Exercise in Humility

I really need to exercise.

Not like bending-down-and-picking-up-kids type of exercise, but real exercise.

Why, you ask?  Because the other night, my dear husband showed me up.  Big time.

Saturday afternoon, some of our wonderful friends visited us from Pennsylvania.  We were all over at my in-laws, playing with their newly-purchased Nintendo Wii.  Jim declared that he was a hula-hooping champion on Wii Fit.  I snorted dismissively, but Jim insisted.  He got up and we all laughed as my husband vigorously whirled his hips in the hula-hooping simulation.  He was sweating and panting when he finished the three-minute game, with a victorious “4-star Calorie Roaster” rating.  I figured that it must not be all that difficult, since Jim’s only exercise regime consists of lifting Rebecca and Susanna onto his shoulders for rides around the house. 

I volunteered to be the next contestant and vowed to all present that I would show them how it was properly done.  I stood on the Wii Fit balance board, trying to summon my childhood hula-hooping experience.  I started swinging my hips and arms in a circle, quickly realizing that my endurance and flexibility were not what they used to be.  I whirled and twirled and willed myself to beat Jim.  I watched in horror as the time clock spun down while my score remained stubbornly low.  I moved faster and more erratically, urging my flailing body to last just a few more moments.  Alas, I couldn’t even finish the game.  I stepped off the board with three seconds to go and collapsed in a heap on the floor.  My score was half of Jim’s.  And for all of you who know Jim, you can guess that he was not slow in proudly and vociferously proclaiming his victory. 

To make the memory of my loss even more poignant, I am still very sore.  My abdominal and back muscles feel like they were pummeled with a mallet.  I am clearly out of shape, if a Nintendo game is confining me to bed with a heating pad.  I suppose I should have taken into account that I have done virtually no demanding physical exercise in almost a year and a half.  I was too sick in the beginning of the pregnancy to think about running anywhere other than the bathroom, then I was on bedrest and considered trips around the hospital room to be long-distance sprints, then I was recovering from bedrest and found it difficult to haul myself up and down the stairs to respond to the girls’ newborn cries, and then I was too exhausted by the end of the day to think about getting up from the couch, and then…I got lazy.  I really have no excuse now. 

I need to get into shape so I can keep up with the girls as their crawling evolves into more rapid forms of transportation (although Susie gets pretty close to a leaping-crawl at times, where she gets going so fast I’m surprised she doesn’t get tangled in her hands and legs).  But more importantly, I need to redeem myself at our next family Nintendo Wii tournament.  I can’t let Jim hula-whip me again. 

Even if he does melt my heart when he plays with the girls. 

I’ll let him win the Best Daddy in the World contest anytime.