Hey! Get Outta My Way!
In ancient times, children used to walk to school and would play outside whenever possible. They would ride their bikes to deliver newspapers, earning their spending money. Farmers used to walk behind their mules while they plowed their fields. Letter carriers walked their route to deliver the mail, and police would walk their beat, twirling their batons. Most people didn’t need exercise time, as their bodies were constantly in motion carrying out simple everyday tasks. Those days are long gone, as we mostly sit on our respective fat asses and talk about exercise. Not only that, but due to our collective inactivity, we have raised a generation of house puppies. Playing outside is a foreign term for them, and usually a punishment.
So what do we do? We walk in circles, run around tracks and ride our bikes. We do this not to go from point A to point B or to get to any particular destination. No, we are just trying to get our blood pumping and keep from having a coronary while eating potato chips, sprawled out on the couch, watching mindless TV.
I am a big advocate, and participate in various forms of exercise, trying to keep fit and trim (“trying” being the operative word).
I’m a walker, and people like me don’t like runners, as they typically knock us over and don’t smile when they blow by us. They’re all sweaty, and smelly, and often aren’t very friendly.
I’m also a runner, and my fellow runners and I don’t like walkers, as they tend to get in our way, and expect us to smile at them. We don’t smile because we are exerting enormous physical pressure on ourselves. And because we spend so much time sweating and stinking, we don’t have any more energy left to exchange any form of niceties.
Sometimes I’m a bike rider, and when I’m riding with my friends, we don’t like walkers and runners, as they don’t understand that we own the whole damn road, and they need to stay out of our way. We’re in a rush, trying to break the land speed record, so we have no time to even smile at them. They should actually be thankful that the wind we create helps to cool them off.
I’m most often a driver, and we drivers don’t like walkers, runners or bike riders, as they wind up cutting in front of us, causing us to pay more attention and slow down. We subsequently acknowledge them in a very different way, without even the hint of a smile. We’re so busy talking on our cell phones, texting, eating our lunches and listening to our radios, we only have time to greet them with a universally recognized hand gesture. And performing that act is the only form of exercise some of us ever get. No sweat.
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