I was not this way because I made it
that way.
Nuhuhuh, no, nope.
Not just that I was raised this way,
but I learned it's the way to go.
I was not born this way, but you could
kinda say that I indeed was born this way, but not literally.
Yeah.
Oh, what was I talking about? BEING ON
MY FEET!!
My dad believes that everybody must
have sports in their lives: one type of sport will apply to each of
us and become something of ours. I grew up running around the block
to compete against my brothers to see who runs the fastest, playing
baseball in the backyard and on the streets, gathering with the
neighborhood kids and playing “capture the flag” late summer
night. My elementary school was 5 blocks away, it was safe enough for
me to walk back and forth between home and school daily. I finally
rode the school bus when I was 11 when I entered middle school, yet I
still walked several blocks to meet at the bus stop. It was normal.
In high school, it was 2.5 miles away, so I resumed walking,
rollerblading, or biking back and forth. Don't forget running in
track and basketball. I had that overall physical features of
participating in a team sport, commuting on my own feet instead of
using a vehicle, and frequently found exercise in random spirit of
entertainment.
I could start by admitting today....
people are lazy and lacking the creativity of physical pleasure.
For example:
I have discovered on my biking commute
home from work, that in the Portland and surrounding communities
ACTUALLY complies with the needs of close proximity for children to
be dropped off to their homes. Instance? The school bus stops TWICE
on one block. Really? For the life of me, WHY are the kids being
dropped off so closely to their homes-- paid by our beloved taxes. Is
this Okay? Are we telling the children that they should not be able
to walk a length to a destination? Probably just as well why their
parents are obsessed about parking as close as they could to a
grocery store?
I am not insulting you. I am insulting
the way of American life. Sometimes I get nervous, nervous instead of
frustration because I kept pondering about people being dangerous.
Their habits of getting things FAST, QUICK, A TO B, etc, their
tempers are rising and patience growing shorter. When I carpool with
someone, I'm occasionally getting a knot in my stomach when I watch
drivers compete for a spot in front of each other, instead of taking
turns in a friendly way. Or, for instance, when a driver becomes
frustrated waiting to turn into traffic, slams on gas and speds up to
occupy a small space between cars, possibly cutting in front and
causing a potential crash. Ack.
Perhaps this philosophy says that
growing up with spirit of exercising and learning the fulfillment of
commuting between A and B (or a detour on the way, who knows?)
teaches us to enrich our patience, find pleasure in simple things of
nature (both urban and rural). Most importantly, this forces us to
MEDIATE! With this modern culture, people are always in a hurry for
wasteful entertainment (for instance, TV, sitting on couch) or to
meet their needs of family or individual. This schedule drops their
ability to breath in and out. Being on your feet will enforce your
mind to mediate and your body to take in training to flex our muscles
and lungs to be stronger. It is a point where we have to find
ourselves seeing it as a way of life, rather than “exercise time”
as we often feel about gyms.
