Keeping Me Honest

Here I was all set to write a bogus piece about Britain’s quest for a five-word slogan and then it was deleted. I think it’s been ten years since I blamed a computer for deleting something. But as I restarted, and logged in, and tried to remember what I’d written before the world went dark, I came to the conclusion that it was probably better that the bogus post was gone forever, anyway. It wasn’t what’s really on my mind, and I was just forcing some words where there should have been others. Or, at the most, no words at all.

I ended last week in a slump, and I haven’t felt much like talking about it since. If someone were going to put five words to my attitude over the last three days, it would probably be something like “Get in a good mood” (circa Say Anything, of course) because for reasons that are relatively not good, I have been a little down. It goes into that category of “Things That Happen In Life That Are Downers But Not Really a Big Deal Compared to the Rest of the Problems in the World.” Are you familiar with this category? It’s also known as A Bad Day. Enough with the defining, though. A procrastinator like me could go on with that forever, I think.

At the beginning of last week, I found out a person I’d cared about very much in the past and still remain friends with today is engaged. He and I, we were not right for each other. We both knew this, it wasn’t a secret. Learning the news of the engagement wasn’t that kind of hurt, the Why Not Me? hurt. It was just that dull, distant hurt you’d rather not deal with. It was the kind of hurt where you want to just take your heart out of your chest and hold it at arm’s length for a few minutes, until you get used to the idea. Because along with getting used to the idea comes rationale that you know is in you, somewhere. It’s just not the first reaction, because seeing someone you cared about like that move on is simple and not, all at once. And I just wanted to look away, which I couldn’t. It was too late, it was already in my head.

Something like this is just one of those things that made everything else seem a little more. Work was harder, getting excited about it was almost impossible. The five words that came to mind: “Go for a run, stupid.” This has long been my solution to getting my head out of a slump, and the aches and pains out of my heart. (Haven’t I told you about the time I wore out the belt on a treadmill after a break up?) Just make your heart beat faster, that feeling will go away. Sure, there are other ways to deal with it. Ben and Jerry, or nights out with friends, drinking. But before you know it, you’re three bars into “I Put a Spell on You” at a karaoke bar in the Mall of America and you realize wow, I do not feel better. Trust me on this one.

The run helped, like I thought it would. The miles don’t lie; five miles takes what it takes no matter who’s engaged, no matter who’s not right. A mile is the same length it has always been, there’s no way around it. In this case, that’s a good thing, because five miles was what I needed to put everything back into place. And then I went home, rearranged the furniture, cleaned out a closet and painted the bathroom. Maybe next week my high school boyfriend will start having kids and I’ll run a 6:00 mile, or I’ll finally have the motivation to reseal all the windows.