In Which I Deliver Some Exposition

There are several directions I've considered taking the blog in today. For now, let's start with some updates on progress. I was able to get most things squared away with the gym, so tomorrow I should be clear to move my home gym to the one a couple minutes away as opposed to the one that's a half hour drive from my current residence. I've been going on some short walks lately, which has been some progress too. I haven't been able to go too far on my walks, as I've been driving the motorcycle recently and it turns out it's a bit difficult to hike too far when you're wearing over-pants and boots. The motorcycle was another recent change, it's been a lovely vehicle, and I've enjoyed its addition to my life immensely. It's a little cream and crimson colored bit, with a bit of a retro vibe going on. Let me tell you, I get all the senior babes with her. Seriously, I've had multiple silver-haired ladies come up to me and tell me how much they love the bike. Turns out my taste in style lines up pretty well with Gertrude from the local bridge club. I'll include a picture of it as the image for today's blog post. If I'm lazy and just use the picture I already have on my phone (and chances are I will) there will be a bit of what I promise is water under the bike. Rest assured, it is not spewing its guts onto the asphalt.

Progress toward getting back to the gym, progress on walking regularly, and progress on getting outside more often. All in all, things are going nicely. I know that for a fitness blog I spend an inordinate amount of time talking about everything but fitness. That is by design. If you'll recall, I started this blog with the intent to reach out to people who are starting from the bottom of the fitness totem pole. People like me don't hop out of bed, snap our spandex shorts on, drop fifty pushups and film our crossfit routine for our TicTok followers. Instead, we groan at our second alarm to shut up, we ooze off the bed and drag our gelatinous selves through the day. Occasionally, we participate in an annual ritual where we tell ourselves we're going to make ourselves a shape that will not inspire composers to add an eighth planet to Holst's work. This tends to fall flat on its face. My current working theory as to why this happens is that fitness has a lot to do with what's going on in your everyday life.

See, I used to be what I would consider pretty fit my sophomore year of university. Then the fire nation attacked. I kid, I kid. In brief, I went through a physical, emotional, and spiritual crisis. I got a severe concussion (long story), I had some things go on in my dating life that were rough, and I was unsure about my beliefs. I was trying to muscle through the semester and keep going when I had the sudden realization that I didn't have to. All my life I'd been doing things because I considered it my duty to do so, and now I was faced with the idea that I didn't have to. So I didn't. I dropped out of school, stopped going to church, stopped doing anything, really. All those years of doing things because other people told me I should and now I was left in my early twenties with the realization that I had no clue what I actually liked or wanted to do. I've spent the last seven years or so trying to figure that out. I have a much better idea now of what I want to spend my life doing, and I'm working toward achieving that. There you go, the exposition to my tale here on the blog.

This post has meandered all over the place, and I apologize for that. The point of this all is, if you're struggling with getting in shape, chances are you have a lot of other luggage in your life you need to figure out. If you only focus on the fitness, you probably aren't going to succeed. You have to clean house if you want to paint the walls.