly apply to everyone.

What really bothers me about these posts (and please don’t ask me why I read them – I’m apparently a glutton for punishment) is not that these people are sharing their personal experience. Those experiences are absolutely relevant, particularly for someone who has a body type similar to theirs. However, these posts often claim that their way is the Right Way. They claim that science can’t be proven and that starvation mode is a myth. These claims can ultimately be harmful to a person who is new to the weight loss process and hasn’t done excesses of research on the subject the way I tend to do. (Often it’s more confusing the more I read, yet I do it anyway.) People often believe the first thing they’re told, especially if it sounds convincing, and many of these people are. I worry about the damage that could be done to people who eat a minimum of calories per day (for instance, 1200) then exercise every single one of them away. There are people who have ended up in the negative digits for their calories in vs calories out goals. It’s not healthy to burn so many calories without putting in a sufficient amount of fuel, and it’s definitely not healthy to lose a lot of weight in a short amount of time. That’s a fact that these folks seem to pointedly ignore.

I’m not claiming to be an expert in any sense of the word – I am categorically not an expert at this (or anything else, for that matter). I’ve done a little bit of research and found some truths which I will stick to. I’m not going to give advice where I am unqualified to do so, and I’m certainly not going to feed the trolls by suggesting that starvation mode is actually real, thereby getting into a war of words over what happens to one person’s body versus another’s.

I don’t know why I keep reading the threads on MFP. It’s not beneficial to me, and only ends up frustrating me more often than not.

Science can’t be proven? Seriously, people?

Until Sunday.

Sunday, we decided we wanted to go to Panera for an early dinner. We also wanted to go for a bike ride, but wouldn’t really have time because we wasted the morning away sleeping, and our day didn’t really get going until about 3PM. I suggested that we combine the two endeavors, and Johnathan thought that was a pretty good idea. We’ve never ridden our bikes in town before. Whenever we’ve wanted a bike ride, we’ve gone to the metroparks and ridden on the trails there, which is fine, but those aren’t very flat, and well, we’ve seen all the close ones enough before that it’s boring to ride the short lengths. Four or five miles of trail really isn’t much, and the one to Oberlin isn’t very feasible for a weeknight or a short ride. So, this was a nice change, sort of.

It’s about 2.25 miles to Panera from our house. There are sidewalks the whole way, which is nice because there’s a lot of traffic on the streets between our apartment and the restaurant. No problem, right? Most of the way there was okay. We almost had to wait two light cycles because a bunch of cars decided that, despite the fact that we had a “walk” signal, they were more important and had to turn first. I don’t know about anyone else, but I didn’t feel like risking my life just to be able to cross the street. We did go across, but we had to run to make it before the light turned red. I have to say, that really annoyed me. If they had let us get going, they all would have been able to go, and we wouldn’t have had to run the bikes across the street.

We ran into more trouble when we got to another fairly busy intersection. People have a habit of ignoring crosswalks and limit lines alike. There were four cars in the crosswalk to go across a street. We could probably have crossed in front of them all, but the point of the crosswalk is that it’s the safe place for pedestrians (and cyclists, hi!) to cross. If I got hit outside of the crosswalk, even if it’s because I couldn’t walk in the crosswalk because someone was a jerk, it’s ultimately my fault as much as the car’s. The crosswalk is my safe haven as long as I’m crossing when I’m supposed to (walk sign). Cleveland drivers don’t seem to think that the limit line is the first warning to stop, the first line of the crosswalk is the second, and the second line of the crosswalk is the third. And then there are the really big jerks who continue to creep into the intersection on red lights, as if that will cause the light to turn green faster. I’ve seen cars get totally out into the intersection, the whole vehicle past the crosswalk. I mean, really. Don’t be a jerk.

Anyway, once we got past the perils of cars and safely back onto the relatively safe sidewalk, we rode up behind the restaurant. I decided to ride up the tiny grassy hill and coast into the parking lot next to the Panera. It would have been okay if the grass were the same height as the curb, but there was a little dip. It happened really fast, so I’m not 100% on what happened, but I suspect one of my pedals bottomed out, and then my heel did, too, and my bike kind of shuddered and I came to a stop. In the process, I banged up my left index finger. I usually keep the finger on the handle while the other three fingers hover over the brake handle, so when my hand jerked off the handle, it jammed into the mechanism that holds the brake handle up onto the handle. I nicked my knuckle (good gash on it), and I really jammed my finger. I think something hit the muscle in my finger pretty hard, too, because it swelled up and it looked ready to bruise up right away.

