a jog HOP , SKIPAND

I am the right type of person for running as I own a pair of sneakers, belong to a class of bipedal organisms, and say things like, “I can’t do a chin-up because I prefer cardio.” Also, my natural state of movement is akin to a speed walking 1980s businesswoman — elbows up, emphatic stride, power skirt and sports socks — so it’s only a hop-step more to turn that into a light jog.

I have a habit of becoming a springtime runner because the calendar gives me an unproven surge of hope that I will soon look unbelievable in a bathing suit. By July I have given up on the beach-ish body and moved onto creating good workout habits. This is followed by a fall that’s both a season and a description for how easily I justify the lack of time for exercise as soon as schedules get busy. Then comes winter, and by mid-January I realize I’m winded from walking up the stairs to my o ce and strongly considering buying maternity pants “for the stretch.”

Running has always been a two-part activity for me. Part one is all about preparation: finding the exact right mix of beat-thumping songs, drinking a big glass of water, and then running about 200 steps before pausing in order to go to the bathroom.

Once I’ve done my part one business, part two can begin in earnest. Part two starts with nding an entirely di erent set of beat-thumping songs, making a half-hearted attempt at stretching (so that my muscles aren’t sti a er my part one “run”), and then actually running.

We used to live in the country. Out there I’d lace up my sneakers and Velcro on my cell phone armband and make a big show about going for a jog. Our old house was surrounded by one-mile sections of farmland, so a typical run for me would consist of jogging up and back one side of the section. That road only saw a handful of cars a day, so those runs were just me and the wind; which was good, because it really tested the strength of my husband’s love when I returned home all red-faced, jiggly and sweaty from the equivalent of a warm-up.

We moved into town last July. One of the reasons I justified the move was so that I could get a membership to a gym (Orange Theory), the latest “hot mom” thing, and be t all year round, and not just when the weather was cooperating. You may be thinking, “But I live in the country and I have a gym membership.” As a long-time su erer from “every excuse in the book,” I struggled making regular use of the gym because of my inability to wake before 6:30 a.m. unless the roof was being ripped off the house or a baby was crying — meaning that I didn’t have an extra 40 minutes to spare in the morning to get to and from the gym (20-minute drive each way) and still get the kids to school and myself to work on time.

By September I still hadn’t gotten that gym membership, so I told my husband, Kyle, that I “needed indoor space so that I could clear away every possible excuse I could muster and nally work o the thousands of pounds of Hanukkah latkes I’ve been carrying around once and for all. Kyle says yes to everything and so he agreed, and it was some rubber ooring and the absolute cheapest treadmill available on the Internet later that I had a windowless bunker in the basement designated as “the exercise room.”

Now I run, using my crappy treadmill (seriously, Fred Flintstone had a higher-quality rig; the rst time Kyle saw me using it he asked, “Are treadmills supposed to shake like that?”) whenever the mood, and the need to shower, strikes me. Kyle also hung an old TV in the exercise room, so sometimes I work out when I want to watch an episode of “Velvet” without anyone bothering me. As of this moment, my rate of both exercise and self-congratulations are up 100%. My two-piece bathing suit purchases (and returns) are also up 100%. Baby steps.

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WORDS : ALICIA UNDERLEE NELSON

PHOTOGRAPHY : M. SCHLEIF PHOTOGRAPHY

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