I Could Live on Endorphins and Outfits
I don’t know if other bloggers ever feel this way, but I go through cycles where I feel burned out and I can’t think of anything about my life I could possibly write that would be interesting or entertaining. I can go weeks where it’s like pulling teeth to come up with topics. Then, magically, I’ll blip back into the mode where I have an opinion I want to share about everything I do.
What can I say? Some of us are calm and even tempered and some of us are more up and down. I’ve never been accused of being even tempered.
My point is, I’m back to feeling opinionated this week! It might have something to do with the endorphins. I did a lot of The Exercising this weekend. I took my favorite ballet class Saturday morning and then on Sunday I ran 4 miles and went back to the studio for an hour of Ballet Boxing class. Then I went home and felt like a superhero except when I tried to stand or move or do anything but lie on the couch and watch rom-coms from the 1990s.
But I digress. I am currently enjoying many things about The Exercising. Which, a year or so ago, are words you probably would have only heard me say while role playing ‘Sexy Swedish Gym Bunny and Manly Trainer Guy’ with my husband. (Just kidding. We only role-play ‘Guy Snoring on the Couch and Wife Watching Teen Mom While Wearing a Snuggie’. Sometimes we switch parts just to spice things up.)
Besides the endorphins, I have to say, I’m totally getting into the outfits involved in The Exercising. It’s apparently not just about the sweating. There’s like a whole cute/functional clothing language I’m learning.
With ballet, beyond the tutus and ballet shoes (which are, admittedly, awesome), it’s all about layers. When you get to class you start in sweat pants and a sweater. Then you do plies and warm up enough to peel down to legwarmers, tights. After tendus you’re starting to sweat and you can lose the sweater. Finally, by the time you’re finished with the barre work and ready to come out to center and work on an adagio you’ve peeled off the legwarmers and you’re down to a leotard and tights. It’s like you’re an Oscar host and you get four costume changes. Or it’s like a really long strip tease with no real payoff at the end and the strippers all wearing their hair in buns.
I really like the ballet layering thing because I have a very small comfort window as far as temperature goes. I’m usually cold, but about 7 minutes into any kind of physical exertion I get tomato-faced and overheated. I find it super useful to just peel off a tiny bit of clothes every time my body temp rises by a degree. Plus layers are just kind of adorable, right? I tried to work this concept into my regular attire this weekend after class by layering over-the-knee socks on top of skinny jeans with calf-height boots and two thin shirts of different colors and shapes and a sweater on top, but when I came downstairs Jason looked me up and down and shook his head. I believe the words he uttered were, “You’re so weird.” I’m not sure that was an endorsement. So that’s still a concept in progress. I haven’t given it up yet. I might just need to do some shopping.
The thing I’m not enjoying about The Exercising is this whole ‘being injured’ nonsense. It’s kind of counter-intuitive for The Exercising to make you feel so awesome it’s like you can accomplish anything, but then when you move forward on that premise and actually try to run farther and faster your body breaks itself and hurts a lot. Who invented this shit anyway? I would like to speak to a manager about how this whole process could be improved. Is there a suggestion box I can put my paper that says, Stop hurting, Stupid Body, into?
Luckily, my current injury (some lame IT band thing) seems to be fairly minor. Plus, since I got my medical degree through Google, I’ve managed to diagnose it and treat it myself with stretching and several hundred dollars spent at the running store (none of which went to adorable outfits, sadly). I’m still planning to be ready to run the RAGNAR Del Sol in a month. (Don’t worry if you don’t know what that is; I’m sure I’ll be discussing it at length as we get closer to it.)
In conclusion and to sum it all up:
The Exercise, Endorphins, Outfits = Good.
My body refusing to live up to the awesomeness of my head = Lame, but we’re working on it.