An injury on one finger is relatively minor as far as injuries go. I mean, it was the index finger of my dominant hand, but ultimately, it wasn’t broken or anything, and it certainly wasn’t as if I broke my wrist or something. I had some range of movement, and it wasn’t excruciating to try to use it, but any pressure caused pain. So that was fun. I had to figure out how to eat my early dinner without using my left index finger. It was… interesting! I had a feeling of inner instability afterward, as if everything would go wrong if I didn’t stay very, very still and try to do as little as possible. It was a very strange reaction to have to something so simple as jamming a finger. Somehow that simple injury influenced the rest of my day, however.

We did ride our bikes home, but I did everything I could to avoid actively using that finger. It wasn’t as hard as I expected, at least as far as riding home. Typing was interesting, because it hurt to use the finger very actively, and I learned quickly that I had to pay close attention when I was picking things up, because otherwise I would tweak my finger by trying to use it too much. It’s true that you never realize how much you use a part of your body until you can’t anymore. Johnathan was worried that I didn’t just bounce back from the injury and that the swelling didn’t go down much, even after taking ibuprofen. He said that if I hurt enough the next day, we needed to go to the urgent care to get my finger looked at and possibly x-rayed. I agreed. I’ve never been to an urgent care, or at least not in a very long time, so it’s not something I think of doing right away.

Well, I woke up on Monday morning and my finger did not feel at all better. I loaded up with painkillers and it took the edge off, but it certainly wasn’t better. I decided, since it wasn’t feelinf even a tiny bit better, that a trip to ugent care was, after all, necessary. After I got home from work, we headed up to the nearest urgent care center, which also happens to be the facility where my GP’s office is. But that has absolutely nothing to do with this story. I checked in, and probably waited about 20 minutes before they were able to see me. The very nice nurse took me to an examination room and started to get the dtails of what was wrong and what happened. He joked with me a bit, which I appreciated.

We established that my finger was now turning a lovely shade of reddish-bluish-purplish-blackish. In other words, I was developing one major bruise. And it was a beauty. He checked my pulse-ox… stuff, and my blood pressure (better than it was at my last physical, whoo!), and then did a pregnancy test – just in case – before I went off to get some x-rays done. The good news is that I am not pregnant and that I did get some x-rays done.

I went back to my exam room and waited for the doctor. This is the part that amazes me most. The doctor poked and prodded my hand a bit and told me that, thankfully, the x-rays didn’t show any broken bones in my finger. Since I hadn’t fallen, my wrist was given the all-clear, too. He told me it didn’t look like I had torn any ligaments or muscles and that I didn’t appear to have punctured anything. Just a bad bruise. He told me he’d have the nurse come in and put a splint on my finger, and I was to wear that for three to four days, just to help the finger heal, and keep it elevated whenever possible to help with the swelling. And that was that. Then he left. He touched my finger and poked at my wrist, and that’s what he gets paid the big bucks for. Oh well. That’s the system.

The nurse came back, put a splint on my finger and I was free to go. No pain killers – I’ll just use OTC stuff as necessary – and just a splint to help immobilize it. It’s helping with the pain already. Although, I have to say, I kind of look like a dweeb.

So, this has been my adventure this week. Do you know how hard it is to type when your dominant index finger is in a splint? Well, I’ll tell you. It’s really hard. I can’t wait until my finger is healed. You can bet I won’t be haphazardly riding off any curbs, however short, in the future.

Finals were last week. I finished them all with a bit of a whimper. I was really ready to be done with classes. I questioned the point. I asked myself if grades really matter to anyone but me. (Do they, honestly? Is anyone going to care what grade I got in a random class in community college? I really doubt it.) I wondered why I was putting myself through all of this. I talked about school at the beginning of the semester, before things had started to overwhelm me. Reading it again, I seemed so positive, so hopeful! At some point, I lost that. Possibly it was when I realized that my theater teacher was making the class very difficult for working students. (A weekday, daytime meeting requirement, really? Isn’t that the point of online classes? That they’re flexible for working students? Meh.) Maybe it was when I realized that most of the students in my classes were basically incapable of analyzing anything, and that I was doing way too much work to get the same grades as they would get. Maybe it was just because I lost the plot somewhere after the midterms. I still got my stuff done. I managed ultimately to get, I’m pretty sure, three As (in history and my two music survey classes) and a C (in theater – I could say a lot of mean things, but I’ll just say this: if you want a paper that’s 5-6 pages, tell me that; if you say you want the paper to be 4-5 pages, and I hit 4.5 pages, do not say it is on the short side! No! It is not! It is right in the middle. So there). I’m pretty satisfied with that. The perfectionist side of me is kicking myself for every point that I lost in that theater class that would have given me a C. Despite the fact that I lost 100 points (of 1100) because I couldn’t justify taking four or five hours off of work to go and watch a video of a play I’d already read (and he offered no alternative other than trying for extra credit in the discussion boards), I still blame myself. Surely I could have done something else to make up the points, right? Yeah, whatever. I vacillate between kicking myself and being overwhelmed by apathy about it. Either way, it’s over. So, this semester is done.

