Count on Me

I told the head of group exercise at my gym that she could count on me to wear an AARP-sponsored pedometer for 10 weeks, with the goal of taking at least 10,000 steps a day. Unfortunately, I’m not even close to meeting this goal, so my failure has turned me into a petulant pedometer pooper (which every party has, all alliteration aside).

I mean – how on earth is it possible that I, Ms. Flibber-de-Gibbet, the Original Restless Leg Swinger, am only averaging 5,000 steps a day, considering all I do is walk, exercise, then walk some more? Explain why no matter how I try to up my step quotient, I remain lower than low on the totem pole. I’m all ears, since these feet don’t seem to be doing enough walkin’.

My newest illogical answer is that I must be moving my legs and size 7 feet too fast for the pedometer to accurately measure my steps; therefore, it’s the pedometer’s fault, not mine.

As if.

Seriously, though – how can it be my fault, when I rarely sit still (even when I’m typing on the computer or checking email)? How come I, uber diligent student and slave that I am to this stupid, frickin’ black and white plastic clip-on box, am not in the top 50,000 step range, considering that I even clip the thing on my underpants when I get up, so that (God forbid) I won’t miss counting a step before I get my pants on? How come, now that I go out of my way to run up and down the stairs even more now than I did before I had to count my steps, they don’t add up?

I’ve decided that it’s your turn to explain, because this morning when I went to yoga, which was taught by a new instructor whose voice was pitched so low and New Age water-dripping-down-the-stones music was so droningly and ear-splittingly loud I couldn’t hear most of what she was telling us to do, I barely moved, let alone took steps. But, when I got home and checked my pedometer, it said I was up to 7,221.

I am no longer holding myself accountable, even though I try so hard. Maybe I do not understand, because something is happening here, but I don’t know what it is. Do you?