Changing

About three months ago, I hired a woman with whom I used to work. She's kind of hard to classify. When I worked with her, she was an education person, responsible for setting up courses, maintaining records, etc. In the interim, she worked as a call center manager for a local branch of Williams Sonoma, did part-time work for other organizations. Now she's working as a physical therapist at a gym that's oriented toward people with disabilities, and, along the way, she's working with some private clients. I hired her as a trainer.

When I did that, I wasn't exactly sure what to expect. I had sort of hoped that merely the act of hiring her would be enough, but of course that wasn't the case. We met once or twice in June, knocked off until July first, then almost not at all during July, when our XG was here. (From whom I've essentially heard not at all since then, and yeah, that bothers me a little.) In August, reluctantly, I got back together with her, again sort-of hoping that merely meeting with her would be enough. Now, a month into it, I have seen some results, but I'm not exactly sure how she figures into it.

She has worked with me to show me weights to use, and she's done some stretches with me, things she's learned with her disabled patients, that are much more than I would ever do. I don't even do the easier stretches that she told me about. The others, I literally couldn't do by myself. I think that I've benefited from that. But she doesn't push me to go to the gym. She hasn't said you need to go three or four times a week. She doesn't praise me all that often when I do go, but occasionally she will. So, it's not feedback from her that's keeping me going.

Part of it might be just looking at her, thinking that there is this forty year old woman who's in great shape, running half-marathons and more, and wishing that I could be in that shape. Of course, I've wished things like that before. As the comic once said, I'd do anything to get in shape, except, you know, diet and exercise. So just knowing that she does those things ought not to be a motivator for me. I can't really say that it is.

I don't know what it is that is motivating me. Whatever it is, whether its this woman or the desire to be able to eat while in France (assuming we even go) or some vague sense of aging, I don't know. But I hope it continues. I still don't like exercising, and I doubt I ever will. But seeing results.... well. Makes it a little easier to accept, y'know?