Before the semester ended, I made a few decisions. I was not going to take full time classes through the end of the year. This was my original plan. I’d have an Associate of Arts by the end of the year if I did. It would look really great to achieve that much! But that’s for students who have part time jobs or even no jobs at all. I can’t justify the sacrifice of life and sanity to get a degree that doesn’t actually achieve anything for me. I won’t get a raise or promotion because I have an associate’s degree, particularly in arts! That’s just not what IT departments are looking for, I’m pretty sure. So I dropped three of my classes for summer term and registered only for two classes in the fall. I’ll probably need to do classes next spring and summer, too, just to make sure I get all the classes I need for my degree, but with every semester, I’ll be getting a little closer. And, since I wouldn’t be pushing myself so hard, I’ll retain my sanity. That’s always a positive, I think.

In the last week, I decided to read one of the books that I go to when I want some comfort. It took me about one day to read through it, so then I picked up one of the books I brought in and sat up on the shelf on my desk before the semester started, when I thought I would still have time to read now and then. (That didn’t so much happen. They’re all a little dusty at this point.) I finished that one the next day. That night, we went to Barnes & Noble, just because. I bought two books. I started that one the next day and finished it last night. Then I started on the other book I bought. I’m reading it today at work (Friday! Whoo!) with every intention of finishing it today, unless things get crazy and busy. I have two books on my shelf here at work and at least two at home that I haven’t read before. I’m predicting that I’m going to run out of new books to read before the new semester starts up.

What I’ve really discovered is that it’s amazing what you miss out on when you have to sacrifice self in a busy schedule like I was living. I lost track of myself, and I really bottled everything up, because I didn’t want anyone else to see how hard it was on me. Earlier this week, as I was driving home from work, I basically lost it on the way home. I started sobbing, and I couldn’t stop. I cried halfway home, then came home and cuddled Beethoven for as long as he would let me hold him. Then he deserted me. My kitties, for once, couldn’t seem to tell that I needed them. So I took a nap. And when I woke up, I still felt off, but better. We went to the bookstore that night, and I started to feel more alive than I’ve felt in four months. I was reliving interests that I’ve had to put aside, not only for lack of time but also for lack of money. (We’ve been pretty ruthless with ourselves, and there just wasn’t money to buy books or many other fun things in past months.) We got coffee and meandered through the bookstore. I remembered what it feels like to find so many books that are begging to be taken home and to have to practice the self-denial which usually still involves buying two or three books. (I only got two! I was so proud of myself!) It felt like a piece of myself came back to me.

Now I’m reading voraciously, and thinking about imaginary characters in imaginary places and disappearing into their worlds for a little while. And then when I come back to real life,  I feel more alive again, like it’s easier to handle again. I’ve missed books. I didn’t realize how much I missed being able to read because I wanted to read, not because I needed to for a class. And it feels like, with the re-introduction of reading to my daily schedule, I have regained a piece of myself that has been dormant for months. It feels wonderful. I’m hopeful that I can avoid a repeat of this mania at the end of every semester to follow.

Hello, me! I missed you!

The direction that we went seemed to be mostly uphill, which was tough on the way “out” – especially as we got to a hill that my phone tells me was a 6% grade. It was quite the venture to get up. We followed behind another couple, and though the woman had done spinning classes, after two attempts, she simply could not get up the hill on her bike. I only got about a quarter of the way up before I got off and walked it up. Johnathan made it all the way up, but his bike has more gears than mine has, so that probably helped. The way back was much less uphill, and I was able to coast a lot, which was really nice. All told, we went about five miles on Monday.

