My fall from grace to tar

Yesterday evening brought a better understanding to the adage “the bigger they are, the harder they fall’. I had cancelled my daily jogging plans because my fitness partner, who also serves as my husband, came home a bit late from work. It wasn’t completely dark, so he insisted that we jog and I complied.

The evil slope

We hit the road. About 2km away from home, like Humpty Dumpty, I had a great fall. I have no recollection whatsoever of what caused the fall. All I remember is that as I ran downhill on a steep slope, I suddenly realised I was so going down after staggering for a few metres. I always told my husband that if I fell in a public place I’d just pretend to faint to cover my shame. When you eventually have as ugly a come-down as I did, theatrics won’t even cross your mind. I felt as if the wind had been knocked out of me and the pit of my stomach really hurt. Someone tried to scoop me off the ground, but I didn’t want anyone to touch me as it appeared to aggravate the pain. Without opening my eyes, I could tell a group of men had surrounded me and were fussing, fanning my face and pulling my body parts in all directions, with all good intentions. Bless their golden hearts, but first aid should be made compulsory in schools. If I had got a fracture I would have been in trouble because those men really had no idea how to handle an injured person, from the way it looked.

Needle to say, the jog was cancelled. I had an ugly gaping wound on my left elbow, which I had inadvertently used for support when I met the ground.  Within a few minutes, my arm had this searing pain and I thought I would collapse. I don’t remember ever feeling so much physical pain, maybe a year ago when the anesthetic wore off after the C-section to deliver my baby. When we got home, my husband cleaned and dressed the wound and I took a painkiller.

After the pain had somewhat subsided, I began to think deeply about this misadventure. I never jog by myself as a precautionary measure. There are stories about unsuspecting joggers getting attacked, and I felt safer running with my husband. Did you notice the past tense – felt? A certain percentage of idiotic African men think a full-figured woman’s body is made for sin, so walking alone in my tights elicits wolf whistles and lewd comments from depraved men and I deplore that.

For me, running together as a couple means we are a team. When my teammate isn’t in sparkling form on a certain day, I reduce my pace or walk with him. Anything, as long as I am by his side.

Jogging together is more than just about fitness and weight-management. It’s also about bonding, an opportunity to touch base in the fresh air, away from the kids. But evidently, different strokes for different folks. My husband is occasionally faster than I am because he doesn’t have hips, boobs and pumpkins to carry. So regardless of my pace, he just runs ahead of me like a cheetah on steroids. I’m sure sometimes not many people can tell we are actually running partners because of the geographical distance between us on the road. There are times when we have to cross busy roads, and if he’s ahead of me, he just runs across the road. I’ve had occasions when I just followed him blindly on the assumption that the road was clear, only to find myself almost getting hit by cars. I called him out on this before, that we are a team and have to look out for each other, so he can’t just run and cross roads at the risk of having me follow thinking the road is clear when it’s not. The most natural thing when you are running with someone is to want to catch up with your partner and you might overlook checking the roads. I realise how stupid this sounds. Road regulations stipulate that pedestrians must check left, right and left again before crossing the road. They don’t say husbands ought to do that for their wives. To each his own.Yesterday as I tumbled down, my husband didn’t even see it. I could see him sprint away as I struggled to find my balance. The one that proclaimed before God and man he would be there for me “to have and to hold” wasn’t there to catch me when I fell. He only realised there was a catastrophe after I screamed in agony, already on the ground. 

As they say, pride goes before a fall. I had to tell him that if he had been by my side, I would not have fallen. Isn’t that what marriage is all about? Catching your wife when she falls? I told him it could have well been a thug stabbing me with a knife and running off and he wouldn’t have been able to defend me. The fall left me really shaken. It was a nasty one and if I had fallen on sharp objects, like broken bottles peppering the road, or hit my head hard, I wouldn’t have been able to come back home to my babies the same.I’m not even being dramatic, I’m really rattled. Now I can’t even giggle or cough without feeling pain around my rib cage.  It will take me a while to feel bold enough to run, especially on that particular slope where it happened.

