Prologue

I decided I'd give myself a birthday present.
This is the culmination of many factors.
I've always wanted to.
And so the plan came together.

I've always held a watered down disdain for runners, solely for the fact that I couldn't imagine what they were getting out of running. Running? Really? My feelings could be summed up in a single line from Back to the Future III, spoken by an incredulous drunk native of the 1800's, upon hearing Doc's rambling description of the future. "People run? For fun?"

I've always been a chubby kid. I don't know if I'd say fat, but I remember I got to a certain age and noticed that I was bit more rolly and polly than average. My pants were always called "husky." I had tits. Then came gym class: changing in front of my peers, followed by swimming: no way to hide.

My favorite personal indignity: Boy Scout camp. The showers were a concrete pad, surrounded by walls, cold water only. And like many bathroom sinks they had to be held on. Being homophobic shy young men we avoided to shower and I think at a certain point we were forced to go. Why else would we have all gone together?

The unspoken agreement was everyone showered without removing their underwear. This is how I found everyone my age wore boxers. Everyone except me in white. Tight. Briefs.

That wasn't bad compared to what came from the mouth of a young man who had a learning disorder, the kind of which led him to say whatever observation came to mind, much in the manner of Ralph Wiggum's classic "my cat's breath smells like cat food." We were all soaped and showering, doing our best to avoid eye contact and conversation, when he turned to me and said, almost joyfully, "you look like a sumo wrestler."

Some months ago I'd read an article espousing the benefits of "barefoot" running. I use quotes because it was really about shoes that protect the foot from rocks and such while being as thin as possible to mimic the feel of running barefoot. Apparently thicker sole running shoes are designed to minimize heel impact through padding, though their shape necessitates running on your heels. This, they say, is the cause of many running injuries. The alternative would be to run more "naturally" by taking away heel padding to make it painful to strike hard on the heel. Just like running barefoot.

I'm a very skeptical person, and I don't buy into anything new-age-y easily, frequently, or much at all. I was surprised at how much sense this article made to me, and how much I wanted those shoes just to walk around in. I love walking barefoot, I just hate cuts and broken glass and being thrown out of pretty much any commercial establishment (1) (I've grown fond of service(2)).

I forwarded the article to my friend Tyr who I knew would enjoy it, and that evening he'd purchased a pair. Soon after The Blue Zipper sent me a similar, if not the same article (I can't remember), which I thought was aneat coincidence. Then, some weeks later an author, Christopher McDougall, was on the Daily Show. In the roughest of summaries by memory: he'd been studying an ancient people in Mexico who, when the rest stayed to fight the Conquistadors, fled to safety. They live in the middle of bf nowhere but are now being threatened by drug lords, those sons a bitches. Well, what's notable about these people is that they run a lot, and they're super happy, and they don't have cancer or suicide, nor do they have knee or other running related problems. Also, they may or may not fart rainbows. Why? Because they run barefoot.

Now that's not very scientific, but in lieu of some new-age conspiracy afoot (he he) to plant a bunch of articles and books and such to promote the same product at the same time, I took it as further confirmation and pined again for those shoes. "It's a shame I don't run" I thought.

Also, shame they're so ugly.

At one point in my life, I was in relatively good shape. On and off through the years I've done weightlifting routines. Then, one summer I worked as a "meter exchange ... something", and in the summer months I'd hoof it around changing electric meters while wearing long pants, a t-shirt, a thick long sleeve fire retardant shirt, and pounds of tools. The dude training me was a bit of a, uh, dumbass, and when he went on about how much weight he'd lost and how much I'd loose doing the job I just blew it off as bull.

Three months later I was down from 215 pounds to 180. This was still overweight according to that BMI thingymaboob, but it was good. I could wear a large t-shirt and not feel self conscious. It was the first time since that adolescent doubt first began that I started to feel good about how I looked.

I stayed around that weight for a good few years. Then college ended, unemployment and a 4 hour block of Star Trek on Spike TV set in(3). Somewhere along the way I also learned to cook for myself, which has presented a challenge at times. Fast forward to now. I'm around 225. My pant size has gone from 34 to 38 or 40 (depending on stretchability), and I'm pretty self conscious about my gut. I look like a sausage in a large t-shirt, and I have a lot of cool shirts that don't get any love anymore. Hell, there are two I bought that I love and I've never worn them.

I want to wear them.

Then, a few weeks ago, walking side by side with my lady, I had a moment. I thought, in that moment, (though I was listening to everything you said D. Mistress, I swear), I want to run. It was a calm, serene feeling. I'm gonna do it. I thought.

I found this Couch to 5k program which is scheduled over an 9 week period, and I figured hey, if I start in mid September, I could be ready to run a 5k by my birthday. What a cool birthday present that would be, huh? Start feeling better, start losing some weight, stop feeling like a fancy sausage.

So I bought the shoes.
And I printed out the program.
And I dug my sweats out from the closet.
And I dug my larger pair of sweats out from the closet.
And I set up the cool heart rate monitoring watch I got from woot.com for twenty bucks yeah!
And I opened up the door
and I set off into the sunrise.




(1) This hasn't really happened.
(2) Services and goods.
(3) ...it was worth it.