Yesterday we went out again. The temperatures had dropped, so it was chilly and windy (ah, springtime), but we decided to go out nevertheless. I put on a sweatshirt and my workout pants, and then ultimately borrowed a zip-up fleece jacket of Johnathan’s to wear over everything. Johnathan put on a hat, too (after some coercion), and his flip-top fingerless mitten-glove thingies, as well as a sweatshirt and long pants. We weren’t exactly bundled, but we were warm. We went to the part of the park that we had walked in on Saturday and went the other direction. This time, I was getting frustrated less than a mile into our ride. I had Johnathan adjust my handlebars down, and oh! What a difference! Then we just started going. We ended up riding all the way to the part of the park where we had started on Monday, which is apparently about four miles away. So we rested a little, then headed back for another four miles! We rode for eight miles when I wasn’t expecting to even get a total of three miles, given how I felt when we stopped to adjust my handlebars.

Something I’ve noticed about our rides is that if I let Johnathan set the pace, we’re more likely to go a sustainable pace. I want to go harder and faster, knowing full well that I can’t sustain such grueling speeds yet, so if he lets me set the pace, then I go harder than I should. He is able to slow me down some, which can be frustrating, but it means that we can ride for eight miles instead of five and, who knows, maybe nine or ten miles next week or the week after, I’m all for it. Someday we’ll be in shape enough to maintain a pace like that, but it’s unreasonable to think that we can do it now, just one week into it.

I’m stiff from yesterday’s ride, but not sore. It’s a good feeling. The weather is cold again today, but we’re planning to go out again anyway. I don’t know which park we’ll go to or how long or far we’ll ride, but we’re going out there and doing it. We’re planning to go out again tomorrow, too, and it’s supposed to be a little bit warmer. I love my shiny new bike!

This last weekend, instead of our usual inside exercise (Wii Fit or EA Active), we went outside. On Saturday, we went to one of the metroparks and walked for about three miles. Well, Johnathan did. I waited too long between meals and started to crash, so only made it to about 2.5 miles. Even so, that’s a sizable walk for people who had to sit down every so often at Disney just because they weren’t used to walking. It was a nice walk, too; a little blustery and drippy at one point, but none of that was unexpected. Johnathan took his camera, and he got some nice pictures of the water and of a puppy that was out with his family having a picnic.

Sunday, we decided to go out for lunch, and then afterward, “do something.” Something turned into buying bicycles. Since Sunday was a holiday, we probably didn’t have the most options that we might have had on any other day, but darn it, we wanted to go for a bike ride! The first store we went to was Wal-Mart, which was fairly picked over as far as adult bike selection. We decided then to go to the Sears in the mall. Apparently they don’t sell bicycles. Dick’s was closed, so that wasn’t an option. We went to the Wal-Mart at the Steelyard. They had a reasonable selection, if incredibly messy and hard to get through. However, the bike that Johnathan wanted had a damaged seat. Nobody wants to buy damaged goods, but it was pretty much exactly what he wanted, and we were willing to buy a new seat if they were willing to work with us on price to accommodate the need to buy the new seat. They were willing to take $3 off. Of a $150 bike. Well, how generous. Not only did only one person have access to their additional stock of bikes (and of course he wasn’t at work), but then they were unwilling to work with us at all. They also waited quite a while to address the issue, so we did what we hate to do: we left our stuff in an aisle and walked out. Nobody deserves to receive such poor service as we did at that store. We decided we would try one more store, and if we didn’t find anything at that one or had a similar experience, we would just try another day at a non-Wal-Mart store with bicycles. We drove out to the Avon store, which was cleaner than the one at Steelyard anyway. We found a good stock of bikes, and there was someone there willing to help me out when I couldn’t get a bike off the rack or back onto it when I decided it wasn’t the one I wanted. (Ultimately, I got that one, but I got it back off myself the second time.) I got a helmet, and we bought a bike pump and a tool to help us adjust the seats and handlebars. Johnathan found one he liked, too. It was painless! The manager was delightfully helpful, as was the worker on the other side of the aisle. He stopped his work repeatedly to assist us, and answered all of our questions, even going out of his way to let us know to double-check the price of the helmet, just in case he hadn’t gotten them all in order yet. It was a night and day experience with the Steelyard store. We’ve decided never to go to that store again unless we absolutely have no other options and really, really need something.

