The Body Electric

"The circling rivers the breath, and breathing it in and out,

The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward toward the knees,

The thin red jellies within you or within me, the bones and the marrow in the bones,

The exquisite realization of health;

O I say these are not the parts and poems of the body only, but of the soul,

O I say now these are the soul!" 

- I Sing the Body Electric, Walt Whitman

Today I got a "running high". 

Typically what happens to me on a run is the first 15 minutes are hell and I question WTF am I doing.  

The next 15 are embodied by the song "I'm Every Woman" by Chaka Khan. 

The last 30-40 minutes I feel like a Bad Ass.  My head is buzzing, my adrenaline is pumping hard and no one can touch me.  I think these last 30-40 minutes are why I continue to run.  I may go a couple month without it, but it always seems to creep back into my life inevitably.  

I once heard the saying that "running is cheaper than therapy."  Is it the amount of endorphins it produces?  Is it the challenge it presents?  Is it the transformation of dragging your feet out the door with dread and by the end feeling like running an extra mile, "because it is fun"?

Whatever it is, it is a beautiful thing to let your body work to it's highest capabilities.  To think of all the time we spend on our ass is down-right frightening.  As I get older I assume I won't be able to go the same distance or intensity as I can now.  Might as well enjoy the gift of youth while I still got it!

Another one of my favorite quotes about the body is from comedian, Mel Brooks:

“Look, I really don't want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you're alive, you've got to flap your arms and legs, you got to jump around a lot, you got to make a lot of noise, because life is the very opposite of death. And therefore, as I see it, if you're quiet, you're not living. You've got to be noisy, or at least your thoughts should be noisy, colorful and lively.”



And on one final note, I swear to God this week of crazy healthy eating and exercising is working wonders for me.  I sleep better (and more) and I have been so happy/optimistic lately.  I feel like this may be due to the Reagan-like blind optimism that I could also - like running 4 miles - attribute to my youthful stage in life.  It's easy to be optimistic about finding a future job when you're young and have no place to be or timeline.  It's easy to think you will find something when you've just started looking.  Hopefully this optimism can maintain itself through August if I've yet to find anything.

If I can't find anything by then, it's off to D.C.  So many contractors jobs, I'd be glad to take one!