6/14/2011 - the relationship I have with 24 Hour Fitness. . .

On the mornings I don't make it to the gym, I would spend the rest of the day trying to get there.  I rarely do, but the intention haunts me all day.  The relationship I have with 24 Hour Fitness is dysfunctional, I know it, as I depend on and dread it at the same time.

If I choose to sleep in (which, in itself, is an absurd concept to begin with, thinking I have a choice to leave my warm bed before the sun rises), I would almost immediately begin contingency planning, sometimes while I'm still in bed and floating between waking and non-waking: I could go at lunch instead, but then what about the blog, which I have taken to working on during my lunch hour?  Maybe mid-morning and stay at work later, but I have meetings scheduled.  Late afternoon, but I'll have food coma.  After work and it'd be too crowded.  So when??

I'd work all day with my gym absence looming heavily in my thoughts, go home, and feel lousy, even unmotivated to eat since I didn't work out that day; how will all that food turn me into the muscle-bound jock I've always wanted (and likely doomed to always want) to be if I didn't work out.

Every day, this struggle, and I hate it; how unnecessary it all is.  But I also need it, depend on the gym to make me see myself as someone other than that awkward boy in school, the clumsy kid in P.E. holding the bat at home plate while the opposing team's captain calls out to his players in the outfield, "Come closer!  Austin's up."  Whether the gym provides any physical benefits, I can't say for certain.  I still lift the same amount of weights as I've ever lifted.  I still get winded chasing after Grr up the Bernal hill.  I still can't throw a ball with convincing trajectory, as Sam made me demonstrate this weekend at the dog park. 

But on the days when I do go to the gym, even if I have to fight the call of sleep and struggle through the workout itself, I stand taller, hold my head up higher.  Not that I skulk around slumped over or anything, but with the onus of the gym off my shoulders, I feel more confident in holding them back and attuning the body I want with the one I inhabit.  I focus better and go home confident that I spent every moment more wisely.

Kind of like today.