…um, gasp…heart booming…can’t breathe…I’m flirting with a…head thudding…with a heart attack…no pain just can’t speak…
9…ugh. I almost did ten jumping jacks. Going to keep trying, keep standing, bouncing in this living room until I do ten then another then, more, until I can jump rope like I did when I was a kid, stay here all day long, just jumping until everyone else quits and goes home.
8.
I just bought a jump rope; it arrived last night. I tried to do ten jumps (turns?) and almost couldn’t walk to the couch. I’m old. I thought I could just take it out of the box and go, knock out thirty minutes a day, and it was thirty minutes before I had enough energy to get off the couch. What happened?
The benefits. 200 to 300 calories in 15 minutes. Full body workout. Improves cardiovascular endurance and heart health. Should be easier than calisthenics (should have been). A basic jump rope is cheap.
8, 9, what!?! I can’t even do 10? 5. I stepped on the “rope”. It’s a thin piece of wire these days. 4. What?! Calm down. I haven’t jumped rope in over 35 years.
22, 23, 24… No! I got greedy. I had 20, I told myself to stop, then I decided to go to 25, just to show no one that I can still do it. And I missed.
Ten minutes later and I haven’t gotten past five. I don’t understand.
Why is this going to be harder than it looked in my head?
Find a video, see how it’s done. Elbows in. Wrists out. Shoulders back. Work the wrists, not the arms or shoulders. Jump no more than two inches from the ground. Where did all of this come from? Did we do all of that when we were kids?
I have never loved the feel of my insides bouncing up and down inside my body. But this is my chosen exercise, for now. So, tomorrow then.
Mark Earnest Johnson 