Whether it’s working, reading, exercising, playing games, studying or whatever, there are some of us for whom any such activity comes naturally and can be performed for hours on end without stress, strain, worry or fatigue.
Conversely, there are others for whom a molehill of any such activity becomes a Mount Everest to climb, and they make attempt after attempt but never get too far from base.
I have such a mountain I have been trying to climb for as long as I can remember, and for as long as I can remember I have always been at base starting my climb over and over and over.
I have tried climbing on my own without any measurable success and I have tried climbing in company but equally as unsuccessfully. For no matter which way I try, the result is always the same and, sooner or later, I am starting all over again. My Everest is exercise.
Periodically, I force myself to put on some walking shoes and sweat gear and take off from the house with a proper distance in mind to cover. But the farther I go, the louder the voice in the head becomes until it convinces me it’s time to turn back now, inevitably long before I reach my intended target.
I have a multi-speed bicycle which I bought about ten years ago and which, I am ashamed to admit, I have ridden less than once a year.
The last time I decided to mount it was when I discovered my neighbour Roger Gill was into riding and I felt doing so in his company might help me to conquer that mountain.
However, when on the evening that I was to join him on the road he told me we would be riding from nearby Queen’s College to St Lucy’s Church and back, my bicycle immediately returned to being a clothes line.
One time somebody suggested that my problem related to trying to exercise on my own and encouraged me to join a gym.
So I joined one that used to operate down by the Hilton Hotel and paid up for a whole year. Well, if I were eligible for a refund it would be for about 11 months. That’s how short it lasted.
Sometime after that I got a birthday gift of free membership with another gym, which I am still to take advantage of. That was about ten birthdays ago.
Apart from that, you would not believe that at my home you can find, among other equipment, a set of weights, a Total Gym 1500 machine, a Bowflex machine, a pull-up bar and an AB Lounge machine all of which, I must confess, serve no other purpose than being more indoor clothes lines.
Fortunately, I have one saving grace: addiction to the sea. I am not one who goes to the beach and remains on the same spot in the water for hours. Once I hit off I continue swimming, diving, splashing around, “hitting headers” an entire afternoon.
My only problem with the sea is that, like RPB, I don’t like cold water. And the sea has been cold since November last year.