The Rain Is Gone

Despite not having a particularly regular schedule, I've managed to fit a fair amount of exercise into my schedule here at college (not as much as when I was on a team in high school, but certainly more than this summer when I was unbelievably lazy). I've even flirted with thoughts of a "comeback" to road races and maybe even the track team in '09. At this rate though, that'll never happen because things keep coming up to prevent me from taking my training seriously.

The first is a classic: not enough time. Between classes, homework, trying to have a life, and the meager extracurriculars I've found, it's very hard to justify spending a lot of time on working out instead of hanging out. This is basically the problem I had last year. Wanting to be happy (that is to say superficially happy, the kind where you spend times with friends, laugh, etc) and running well are mutually exclusive (at least for me). Who would spend hours every day running, lifting, and suffering when they could be having fun?

Early this semester, which is to say during and right after orientation, my exercise featured yoga more than running because it was supposed to be geared towards rock climbing. At the time I was getting used to the idea of my running career being over (that feeling has since left) and was turning my attentions to outdoorsmanship, which I figured was more sustainable later in life (if I ever get old, which I don't plan on doing, I want to be one of those really tough guys who can still climb and backpack and shit). Frustration at my lack of climbing skill or conditioning, plus no stimulus from the outing club has moved climbing to the back burner.

After a week or two of good running, we get here. At this moment, I ought to be running but I really don't want to. This is partly due to the fact that today is simply a lazy day. More importantly though, I've fallen into the trap of fun sports. I've joined the cricket club (worth a post sometime in the future) and an IM soccer team. For those of you who don't know, intramural (or IM) sports are for people who aren't good at sports, like yours truly. But I take stuff, especially sports, seriously all the time. Plus, the team if my hall, which I'm feverishly loyal to. The end result; I practice for IM soccer almost everyday, as long as I can find someone to kick balls at my head. See, I'm goalkeeping for my team, something that I was very good at in 1st grade or so. Now, not so much. Anyways, even though I get pretty beat up in the process, soccer is way more fun than running (and accordingly way less helpful for my fitness), so I keep trying to justify not running with playing soccer. By the time soccer season is over, winter will be fast approaching and with it limited running opportunities and broomball (count on that taking tons of my time and energy).

You've now reached the end of this post. What you probably realize is that it lacks a point, a conclusion, or even a series of lyrics slipped in. I hope it at least has been pleasantly diverting, and left you hungrily anticipating future posts about goalkeeping, cricket, and broomball. Failing at that, at least your appreciation for decent prose has been increased.