Field Day

Do you remember Field Day at school?  The time of year to get out of the classroom and onto the athletic field - time to shake out the cobwebs - time to run around and get the blood flowing through your veins again after a long winter hibernation - time to prove your physical prowess by participating in such things as relay races, potato sack races, three-legged races, long jump, shot-put, etc.?

I hated Field Day.

That shouldn't come as a big surprise to anyone that really knows me.  After all, the term "athletic" was never an adjective used to describe me.  "Book nerd" was more like it.

But, every spring I'd find myself out there on the field.  Dreading whatever show of physical strength, dexterity or prowess was coming next.  I'd suffer from so much anxiety about running a short relay race that if I didn't have my inhaler at the ready, I could anxiety myself right into a full on asthma attack in about a half hour.

It was a great excuse to get out of Field Day.

But here's the thing.  All that getting out of Field Day set me up for an adulthood devoid of much physical activity.  Given a choice between going for a walk or curling up and reading a book, well, the book won every time.  Choose between a nice skate on a winter day or a mug of steaming hot chocolate?  Where's the whip cream?

So, it was with a TON of dread that I signed up for Fitness Bootcamp a couple of weeks ago.  I've been hitting the gym five days a week for the last 9 months and all I can say is, my fitness regime had become BO - RING.  I needed to shake it up and when a colleague suggested I join her at Fitness Bootcamp, I signed up in a snap.

Okay, that last part isn't true.  I bitched and moaned and whined about it.  The last time I'd done a Fitness Bootcamp I was living in Vancouver, I was about 40 lbs heavier than I am now and at the very first class I tore my achilles tendon and pissed away $300.  I wasn't really sure I wanted to repeat that.

But, here's the thing.  I decided I could continue to do what I've always done on the fitness front, and I could continue to tone muscles and drop weight at my steady 8-ounces per week rate, or I could ramp it up a notch and get over my high anxieties about group fitness classes and my poor old achilles tendon and I could sign up.

So I did.

I've endured two classes so far.  In a lot of ways it's just like Field Day was back in Junior High School. We're still competing with each other, but this time, it's not about reward & recognition, it's about feeling better.  We still run around a field.  Sometimes in the rain.  We still push the limits of our physical abilities.  We still do squats, lunges push-ups and those nasty things called burpees.

And guess what?

I LOVE it!

Believe me.  No one is more surprised than I am.

I don't know but I've been told...
This is how we don't get old...
March!  Two, three, four