After our actually delightful experience getting our bikes, we put together our new bike rack and mounted it on the car, then headed to a park in Elyria. We spent a while getting our bikes adjusted. It’s been a while since I rode a bike, so I was a bit shaky at first, and it took a few more adjustments before we really were comfortable with our bikes. The trail in Elyria is just over 2.5 miles long – maybe closer to 2.75 miles. It is pretty scenic, and I bet it looks lovely in late spring and in summer, when the trees have leaves on them.

We had a few technical difficulties with our brand new bikes as we started our ride. My bike seat was loose and we had no tool that would tighten it – they were all the wrong size. So every now and then, my seat would just decide to move! This made it an interesting ride. At one point, my handlebars came loose, too, so I was grappling with a loose seat, only to have my wheel not turn when my handlebars did. We got the handlebars sorted out, though. Johnathan’s bike did much better on our first ride, especially once he figured out how to adjust the angle of the bars.

The bikes didn’t fall apart, so that’s a good sign. I didn’t fall apart, either, though I felt, at some points, like I would keel over and die. I’m really, really out of shape. Johnathan is in better shape than I am, as is evidenced by the fact that he ended up waiting for me sometimes while I needed to sit. My seat is maybe too hard and too narrow for my behind, too, because my butt is incredibly sore today. Not a fun feeling! I think I will get used to it, though, as we go out and ride more. I drove myself in to delightful exhaustion on our relatively short bike ride yesterday. I look forward to doing it again soon, perhaps one evening this week. (After my butt has recovered and we get a new seat for my bike, of course.) We discussed some other parks where we could ride, and I’m quite looking forward to it. It’s lovely to feel the wind in my face as I race down the path, and it’s beautiful outside lately. Not to mention, it’s great exercise. I felt it in places that the Wii Fit exercises just don’t usually get me.

I’m looking forward to the next few months as Johnathan and I trek all over the place with our bikes and his camera. It will be nice to be outside, and it will be especially nice to be outside for our exercise. That kind of exercise is so much less tedious than the inside kind, so that it almost doesn’t feel like work at all, despite getting winded. I think we will finally enjoy the local parks for the beautiful gems that they are, as well as venturing to parts of the area that we have previously talked about exploring, but never got around to going.

Spring has never necessarily been my favorite season. In Portland, it’s a lot like winter, but a little bit warmer and with more flowers. Cleveland gets a true winter, complete with snow, ice, and bare trees, so spring time really is like a new awakening. I can finally appreciate why people love spring so much. It isn’t about the pastels and Easter eggs and cutesy flowers and rabbits – it’s about the beauty of coming out of the bare and gray winter into a shiny, new springtime with new growth. Spring still isn’t my favorite season (I still love autumn above all), but I think I’ve learned to appreciate it more than I ever had before.

It’s springtime in Northeast Ohio, and I plan to take full advantage of it.

At 7:30, it was time for open lap swim. It wasn’t a very busy lap swim, for which I was very grateful, because it meant that Johnathan and I got our own lane. It’s been a while since I swam on a regular basis, so I admit to having some difficulty at the start. I had no rhythm, so I kept trying to inhale water. Trying to inhale while your face is in the water is just not a good idea no matter how you look at it. After a few lengths, I got a little better, and then it was like my muscles had a revelation. “I know how to do this!” Everything clicked. My rhythm came back and with it came some speed. The endorphines kicked in and I was ready to go for another hour or more.

Unfortunately, Johnathan didn’t fare quite as well. He’s never been much of a swimmer, and he therefore hasn’t got the practiced technique or the muscle memory for it. After about twenty minutes, he was feeling pretty sick. I think the combination of the chlorine, the poor lunch he had, and the unfamiliary athletic activity made it rough on him. I have faith that it will get better after a few times, though. Right now, though, he’s really sore. He woke up telling me that every muscle he has is sore. I feel pretty good, with only minor aches in my thighs, stomach and arms, but poor Johnathan… I remember daily doubles, when I felt like I was going to fall apart. I can just imagine how he feels, even with a relatively light workout as far as swimming workouts go.

I’m really looking forward to going back. We’re planning to get a three-month pass, and we’re planning to develop a regular weekly schedule so that we actually have physical activity in the wintertime. I’m really pleased about that. This is going to do us both a lot of good, and I know that my stress level will benefit from the exercise. We’re just started, and I’m really excited to continue. I’ve missed swimming. I didn’t realize until yesterday just how much.