Do Over Over Do

I once knew a woman I worked with who had marriage problems, or so she said, and that she needed to run them off. I ran with her for a time but her abnormal diligence while running, made me doubt the benefits of pounding my runners on the pavement while beside me automobiles pumped out their fumes that I had to breathe in. After all, I had a good marriage. What was I doing here? It was all about friendship, I worried. My final excuse for quitting was a broken toe as a result of running down the beach to a beer and hot dog roast and falling over a log.  Not only did this unfortunate woman run before work every day, she went to the gym every day of the week except weekends. How this addiction would clear away her stress seemed to me, a false notion. Her generous shape did not change and the marriage struggled on and on regardless. Gyms, exercise classes and yogaism, remain mysteries to me. First of all, I am one of these tiresome people who refuse to be scheduled for long periods. Second of all, I am naturally lazy and third of all, I find more interesting things to do than reps, kilometers and plastic bottles of water. Driving past a gym window replete with lithesome bodies all running nowhere on treadmills and then having to go to work on yet another kind of  treadmill, is one of the saddest modern sights there is. My theory is what we do is what we are. Running is running away from something. I did try the gym once after a physio therapist remarked to me, why you don't even have shoulders, my dear! We must get you into my gym - at a discount, of course. I actually tried it and got my little plan for the machines and other metal bits.  I strapped myself into various contraptions and duly counted. The innocent looking big ball I attempted to sit on and flap my arms and legs about was the most challenging bit there. About it, I thought, wow I could do this at home but who would call the ambulance if I fell off. At least in the gym they had mats on the floor. It was fun for the first three visits but when I spotted, on the grimy floor, a cast aside piece of pizza, I resigned and headed for the nearest pizza parlour. I had worked up an appetite! I suppose addicts of the exercise crowd would argue that a "healthy body is a healthy mind". My answer is that if the adage is true, how come so many runners have knee problems? Or that weird yoga talk is boring? Or that body over-musculature is really not cute? Or that being skinny is actually starvation? Or that brains don't lift weights? Okay, so you take a look at my pudgy bits and nod wisely, eyebrows lifting. aha! Sorry, that won't get me to the gym either. I eat what I like when I like it. I might think of exercise but hate the schedules. My time is not taken up with beating my knees to death or sweating on a steel conglomeration or worrying about single figure dress sizes. I walk around and avoid doing it too fast; I want not to miss smelling the pines or hearing the bird song along the way. So far, no headaches, no stress, no calorie or step reps, no joint replacements as I approach serious old age. Both my dear grandmothers, one who lived to eighty-eight, the other to a couple of years after her one hundred mark,  didn't exercise a day in their lives. They didn't diet, drank sherry, never admitted to sweating, giggled constantly, loved life and had over eight children each. I intend to follow their example of a no stress: laugh it off, breathe deeply, walk in the park and read a lot lifestyle. As to the eight children? That's out dears; I'd never find a nanny.