Yesterday, I actually went to failure on both the back squat (at 100#) and the bench press (at 70#). By this I mean I actually collapsed under the bar during the last round of squats. (Hooray for those safety bar thingamajigs!)
The curious thing about the experience is that I wasn’t at all in pain and was taken entirely by surprise. I did rep #4 without incident, and then rep #5 completely took me down. I was just on the floor with no forewarning whatsoever. This happened to me once before when I was trying out Crossfit. There’s a threshold where adding just 5 more pounds to the squat load painlessly but inexorably forces me to the ground. I’m thinking it’s not muscle failure (there’s no real discomfort), but a function of neurological adaptation (or lack thereof).
Also, I somehow managed to accomplish all this collapsing so quietly that NOBODY noticed, not even the guy in front of the mirror FIVE FEET AWAY. Come on, guys. Throw me a bone here.
Ephemera
I’m solving that old equation: Exactly
How to undo
The geometry that holds us
Suspended
The diagram takes
A cunning shape
Sharp to the touch,
and precarious:
A cat’s cradle tangled
A jangling mobile hanged
On a steel wire net
It’s an acrobatic trick,
Disarming this love
Trip one wire, and the shock
Will set the rest to humming
Vibrating our small constellation till it shatters
Holding my breath
I clip at your heartstrings
Hoping this whole thing doesn’t shake apart
If I’m subtle enough
To slip the knots
You may never notice me let go
Even now I can feel us
Fragmenting
Hurtling
Casting off the vestigial
and essential
Indiscriminately,
And without forethought
All the while attempting
A casual disregard
for regret
Life used to be a death sentence. Just ask any fifteen-year-old. They can’t imagine being thirty – they just don’t have the life experience. But now that I’m thirty-four-point-seven-five, I find I can’t really remember what it’s like to be fifteen. I’ve got notebooks, old diaries in which I sporadically penned (penned! with a ballpoint!) entries about the usual politics of adolescence, AP exams, glee club practice, dieting, awful sitcoms – those were the days of my life.
Take a giant step back, and it’s pretty much the same these days. Do the politics of humanity ever really change? I remember reading Douglas Coupland’s “Life After God,” in which the characters were all preoccupied with the bomb; that was how the end was going to come for them. My generation doesn’t concern itself with nukes (although they’re still very much out there), but with plagues and zombies. The images in Alan Weisman’s “The World without Us” are alternately heartbreaking and comforting. They always feel compelling and somehow right. It’s probably human nature to feel like we’re on the cusp of the end times. (Also, maybe I should stop reading books about plagues and zombies.) Like a fifteen-year-old, I have trouble imagining the future 10 or 20 years down the line. The center will not hold, or it will not hold steady. Empires do fall, yes, and history repeats itself. But how quickly? Would I have time to build a family, grow old, have grandchildren? The economic climate makes it increasingly unlikely that I could ever provide even the basic needs of food and shelter to anyone.
But, still. Whether the world ends with a bang or a whimper, tomorrow will be another day. So maybe I should get on with my life.
