Introduction & Early Stages

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July 2001

Thursday, July 05, 2001

Summer means two things to me: heat and humidity. It also means ‘scattered thunderstorms likely in the afternoon’, just about every day. To me, it’s a nightmare because everything I do it seems like I hurt a little bit more and more. This whole week, as a matter of fact, has been pretty crappy – as far as how I feel. That’s why summer time in New York means achy backs and trouble getting out of the car.

But the good news is that Shayne is home from her session out west. The two of us got to spend the day together and will spend the rest of our break together. She’s one of three people in this world that I let my guard down and let my true colors show through. For everyone else I am always smiling and always saying how everything is okay – no matter how achy I am. When anyone asks me “how are you feeling?” I always reply “I’m feeling good, much better, thank you for asking”. With Shayne, my mom and my brother I do not hide anything. When I can’t cut my chicken, I let her know. When I can’t get up from the couch, she gives me a hand. When I can’t do anything or when something hurts, the three are the first and last to know.

So when Shayne and I got together for the first time in a month, it was a weird feeling to have somebody respond to how I feel. Even something as minor as an expression on my face was enough for her to know that I wasn’t comfortable.

So even though it’s summertime and I can’t stand the weather, with the bad comes the good.

Monday, July 09, 2001

It’s been a tough few days for me. I was hit with the realization that I am overweight. By my standards at least. I came to this conclusion Friday as I was at the movies uncomforably watching “A.I.” with my pants undone and my belt loosened. While this may sound like a good Pee Wee Herman impersonation, I was very upset. I went straight home, sobbed for 10 minutes with the closet door open and a wardrobe of pants that no longer fit staring at my sorry ass.

Declaring a state of emergency probably wasn’t the best thing to do, but desperate times call for desperate measures. I hit the floor and immediately started doing back-wrenching sit-ups; muscle tightening pushups and extemporaneously finished with useless stretches. In the middle of my floor, wearing nothing but boxers and socks, I sat short of breath and covered in sweat. Again, I thought to myself, a pretty good Pee Wee Herman impersonation. Only unlike Pee Wee, I was in pain and upset beyond belief.

I knew from that moment that I wasn’t going to be able to work out like the next person. I wasn’t going to cut the fat away without expecting a lot of pain. And that a plan was definitely necessary if I wanted my flat-front chinos to fit once again.

Except I couldn’t get off the floor.

Tuesday, July 17, 2001

Over the weekend I hung out with Shayne. She had some family friends over for a BBQ, and since her father ran away to the computer room, I was left to grill the food. One thing I don’t understand about grilling chicken, is how do you know when it’s done? I didn’t want to undercook the food – because uncooked chicken is enough to make anyone hurl – but I didn’t want to burn it. After turning and turning the chicken on a low flame (for 30 minutes) the crown began to get anxious. So I turned the flame up a little bit. Then some more and more and finally I burned the goddamned chicken.

So I’m an idiot. But as I was looking at the chicken not cooking on a low flame, and as I was getting hungrier and hungrier, I had a flashback to highschool English class. Suddenly, in a zone, I was the chicken breast. And getting cooked was a metaphor for getting in shape. Slowly turned on a low flame wasn’t going to cook the chicken, just like stupid range of motion exercises wasn’t going to get me a 6-pack. Turning the heat up to high and roasting the suckers was only going to burn them. Just like I did 50 sit-ups yesterday and wasn’t able to move this morning, I burned my body badly. And I just didn’t have patience to stick around for results. I was hungry.

So as I was the last one to finally eat, and after the grill was shut off, did I realize how I have to somehow modify my exercising so that I lose weight and not hurt myself. I can’t exercise with a low flame but I can’t burn myself on high heat. Maybe the next person at the gym is able to max out bench pressing, but I can’t afford to burn the chicken again.

Monday, July 23, 2001

Yesterday I spent the day with Shayne at her old sleep-away camp. It was alumni day for campers and counselors, so we took a ride upstate so she could pay her visit. There she met all of her old friends and people she has known for the two generations that her family has bunked in the rustic outdoors of scenic New York. The day was fun but tiring; long but exciting.

Clearly the highlight of my day (of my week?) was meeting a very special alum of the camp – Jerry Stiller. Our words were brief since he was eating his lunch under the tent and I didn’t want to disturb him. Approaching him, I said “Mr. Stiller, I want to thank you on behalf of my entire family for the work that you do. Please continue to bring us joy”, in a respectful but nervous voice. “Thank you son, what is your name?” he said. “Seth Ginsberg” I replied, as though I were a nine-year-old girl meeting N’Sync. “Your kind words mean a lot to me. Thank you.” He said, and I shook his hand and walked away before I was able to make a fool out of myself. Returning to Shayne (who was more interested in her old friends than the superstar I just met), I began recalling all of the scenes from “Seinfeld” and “King of Queens” that have made us laugh well into the nights that they aired. I had met true greatness, and at a camp of all places.

Walking around the lake later on that afternoon, I began thinking about what it would be like if I went to camp this summer (which I haven’t done since I’ve gotten sick – but not because I got sick). After the walk up and down the hills on the dirt roads from my car to the lake, I was already feeling the wear-and-tear on my knees and hip. Looking at the kids run around with endless energy, I thought to myself “how in the world was I able to do this?” The thought of spending an entire day (not even a full summer) playing sports and running around made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I can’t get off low couches without help anymore, lest row myself to victory in a boating race or boot in the winning run in kickball. I guess times have really changed.

What upset me the most was thinking about all of the things that I used to love to do. The nostalgia of a group of 12-year-old boys playing kickball or some 15-year-old boys playing softball really sunk a bad feeling into my stomach. I felt isolated, I felt old and I felt very badly about myself and the condition I was in.

But I felt better knowing that not being able to do even the simplest things at a camp anymore gave me one more thing to have in common with Jerry Stiller.

Tuesday, July 31, 2001

I have started to realize that time goes by a whole lot faster when I’m not sitting in my room feeling sorry for myself. Even if it means going 2 miles down the road to fill up my car with gas, I am still getting out, talking to the attendant and actually appreciating all that I have.

It’s really easy to sit at home, in my favorite part of the couch – that I have seemingly molded with the contours of my ass – and just stare at the TV all day. But that ain’t gonna help. Theoretically I could do nothing all day and just keep buying bigger and bigger pants to fit. But what good would that do? Sure, being a ‘husky’ size is something that Shayne would make fun of me about, and hopefully it will never get to that point, but would I really be better off? I honestly don’t think so – which is why I will work harder and harder to prevent it. Basically, in the last two weeks it really clicked. I got connected to my body and to my mind and realized that just because I have a problem, or just because it hurts to walk doesn’t mean I can’t do it at all.

And another thing, this weekend I was up in Boston for the AJAO regional conference. Met lots and lots and lots of really great people. Many already members of CreakyJoints, which let’s face it, was really flattering and somewhat a shock. And in the last two years of being in the business of helping others, I haven’t had all that many opportunities to take my parents along with me. The fast pace of squeezing speeches and appearances at events into a college schedule was entirely too much for two semi-retired parents. But the love and the appreciation of including them in my weekend was really important, and something I will do more often. They’ve always been my two biggest supporters, and at the end of the day, the two that understand the most what I’m going through.