In retrospect, I think I was unfair to my husband. He has his own reasons for running. It’s not like we sat down and drafted some ground rules for jogging together and he flouted them.Maybe he wants to beat the clock, in which case he doesn’t have to be slow because I’m slow. The fact that I stop when he’s tired or out of form doesn’t mean he has to reciprocate.  Like in all painful things in life, there are lessons to be learned from this. The first one is that sometimes there’s absolutely no security in numbers. I should get used to looking out for Numero Uno, watch my step, look left, right and left again on busy roads, and take karate lessons in case I have to defend myself against the perverts that might want to go further than making cat calls. The other lesson is that there are absolutely beautiful people out there. The security guards that came to help me out might not have known exactly what to do to help, but they were there and tried what they could. Then there was a motorist that also stopped to check what had happened. He said he was sorry about my fall and added that I shouldn’t give up running. I don’t think I will give up completely. I will just slow down a bit, and run my own race without trying to catch up with anyone. I also think it’s better to use the stationary bike or skipping rope at home.

Sorry if I sounded like I was ranting, but it’s not every day that a grown woman just falls while chasing her husband down the road. It could also be the meds that I’m taking for the arm.  

Blame it on Singende

Last night I told myself I would wake up first thing and go to gym. But here I am sitting in front of my computer instead, and I blame it all on Singende.

Gym cross-trainers
Photo by Allen Chipangura

Singende was a guy I met at university during my first year. He was dark, handsome and athletic-looking. He loved showing off his muscles in small t-shirts. One day Singende invited my friend Christina and I for a tour of the varsity gym. Like sheep we followed him. When we got there, he showed us around and identified the various equipment around. It was a very poorly equipped gym, I know that now. Most of the equipment were heavy weights. He made us try the several pieces out. And there we were, wanting to impress the handsome tour guide. We went overboard lifting everything on sight. Singende encouraged us and said if we felt a bit of pain, that was a good thing. It meant the work out was effective. 

He didn't tell us we needed to warm up first, or that working out had to be gradually built up - a process, not one grand event. We left the gym feeling this had been a day well-spent, and that we would be back the next day but alas! 
The next day saw me having to ask my room mate Siduduziwe to help me rise from my bed to prepare for my lectures. Every inch of my body screamed in agony. I struggled to take a bath and dragged myself to my morning lecture, which I was inevitably late for as I moved like a chameleon to avoid further damage to my aching muscles. I was convince I would die that day. I could not even laugh without feeling a hundred degrees of pain shooting through my body, I could not hug my friends. My ribs ached, my shoulders seemed damaged, my legs were heavy logs... Nothing on my body functioned the way it was supposed to. If I thought going to the lecture was difficult, I had a near death experience waiting for me on my way back. My room, H4 Swinton Hall was on the 2nd floor and now I had to go up the stairs. Those that have been beaten up by ruling party militia in a certain African country had nothing on me. I eventually got to my room and collapsed on my bed for what must have been several hours. The pain took more than a week to dissipate. Singende came to collect us for the next gym session, and said we needed to keep exercising for our bodies to become more resilient. Needless to say, he didn't see any of my teeth that day, or on any other thereafter. I avoided him like the plague, and he eventually gave up.

Gym circuit
  Photo by Allen Chipangura

More than a decade later, I joined gym again. I stick to the treadmill, stationary bike, cross trainers, and sometimes aerobics.

When I look at the circuit at my gym, which is quite cool for many, all I see is a mass of heavy metals with a potential to leave me bed ridden. One look at them and I'm on the verge of a panic attack. All because of Singende.I didn't even get to know his first name, but I know my children's children will get to know about him.This Singende who scared me off weights and is the reason why my arms aren't as toned as Michelle Obama's.