So there I am: on my back, shoulder blades straddling the thin layer of padding wrapped in cheap, easy-to-wipe-away-the-sweat vinyl, staring up at the bar hovering just inches above my chest – as my arms, shoulders, and chest strain to overpower the law of gravity. My jaw is beginning to ache from unconsciously clenching it. (As though my biting down hard will somehow bring my undisciplined, thirty-something body into a zen-like state of coordination and power.)

Feeling exhausted and out of shape, trying hard to control my breathing (and frustration), I wonder how I got myself into this?

Perhaps I should explain.

Through years of benign neglect, the silent and insidious predator Atrophy crept into my world. Far enough away that I felt he posed no real threat, and so I tuned him out and failed to observe the way he quietly, nonchalantly sidled ever closer to my person… until one day I turned – to find him staring me down, point blank.

How did I let this happen? Oh, that’s right: life. I just got so caught up in business, and fathering, and home maintenance, and fishing – that I let my personal discipline and fitness take a backseat to convenience and more attention-demanding enterprises.

So these things go.

Fortunately, a dear friend – expert in all things fitness (and probably sick of hearing me whine) – invited me to make some changes. Wanting to take advantage of his skill set and desiring a better me, I agreed.

It started simply enough. He began to make some casual observations about my consumption habits. He noted how much crap I took in, and how I seemed to be lacking consistent, quality nutrition. Grumpy about having to exercise some actual self control and discipline, I nonetheless attempted to begin improving my intake…

Then came the workouts. Nothing big at first – just measuring up my fitness level (I’m not sure I was even on the scale one uses to measure such things). Testing my flexibility (somewhere between a 2×4 and a slab of granite). Judging my limitations.

Once my capacities were determined, however, the struggle began in earnest.

In the beginning, my hopeful optimism and reserved energies carried me through the discomforts and grueling tasks. But in a very short period of time, I found my enthusiasm waning, my go-juice evaporating, and a self-pitying sorrow creeping into my thoughts. I wasn’t far enough along to witness any return on investment, and I began to question whether the ends would ever justify the means.

Nonetheless, not wanting to be a quitter (and therefore a failure) I persevered.

Time passed and the program progressed, and (little by little) I began to notice a change. I was reaching a point of base stability that enabled me to complete my reps and endure the exercises.

Yet as soon as I began to feel competent, my friend felt that that moment was a terrific time to add weight to the bar, increase the reps, or introduce something new altogether. And so the pain, discomfort, sweat, and aches seemed to perpetually continue. A seeming cycle of progress with no apparent destination on the horizon.

Which brings me to the present: gulping for breath, the tendons in my neck straining like the strings of a guitar tuned 5 steps too high, blue vein wandering across my right temple like the satellite image of a pulsing river switchbacking across some barren, pale continent.

But as I feel my muscles giving out and the weights start to inch closer and closer to the floor (where I will most assuredly be in its way), I see my friend reach out towards the bar to prevent my collapse.

Through sweat-blurred eyes, I watch his arms extend and glimpse the scars in his down-turned palms (which he says no longer hurt – and yet they make me cringe every time I see them, remembering how I caused them) as those powerful hands close over this burden I haven’t strength sufficient to repel – and slowly, deliberately, almost torturously – He renders just enough assistance to enable me to slowly, weakly, feebly complete the effort.