Endorphin Heaven
Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don’t shoot their husbands, they just don’t. – Elle Woods, Legally Blonde
That line (slightly garbled) kept going through my head today as I was out walking. I started off my walk thinking I’d do my usual ten to twelve kilometres but then I took off on the open road, pushing past the limits I’d set myself previously. I refused to be constricted by space. I was no overly domesticated dog stuck in its run going back and forth over the same ground!
No, I didn’t do some quantum voyage thing. I just went father than I’d gone before. Today I walked a half-marathon – over 20km! I did this at the breakneck speed of 7.5km/hour.
Up and down hills, under a rain shower and through chilly sunshine, the endorphins were rushing and so was I. Several times I had to shout out a wordless "Argh!" from pure physical joy and pent up energy. This was better than sex! Forget chocolate!
My brain also sang snippets (the pieces I could remember) of Cole Porter’s "Don’t Fence Me In." I was free! I was –
Ohmygodmyhipshurtandmylegsaremovingontheirown!!!
With four kilometres to go I couldn’t have stopped if I tried!
As I was winding down and thinking about the nice glass of wine waiting for me back at the apartment, I wondered what a walk like this would look like in Toronto. So, at home again, lying on the couch, I looked it up: it would be a round trip from the waterfront to Yonge and Lawrence (for those unfamiliar with Toronto, you can see it here), basically up through the centre of the city.
Since I also used to walk a lot as a teenager (in a roving clump of suburban semi-Goths), I thought I’d check it out in terms of my old home town – and discovered it would be like walking from my old house to Canada’s Wonderland (again, see the map if you’re interested). Okay, so I didn’t walk a lot as a teenager, because that was one trip I’d NEVER have done.
Isn’t it amazing how the same trip in three settings was so totally different? The France walk was liberating and boundary-pushing, the Toronto one a boring chore, something only to be done if the subways weren’t running, and the suburban walk an impossibility.
EDIT: Oops forgot the map of the route I actually did do… The line is the walk home, the walk there was the road on the north side of the river.
Someday Lessons:
- Space expands or contracts depending on context.
- Don’t let space limit you – push yourself out of your normal "dog run."
Lunch Today:
Goat’s cheese melted on rye crackers under the broiler with fresh tomato slices, a bit of dill weed and some Baba Ghanouj.
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[...] my December 2006 post, Endorphin Heaven, I talked about spontaneous actions, happiness, and breaking limits and one of my favourite [...]