Press ups and procrastination

If there was an Olympic category for procrastination, I would….. think about definitely finding out about maybe entering … and then miss the deadline.

I’ve been putting off writing an update on my blog for so long, I’ve forgotten why I don’t write anymore. And the longer I put it off, the harder it seems to be to start again. A bit like swimming.

I figured that three months of lockdown would definitely afford me enough time to knock out a ten minute blog entry. Well, as my Mother would say, ‘you know what thought did, don’t you?’ So I took a Buddhist course on attachment to possessions and decluttered my entire house. I did the garden. I cleaned the cooker (which is now dirty again – how very rude). I painted my toenails. I even, one fateful afternoon, tried actually doing some work (don’t tell my boss, it will just raise his expectations and nobody wants that).

Anyway, that was the final straw and I thought I’d better just open the laptop and start moving my fingers and see what came out. I thought I’d let myself off lightly and do an easy (ish) one. So, it goes something like this:

Near to the start of lockdown, we were all sat around chatting before the weekly zoom – based staff quiz. The Uber-boss asked what everyone had been doing during lockdown. He’s been learning Mandarin, apparently. Someone else is learning Japanese. My lovely colleague M- is learning to solve The Times cryptic crossword. That’s the trouble with working at a college, everyone is so bloody clever. There was a pause in conversation which I inexplicably decided to fill by saying…. “I’ve watched the whole of Gavin and Stacey”. I’ll get my (virtual) coat.

I thought I’d better achieve something. So, after several weeks of practise (following a couple of years of serious procrastination after my wonderful friend J- sent me an instructional video whilst getting fit for her paramedics physical exam), I am pleased to say that I can now do press ups (item number 61 off the list). More or less. I still can’t quite get my nose to the floor, but the knees are no longer a key player in this activity. It is even possible that I may have visible muscle tone in my upper body. So, I would like to say thank you to J- for her encouragement in this endeavour (as well as telling her again that I think that she is awesome for qualifying as a paramedic and carrying out her role over the last 3 months). I’d also like to thank Joe Wickes for making me realise that by comparison, doing ten press ups every morning wasn’t that bad.

I hope that whatever is going on for you, the person reading this, you are finding the strength to navigate it and are able to think of even the smallest positive every day, even if it’s just making it through to the end of it.

P.S. I just searched the media library using the term ‘press up’ to see if I could find a suitable photo for the top of this post. I couldn’t. They were all of sickeningly fit people looking happy whilst doing press ups. So there is a photo of a baby elephant instead.