Humor in the Morning Workout

At 5:45 am today my alarm went off.  Although I had every intention of going to the gym yesterday, writing my paper and preparing for my presentation tonight got in the way.  I didn't finish my work until 11 pm and by then the gym was closed.  Determined that I still needed to workout, I got up this morning.  The old Emily wouldn't have done that.  She would have slept through that alarm this morning.  But not the new and improved Emily.  I was up READY to go this morning.

The entire workout I kept thinking about what I wanted to blog.  This makes the jogging less painful.  I think of all the words of "wisdom" I want to impart on the electronic world and it makes the 20 minutes seem much shorter. 

This morning's entry was supposed to be about how exciting it is that I am up to jogging 12 minute miles.  5.0 on the machine to be exact.  I KNOW that Serina, Meg, and I will be rocking out with another 5k soon.  There was also supposed to be a good portion of motivational excitement since I just facebooked my old personal trainer and felt awesome having her read my blog.  As she wrote on my facebook, it was PAINFUL trying to get me to run a mile... think how in shape I would be if I had her here in MN.

Those thoughts WERE supposed to be this entry... However, let me share with you what happened after my workout this morning.
 
I am super organized when it comes to my work.  I am anal about color coding and keeping things organized.  In my own personal life, wellllll.... not so much.  Last night, after finishing my paper I got all ready for today so I could get up and head straight to the gym.  I packed my lunch and school bag.  Then I set out my workout clothes and in my gym bag packed shampoo, conditioner, hair spray, deodorant, my outfit for today, and an extra shirt just in case I didn't like the first one I had picked out (which I didn't this morning so it's a good thing I packed an extra).  Perhaps if you are a critical thinking minded person you might already see the GLARING item that I should have packed but forgot.

It's actually a pretty amazing mental image that follows.  I am super pumped from the run, so I head downstairs to take a shower.  I grab the shampoo and conditioner and head to the shower stall.  I already knew there would be soap in the dispenser on the wall when I got there so I wasn't worried.  As I was walking to the shower, I began taking my socks off.  I realized that I had forgotten shower shoes... yuck.  I am a little bit of a germaphobe sometimes, and I couldn't stop thinking about all the different people's foot fungi that would be touching my feet.  But, with a sigh, I got into the shower.  I am in the process of conditioning my hair when it dawns on me that I don't have a towel with me. 

(Now, if my boyfriend JD reads this, it will probably make him roll his eyes, because on a fairly regular basis I get into the shower without having my towel in the bathroom... so he could have seen this coming.)

So there I am, conditioner in my hair with no towel.  My brain started to go into overdrive.  There were many options that I could go with, but which one would be the least mortifying for me.  A) I could run to the locker with no clothes and hope that no one was there.  B) I could put my sweaty clothes back on, but that seemed really gross.  C) Or I could spin in circles and hope that I would dry that way.

I went with plan C.  I counted to 3 (yes, out loud), grabbed my clothes, and half-running, half-scampering went to my locker.  And of course, in true my-life-is-dramatic fashion, as I am running to my locker with NO clothes on, 3 older ladies walk into the locker room and give me a look.  Not a mean look.  Or a judging look.  But a WTF are you doing look.  I am sure my eyes looked fairly shifty and I was feeling stressed, so I know that came across on my face.  I felt MORTIFIED.  I couldn't believe I was standing there, with no clothing on, dripping wet, staring at three grey haired ladies.

Well, to end this story... I said excuse me, passed them in my birthday suit, and set down my clothes.  I ended up getting paper towels and one-at-a-time drying myself off. 

I am SURE those three ladies had a good laugh at my expense after they left to go work out.  And I learned two valuable lessons today. 

1) A year ago, had that happened, I would have cried that someone had seen my body in full form.  It is something that I have always been self-conscience about.  But today, I was embarrassed, then amused, and then proud that I even felt confident enough to scurry around the locker room.
2) Always bring a towel.

Was this story about weigh-loss specifically?  No.  Was it an amusing anecdotal story about something that happened to me?  Yes. 

I hope that in the hardest of times, the days when you are feeling down the most, you also remember that there is humor in this world. :-)

Feeling Confident in my workout clothes