The Beginning

I actually didn’t begin my running career until the tender age of forty six. The dates are cloudy but I suspect that it was nearly six years after I’d abandoned my three pack a day habit, two years after I’d added thirty pounds to my midsection and lost of any kind of self esteem, disgusted with myself every time I passed a parked car or a storefront, always looking, always with disdain for what I had become.
There was a small gym not far from work, one built into an old, whitewashed, wooden, one story building. It seemed unthreatening but still a bit intimidating for a novice like myself, one who was not entirely proud of his current situation. I didn’t sign up that first day, venturing in after a wager with a friend who told me I would never take the initiative. It was three more days before I paid my thirty two dollars and scheduled my very first training session.
I wore my street clothes for the first couple of weeks, debating the longevity of this new routine, wondering if I had the determination and the stamina to fulfill this lifelong commitment.
I was still living with my wife and kids at the time but kept my new endeavor to myself, knowing that she would never accept any sort of deviation from what she considered to be “normal” behavior. Oddly enough, while dieting as well during this time she repeated over and over that what I really needed was exercise, condemning any attempt I made at weight loss. After four months and much derision, I finally admitted to her that I had joined a gym and that I was, in fact, working out almost every day in an effort to regain what was given to me at birth. She immediately leapt into one of her tirades, condemning the act and begging me to give up my membership, I’ll never understand..
I stopped in every morning at six, before my hour and a half drive to the new job, the one that was rapidly deteriorating; causing more aggravation than I thought was possible. I think it might have been the only thing that kept me alive during that year. I didn’t run in the beginning, I walked, walked on the treadmill and made use of the elliptical, never thinking that running was in my future, being told after my discs went out that running was actually out of the question, that the best I could do was stick to the recumbent bike, maybe that’s what inspired me.
It began simply as walking at a somewhat more brisk pace, occasionally breaking out into a jog until eventually I could string together a couple of miles.
It was another year and a series of back strengthening exercises and the graduation to a larger facility, having taken off twenty five of the thirty, no longer ashamed, no longer intimidated by the guys who appeared to be made out of brightly illustrated inner tubes.
There was a sign on the glass door, a two mile run in town before the St. Patrick’s Day parade. I thought I might try it, gradually adding longer runs to my workouts. I had a month to prepare.