Who’s Who
Kelly Mills: Editor
Okay, here’s the dirt on me: I’m a big-time exercise fiend, I teach fitness classes, and I run five times a week. I’ve done races and triathalons. I also write about health for a living.
However, for the majority of my life, I believed I was not an athletic person. I thought this was just how it was: I’m not left-handed, I’m not perky, I’m not athletic. I never played any sports and I thought sweating was something to be avoided. In school I was picked for teams somewhere between the kid on crutches and the kid with the inch-thick glasses who grew up to run a computer company and now owns three small islands. If you threw a ball to me I’d run away from it. I probably caught more balls with the back of my head than I ever did with my hands. I got straight C-minuses in high school P.E., which is basically the best grade you can get if you spend most of the period hiding under the bleachers doing illegal substances. I dabbled a little in exercise at various points in my life, mostly at chain gyms, and mostly without enthusiasm.
Then, during my pregnancy I gained at least 65 pounds. I say “at least†because once I passed 200 pounds, I started averting my eyes when my doctor made me step on the scale. After my daughter was born, I expected the weight to drop right off like everyone says it will. They lie.
My weight just jumped all over the place until one day my very forceful friend Juliet decided we were going to start running, and basically dragged me to the track. We began running regularly, panting through two miles, complaining and swearing the whole time. We both hated running. Hated. It. But it made us feel virtuous and helped with the weight loss, so we kept at it. Slowly, over the course of a year, a freaky thing happened. We got faster. We upped our distance to three, four, then five miles. We ran six days a week. And most bizarre- we both started to like running.
So now I’m kind of a jock and I think you can be one too, if you are so inclined. Or just get in better shape or whatever. But no matter what you do, you shouldn’t have to feel crappy about yourself. Unless you are into that sort of thing.
I channel your high school gym teacher.
That’s pigtails- I don’t have a mullet.
Eric Knight: Technical Warrior
Eric tries to help me with my site. He wishes I would get a new template. He tries to teach me shortcuts. I nod and then do some really laborious coding because it is what I’ve always done. He throws up his hands, but keeps trying anyway.
He works out at Modern Combatives. He went from having no abdominal strength to being Mr. Ab Guy. That’s actually what it says on his driver’s license: Mr. Ab Guy.
