3 a (1) : incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result
-Merriam-Webster OnLine Dictionary
I had the idea earlier this year, as I contemplated mortality while approaching 30 years next October, to try something new and challenging, as an attempt to lift my spirits and start my fourth decade off on the right foot. I decided to run a marathon at some point next year, just to finish, and voiced this thought to a friend at work. He convinced me to try a half marathon first, a smart thought since I'd never run over 5 miles straight. He was going to run with me, and we had a race in mind for October 17.
In a result from which I'm sure I could learn something profound, but refuse to, I have pulled/torn a muscle so badly I can barely walk, and no less than three people independently attributed it to old age. It came as a result of combining half marathon runs and soccer season, a daily level of training which my younger self finished before lunch, and I can only guess that I would be dead if I was pushing for a marathon.
Setting out to prove my youth and virility, I'm now hobbling around, taking the elevator, with my wife putting on my socks. How ironic.
Irony: a rocket scientist posts about a literary device like irony and then an English major posts a comment and references... Inverse Proportionality.
ReplyDeleteYou see, I hav discovered as I've gotten older that the amount of time I spend prepping to exercise must increase while the time I spend exercising must decrease. For example, in high school prep time consisted of five minutes eating a bag of doritos and exercise time could be a solid 1:55 of whatever I wanted. Now, prep time is perhaps and hour of warm up and cool down, stretching, yoga (I said it), and even some dietary changes. Excerise time is limited to the other hour and can't be just anyhing anymore. The two hours remains the constant, but the x and y of prep time and work time must change in proportion to each other.
Reality does not care if we believe it