Fitness Isn't Pretty

I studiously avoid mirrors when I exercise.  I'm not pretty.  I make faces and get sweaty and gross and smell bad.  I notice my mighty bat-wings and how much my stomach sticks out.  If I forget my headband, my hair goes all Helena Bonham Carter on me.  Nothing I do looks all lovely and demure.

This morning I hit the fitness room at my hotel and quickly realized the small stuffy room with the rickety equipment was not a happy place.  SO, I handed my stuff over to the guy at the front desk and asked him to watch my phone, inhaler, keys and newspaper because I was going out to run.

He looked really surprised and said, "Outside?"  I nodded.  He said, still rather slowly, "Okay.  Have fun."

I stay here a lot so I know this neighborhood has more strip clubs than tea rooms.  Still, it's 5:30 AM, I'm over 6ft tall and surrounded by angels.  No one messes with me.

So, off I went, down 44th st, over to Van Buren, thinking about pancakes as I passed Bill Johnson's Big Apple.  I zigged through parking lots and zagged around cars.  My ipod played all the good songs, with the volume kept low in case there was anything I needed to hear approaching. (I'm well-protected, not stupid...)

It was cold.  I left my hoodie in Flagstaff (why on earth would I need it in Phoenix of all places?? Because now they are going through a cold spell that's why!) and my hands were numb as I moved from walking to running.

And I ran.

It was like there was all this extra oxygen just lying around.  I had completely spaced taking any asthma medication, and it didn't matter.  I ran.  Up streets, down sidewalks, walking across streets, running the long sides.  I felt like I could do this forever.

I glanced at the time and realized I needed to to get back and cleaned up to face my work day.  I ran twice around the hotel parking lot just because I wasn't QUITE ready to stop. 

As I ran inside, sweaty and gross and glowing, the clerk looked up and smiled at me and asked, "Have a good run?"  I grinned and nodded and he smiled even bigger and said, "It's good to sweat, isn't it?"

So, he knew.  It was a shared moment.

Because fitness isn't pretty.  It's beautiful.