Runaway Dork!

Dateline – 1971. I am 14 years old, and I’m changing my clothes for gym class. As I put my bell bottoms and tie die shirt in my locker and head for P.E, I remember thinking, “I’m not good at this. Do people think I’m a dork? Do I look like a dork?”

Not much has changed in 34 years.

I’m at the gym this morning, using a treadmill. Treadmills are these satanic instruments designed for ultimate humiliation. These evil machines do have some cool features. It has a stop, and start button. It has these numbers that flash and give you all sorts of useful information, like how many calories you have used, how many calories you are burning per minutes, how far you’ve gone, and how long you’ve been walking. It also has a number I have no idea what it is. I’m suspecting it’s my time of death.

The number I normally focus on is the distance traveled. When I started back to the gym a few weeks ago, my goal was to walk a mile before Angie graduated from high school. Over days of workout wonders, I can now do it in around 20 minutes. I’m sure that’s an Olympic record somewhere.

The number I focused on this morning was 3.3. It’s the speed that you are walking. You can dial the speed from 0, which I’m most comfortable, to some high number I don’t want to think about. I don’t want my obituary to read, “death by treadmill.” I’ve been doing 3.3 for a few days now. I’m guessing it’s over three miles an hour. I was pretty proud of myself until this morning.

Monday, May 22nd, must be National Treadmill Day, because all the treadmills were being used this morning. Normally I’m by myself. But this morning, we had a treadmill club going. So I stepped on. I pushed on and set the speed knob at 2.0; you know to warm up the old whatever muscles. The treadmills are side by side in a straight line, facing a few TV’s suspended from the ceiling. As I’m sweating to Katie Couric’s final days on the Today Show, I pushed my treadmill to 3.3. I couldn’t see Katie because sweat was blurring my vision. I couldn’t hear her charming commentary because of my gasping breaths. But I felt great. I was in a zone, so I did the unthinkable. I boosted my treadmill to 3.5! The wind was rushing by my head. Life was good. In fact, I was doing great until I glanced to my right and my left. The people around me were going at 4.6!

Did I mention they were women? One was casually talking on a cell phone. The other was listening to her I-pod. As I scanned the horizon, everyone was going faster than me! I was the dead weight in a power puff treadmill party! Instantly, I was 14 years old, and dork-like feelings rushed over me.

You know the feeling. People can do things better than I can do them. There are folks who are smarter, better looking, have more stuff, etc., etc., etc. When I find myself on this pity party treadmill, Christ pushes the STOP button, and reminds me that I am an adopted son (Ephesians 1) and an heir to the Kingdom (Ephesians 3). God loves me.

Even when I’m a dork!