Running sucks. Until zombies chase you.

I lost 30 pounds from running. That is why I keep running. It is not because running is fun. Running is miserable. People who say running is "addicting" are either liars or delusional. Okay fine, maybe they are just real athletes. I was never the real athlete growing up. One time when I was like 9, I was playing softball and I was the catcher and there was a past (passed?) ball and Lisa Maiorana was stealing home and I ripped off my catcher's helmet like a bad ass and, with the ball in my mitt, dove headfirst to try and tag her out. My face smashed into her helmet and my nose was super gushing blood.

I think she was safe.

My parents bought me a "There's No Crying In Softball" shirt. They were so proud of my athletic moment.

Except that I did cry. And she was safe.

One other time, I got kicked out of a softball game for kicking dirt on an umpire because he kept calling my sister's pitches balls when they were actually strikes (sistas 4 lyyyyyfe). So I kicked dirt on him and he threw me out of the game. And he threw my dad out too. Because my dad was so proud of his usually non-competitive sunshine-y daughter showin' some sports-related passion so he told the ump that he was clearly BLIND and my pops and I walked off the field. We sure showed him. Woot Woot.

Hashtag total athlete.

One other time, I hit a homerun off of Vanessa Alva (a good friend and the league's best pitcher for our age bracket) in the championship game. I'd like to claim that as an athletic moment, but hell, that was just. pure. luck. I still don't know how that happened. My parents still talk about that moment in time. I hope the story lives on through generations forever. Then my great great grandchildren will think I was a real athlete.

Except that I am not.

I am not competitive. When my whole family gathers together for Family Fun Football Weekend, I sleep on the couch or watch "Sister Act II" upstairs (the "Oh Happy Day" scene gets me every time) or I just sit in with a bowl of bean dip and a bottle of wine and wait until the games end and everyone wants to play Balderdash. Or drink more wine with me.

HOWEVER.

I lost 30 pounds from running. I am the oldest I have ever been (haha, why am I so lame that I laughed at that?)  and in the best shape of my life. Exercise freaking sucks. It takes sacrifice and discipline and I am the color of a tomato when I run for more than 45 seconds. I am not a cool exerciser.

Sometimes when I am on the treadmill and I get tired after 3 minutes, I slow down the treadmill and practice a look of agony on my face while I grip my lower back....and the people around me think I am pushing through the chronic pain I must have from being such a committed runner. But really I just want 12 seconds to catch my breath so I do not pass out from my excruciating 3 minute sprint.

But ya better believe I am healthy these days. And I am in charge of the life of a tiny human. A tiny human whose family history includes heart disease, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, among many other less-than-glam traits. I don't want her to be 29 years old and have to try to trick herself into enjoying running so she can shed the excess pounds that laziness put on her. I don't really care if she is ever a Real Athlete but I don't want her to stare a doctor in the eyes and hear him give her a list of 24893 medications that she needs to be on because she is that unhealthy.

I do not care if she is ever the best at anything. But...hard work...that's a non-negotiable. Life is full of things you don't wanna do. TOUGH. Get over it. Do them anyway.

Or just date a combo of Rambo and Robert Irvine and then see how fast your jiggly booty scurries to the gym ;) Have you seeeeeeeeeeeen those muscles?!

I am so happy when I see families exercising together (like the DeCooks and the Winners), or cute little older people power-walking at the mall together or fields full of kids playing soccer on Saturday mornings. Exercise is not fun, but when you have a support system or you find ways to make it less mizzzerable, you are saving your own life. For realz.

 Ask Faithy why we go to the gym and she says "to exercise" and you ask her why we exercise and she says "to be healthy." I am sure those are still abstract concepts to her little 3 year old brain, but give me a break, I am TRYING ;)

Take your kids to exercise. Please. Teach them to love being active.

Because according to Hollywood, zombies are gonna take over the world and I am depending on the next generation to be fit and nimble enough to defeat them while I hide in my safe house. Like Brendan Fraser in that one movie.