Tag: vomit

5k Challenge

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

I may have just done something stupid. This whole doing exercise outside while it’s sunny thing has taken a hold of me and I agreed to go on a 5k run. Five thousand metres. Not something to be scoffed at. I managed three thousand last week but my knee started hurting at the end so I’m fearing the same may happen today. This time I suspect my rather unsympathetic friend may not pander to my excuses and the abuse will flow. While this is nothing new I am exposing myself enough that something is making me feel wary at the prospect of what’s to come.

But this is all part of this new healthy and energised human being I’m attempting to create. I am in my mid-30s now which is the usual time people have breakdowns and decide it’s time to exercise. And I thought I was unique. I even had a dream last night about eating too many of these pizzas we’re making and getting fat. It wasn’t exactly deep in the subconscious but that’s a fear I can’t deny to myself any longer. My belly was so fat, I can’t possible think how many pizzas I had been eating.

How much of this then is me being vain? I won’t deny there was an aesthetic element involved in the horror I felt at the enormity of my gut but I’m sure I had convinced myself previously it was all health related. The subconscious never lies though. Saying that we do start to become more aware of the aches and pains that once either didn’t exist or only existed for a short period. Now they feel like they never go away. The desire for life must be so strong in people who reach serious old age. My god everything must just hurt endlessly.

I’m supposed to be running in about half and hour and I feel so full of sandwich and the cup of tea I’m currently drinking. I’m going to do a little yoga as a warm up of sorts and crack on. I’ll report back when it’s all over.

Huh huh…huh huh…huh huh…collapse…

I was actually leading the way until about the three kilometre mark at which point I saw a waypoint in the distance and my body started to assume it was time to walk. I thought I felt a little wretch at four kilometres and by then my friend had caught up with me although saying that he had only been about five metres behind the whole time and I know that because I could hear him suffering too. We parted at the four kilometre mark and I struggled my way back and dragged myself over the finish line. It really was a battle of the mind. Having completed a few Vipassana courses in my time I can confirm the relation to meditation is an accurate one. My knees held strong though which was reassuring too. In short though; can taste blood. Tight muscles. Light head. Fucked.

Resolutions Update 2.0

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Part of my resolutions are about to begin. My friend owns some exercise equipment and I’m going to use some ski machine thing I think, or at least something which he says is going to probably make me sick from the twenty minutes of effort I have promised him. The reason sick is actually a good thing for once is that as a result of my attempts at beer making I have not been too far from the toilet these last few days. If this continues I may be writing a piece soon detailing a salt water cleanse, or at least the benefits of it, over the intimate details of the procedure. My friend also drank the beers on Saturday but was sick on Sunday and seemingly felt better after. I unfortunately trained myself when younger not to be sick which can be good when drinking and smoking excessively but along closing the heart chakra apparently, which is perhaps a story for another time, it does mean that my body doesn’t necessarily expel poisons by vomiting in times it should. This attempt at doing some crazy amount of exercise when already feeling a bit weak and ill is completely the most ridiculously illogical approach and reminiscent of tv series from my youth like Jackass or Dirty Sanchez. I am though willing to give it a shot because while I doubt it’ll actually make my sick, I know it is at least an opportunity at making a start on my resolutions and I’ve passed up on far too many chances already. I am though losing weight by being ill so at least the belly is slightly shrinking. Does that mean I am inadvertently sticking to my resolutions? Only in the most perverse of ways. I also accept fully that nothing I say in any articles after this one can be taken with any seriousness and I may have completely destroyed any sense of credibility I have had the good fortune to acquire these last two months. But fuck it, here goes nothing….

…If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs is a line from a poem by Wilfred Owen about the folly of patriotic war and death, this line about the effects of chlorine gas during the First World War. It feels comparable to what I can taste in my mouth now. That old familiar taste of iron. The stabbing sensation in the ears and the throbbing of the head. My legs feel like jelly and either I’ve got cramp or I’ve hurt my hamstring but I completed twenty whole minutes of surprisingly gruelling exercise skiing, running with some bag on my back, lifting some heavy ball repeatedly and doing push ups. I didn’t vomit, I knew I never would despite the silliness of the first paragraph. I should be proud of myself apparently. I’ll let you know tomorrow if I manage to scrape myself off the floor.

End of Year Hypocrisy

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

Tomorrow is another year and like many people I will also be rather self-indulgently posting my New Years resolutions somewhere online hoping that they’ll somehow be so interesting and important that people will read them and take notice. It surely is a symptom of modern day society, social media and upbringings that tell us we’re somehow great and worthy in every way that creates phenomena like this. Why the hell would people be interested in what I have planned for next year, how much cake and pies I’ll be cutting out and how definitely I’ll be going straight to the gym in the morning and not leaving until this time next year. Throw in all the positive affirmations and you’ve got the recipe for self-indulged vomit. Naturally then as I said I will be doing these very things too.

Why is it then that when we know something is not good for us we still continue to do it anyway. That of course includes the pies and cakes, or the sitting on the sofa when we know we should be outside listening to power music and running, but it also includes forcing others to endure our attempts to revolve the earth and all it has created around ourselves. People don’t have to go on social media and read or watch what we have to say that is granted but we do, our lives now are so intertwined it is hard to escape it, so unconsciously we endure it.

Saying that I did fleetingly discuss New Years resolutions with one of my cousins over Christmas and they raised the important point that they are ways to focus the mind on our intentions for the year ahead. I probably paraphrase her badly but that is roughly what she had to say. I suspect also that she doesn’t feel the need to tell the world about her intentions for next year which in a way makes it a far more personal and in my eyes acceptable approach. I can’t wait to be a hypocrite tomorrow, I almost feel like apologising in advance. I won’t though.

I don’t know whats up with me today. My plan had been to dissect how I thought this writing experiment had gone so far, and highlight the intimidating fact that I’ve got over three hundred pieces still to write. Instead a hypocritical rant about New Years resolutions ensued. Perhaps it’s because I’ve never bothered with them before and my first time is going to be in such a public setting that I felt uncomfortable enough about it to preemptively express my disdain for my own future actions. But then maybe it’s important for some people to see others resolutions as it strengthens their own resolve that they’re too on the right track. God damn it why can’t the world ever be black and white just this once. Why must life be that beautiful shade of empathetic grey we have to compassionately endure on a daily basis. And yes you spell it with an e.