Infomercial Dreams
When I can’t sleep I read or watch late night TV. There’s not a lot on TV late at night mostly reruns and old movies. Eventually I fall asleep with the TV on and somewhere around 3:00am normal programming is replaced by infomercials. It’s at this point that the infomercials begin to influence my dreams.

How do infomercials influence dreams you ask?

By pushing exercise equipment on me and lecturing me that I’m fat in my dream! I have enough problems with self esteem and bad eating habits I don’t need some has been actor pushing his or her latest exercise contraption on me in my dreams or telling me that I’m fat. Invariably I wake up mad and shut the TV off.

Or, how about being lectured on how bad the air quality is and having an air purifier pushed on you in your dreams. We all know that Bakersfield has some of the worst air quality in the Country I certainly don’t need an air purifier sales man screaming BAD AIR at me in my dreams causing me to wake up unable to breathe.

Obviously my dreams are open to the power of suggestion. I just need to find some other kind of suggestion to dream. Maybe I should watch Cinderella at night so I could dream about Prince Charming or something. Anything would be better than Infomercial dreams.

Labels: air quality, Cinderella, dreams, exercise, Infomercial, lecture, Prince Charming, TV star

  posted by Matildakay at 10:35 AM 0 comments

Walking for Inspiration
When ‘M’ my trainer at physical therapy announced a few weeks ago that Terrio Therapy Fitness was sponsoring another 5k walk and that I would be participating, I didn’t argue. There’s no point in arguing with ‘M’. He always wins. Instead, I recruited chingpea to walk with me.

This time participating in the 5k walk wasn’t about finding out if I could walk three miles and actually finish, I conquered that battle last time. I knew I could finish. No, this time it was about commitment. I enjoyed saying, “Yes, I’m walking in the 5k walk” and actually meaning it. And when the day of the race rolled around, I even crawled out of bed at 6am on a Saturday morning without complaint, which anyone who knows me, knows 6am doesn’t exist on weekends.

As chingpea and I walked the 5k course chalked out across the CSUB campus enjoying the early Saturday morning sunshine we encountered members of my physical therapy group who were also walking or running. I found their words of encouragement inspiring. They cheered me on to finish the race. That was their goal, to finish. But for me, finishing wasn’t the goal. This 5k walk was only the beginning. For me, the sunshine, the friendship, the words of encouragement and the act of pushing my body and my knees to perform was inspiring. Performance, normalcy, walking without pain that was my goal.

I was inspired to whip my knees into shape. No easy task let me tell you. My knees have been giving me a lot of problems lately. And quite frankly, I’m tired of it. I don’t know if more walking will help or hurt. But I’m going to keep walking (just keep swimming) and hopefully find more inspiration along the way.

Labels: 'M', 5K Walk, bad knees, CSUB, encouragement, exercise, fitness, inspiration, pain, Physical Therapy, race, Terrio Therapy Fitness, walking

  posted by Matildakay at 11:14 PM 0 comments