#scrap-heap

Przemysław Szawłowski

Wrocław

-The Autonomous Scrap-heap emits an indescribable smell.

There was another accident on the road today. This time I saw the spot where it happened myself, but there was a solid wall of police and fire trucks blocking a view of the wreckage itself, so I assume it must have been pretty bad. This guy in an SUV had pulled off the road directly in front of the wall of cops, and I wondered if he'd been a witness to whatever happened or if he knew the people in the wreck, or if he was a reporter or a lawyer or something else. It brought the idea of dying roaring back into my thoughts, and more or less ensured that I would go out for a run in a probably futile attempt to lengthen my own lifespan.

I have the worst possible relationship with running, which is that I hate it but whenever I start thinking I need to exercise more it is what I default to. I used to be able to rip off long distances--six or seven miles, though I never figured out the exact mileage, was my personal best, and I did it five days a week while I lived in Wales, running along the shoreline and turning up to follow the river from which the town of Aberystwyth gets its name--but that was three years and may as well have been a full lifetime ago. 

These days I make it a little over a half mile, then walk, then run, then walk, &c &c until I make it back to the house, then I sprint the last stretch and feel like death is watching me from someone's front yard and just waiting for my heart to explode, which wouldn't surprise me. It would suit me to die while trying not to--irony being, as it is, so in vogue with the kids these days. Then I go inside and the dog inquires as to my health by trying to knock me over so he can lick at the copious amounts of sweat produced by a fat man running (I imagine it is like a goddamn buffet, salty, with a touch of smoky bacon (lol bacon you guise) flavor). Then I shower and down some painkillers because my shins and knees and lower back resent having to propel my fat ass around at speeds higher than a stately shuffle, and my running shoes are old and probably were worn out a year ago but I can't bring myself to spend money on a new pair because it never lasts that long and I'd hate to spend the money on it.

On the flip side, I sleep better (there's this bright light that flashes on the horizon outside my window, and it's kept me awake on more than one occasion), and every time I get out and drag myself around the little course I plotted I go a little further before I have to walk, and I don't walk for quite as long, and blah blah blah you've all heard this sort of crap before. The story of a fat slob running and becoming (gradually) less of a fat slob is a tale as old as time (I'm sure there's a TV Tropes about it, because any narrative happening has a TV Tropes entry so we can pretend to be academic in our watching/reading/listening. I have a whole rant on TV Tropes prepared, but it too is probably a trope so why bother). I'd make this an EXERCISE BLOG, but frankly it's a miracle that I get out and run at all, and once winter hits I'm going to have to buy a gym pass or something ("something" includes "sit around and get fat again" as well as "go run in the cold and risk frostbite"). Point being, my followthrough could use some work, and the thought of making myself write a little report on What I Did Today To Not Be Such A Fat Fuck sounds a little too much like my day job.

There's an effort to eat better that goes along with any exercise attempt, if only because when you exercise your body becomes less willing to tolerate a constant stream of nothing but soda, burgers, and pop tarts. I don't do well with that, because I have not and never will cultivate anything like self-control.