Jim Morrison Would Be Proud

You know, the day destroys the night.

The night divides the day.

Try to run, try to hide.

Break on through to the other side.

Break on through to the other side!

The Doors "Break on Through"

For some reason, and I can't say why, recently Morrison-twanging lyrics from The Doors have been running through my head. I have no idea why this is occuring. Could it be that Jim Morrison's spirit has visited me every night in an attempt for me to promote a really big rock-n-roll show? Is it the fact that my homage-poster/shrine to the fallen poet-cum-pop star is now complete with an original lock of each band member's hair? Or is it perhaps the new tattoo that I recently obtained on my chest of the L.A. Woman album cover?

No, it is none of these things, because those are all lies.

However, it might be because on Friday, when I mounted up on the treadmill, everything in my body functioned properly and without pain. Better than that, it functioned as The Flying Spaghettie Monster originally intended. Even better still was the fact that two weeks ago, I could barely clean 2 miles in my 35 minutes workout. But last Friday, I cleaned 3.25 miles without nearly the same exhaustion and paramedic-calling that previously occured.

Yeah, sure, I'm not the Olympic hopeful that I might once have been, but I'm bringing my negative-splits back down to where I can actually run with my head held high. This is also a good thing because running with your head down will guarentee a sudden and unexpected end to your daily run with a tree, lampost or Mack truck.

Boy was that driver surprised.

But I'm not plugging my gym for this because, for me, fitness just is. I haven't seen anything in any of the many gyms I've belonged to, to indicate that the pressence of equipment, trainers or even monthly fees/dues/membership-priviledge-tokens induces anyone to work harder.

The opposite is also true.

Lack of such does not a fat, slob, twelve-sandwich eating, couch-potato make. For example, I read a blog, every now and then, called Fat Girl to Triathlete. Reading through, though, I can't recall ever seeing her mention a particular health club that she has attested her new, trim, sensual-self to. Her trick? Her secret to a slimmer, younger-looking you?

Ok, come close.

No, no, closer.

Here it is: She reduced caloric intake. Right, got that? And, ok, she increased caloric output.

No, seriously. That's what it is. She tracks her intake and exercises. It's a pain, I understand, but there it is.

Now, I've never been fat, and I'm not likely to become the traditional sense of the term "fat". In part, this is because my damaged body won't let me. My metabolism has remained at a constant Furnace of Hell calorie-buring level, and even if I eat less, because I'm full faster, I would actually have to work at it, Homer Simpson-style, to achieve any size of any proportion that would begin to label me as "fat". So, to that end, I can't really empathize with folk who have a lower metabolism or who's bodies naturally store fat better than mine.

On any given pioneer trail, I would have died first, quickly and not had anything worthwhile to throw in the pot for the others.

But I can certainly share in that triumphant moment when a traitorous body acquiesces to the demands of a mind that no longer wants to be out of shape.