I Signed Up For What?

I’m getting kind of nervous.

This is because a few months ago I did something incredibly rash, without putting much thought whatsoever into just what I was committing to.

I blame it all on Christmas, or, more specifically, Christmas cookies. You know how it is: You swear to yourself that during the upcoming holiday season things will be different, and you’ll control the amount of junk food you eat. However, despite your good intentions, your resolve immediately disintegrates and you end up eating just as terribly as you always do, or maybe even worse. (The closest thing to a vegetable you consume in the second half of December is a cookie that has green frosting and/or sprinkles.) This leaves you a bloated mess when January rolls around, which is the perfect time to ignore your New Year’s resolution to get into shape and instead focus on seeing how long you can stay inert on the couch.

That’s what happened to me last Christmas, which is not unusual. What is unusual is that in February I usually get serious about getting back into some semblance of shape, but this year, for some reason, I didn’t. Soon it was mid-March, and I realized that I had to do something quick, or else I’d have to update my wardrobe to include pants the size of two-man tents

 So I signed up for a half-marathon. The day was March 19th, and at the time the snow was still piled up everywhere. May 14th, the day of the race, seemed like a long, long way away.

But now it’s almost here, and I’m getting nervous.

It’s not because I haven’t trained, mind you, because I have. In fact, signing up turned out to be a great idea, as it busted me out of my lethargy, which was causing me to rival Garfield himself in terms of food consumption, and motivated me to exercise enough so that I no longer have to worry about the button on my pants popping off due to increased belly-pressure and taking out somebody’s eye.

Yet now I have to run the actual race, and I’m no runner.

I envision the race to consist of a bunch of hard-core fanatics with subscriptions to Runner’s World, all smiling smugly and using running terminology such as “splits”, “gentle pickups”, and “speed-work”. They will all have high-tech running shoes and space-age clothing and know all about the benefits of proper stretching. They will be hoping to improve on their previous half-marathon times or warming themselves up for a full marathon. (I reallize that this is a vague, possibly demeaning, generalization of runners. However, I'm sort of intimidated at the moment by them, and this is what I can't help but picture.)

Then there’s me. I don’t use running terminology, unless “my dogs are barking” counts, and my only goal of the race is to not throw up.

So it’s going to be interesting. How will I handle being put into a situation that's like nothing I have ever encountered? Will I wilt before the pressure, or will I rise to the occasion? The day will be memorable, but what kind of memories will be made? Will they be memories that I’ll be happy to have, or memories that I’ll wish I could forget? The tension is nothing if not thick.

So, if you’re in the Maple Grove area on Saturday, feel free to stop on by to cheer or heckle. I’ll be the guy who’s wheezing a lot and cursing the March 19th version of himself for getting me into this situation in the first place. I’ll try not to throw up on you, but I can’t promise anything.