About Me | Park City Photographer
TGIF :: It’s Friday. Get fired up.
I was power walking the other day and I realized that I don’t write too much about myself. I mean, I write a lot about V and about my work, and I figure people will infer my personality from my writings, but I guess I don’t post material explicitly ‘About Carla.’
Not that anyone’s dying to read my autobiographical stuff. But whatevs. Sometimes I like to share tidbits.
So, yeah, I was power walking the other day. Which I do, most days. When my daily exercise isn’t power-walking, it’s doing kickboxing and core-centric pilates exercises in my living room. I work out 6x a week. Not cuz I love it but because I’ve struggled with my weight my entire life. It sucks, to be honest, but I’m never going to give up trying my damndest to look cute.
The thing is, though: I’m anything BUT cute when I’m working out. Aside from the whole I-perspire-a-lot thing (wow, I’m painting a very elegant picture of myself right now), I actually look like a reject from a Muppet movie about jazzercise. I sport a Staying Alive-style white sweatband, cheap hiking-ish sneakers from TJ Maxx (I actually don’t know what they are – almost like high-tops-cum-boots), a giant black/blue sweatshirt that screams WOINK across my chest (a friend of mine started his own brand a few years ago and this sweatshirt is a hold-over from those days), and navy stretchy pants. It’s sexiness embodied, really. The only time I looked better was when I used to strap 10lb weights to each of my wrists, which is something I stopped doing when my upper body started going all Schwarzenegger.
And then there’s the way I powerwalk. It’s like I’m on an f’n mission, my friends. Arms pumping, elbows flailing, hips swaying. Occasional melodic shoulder roll if I’m really digging the song I’m listening to. Let’s just say that I’m more this than your typical worker-outer.
That’s my look. And perhaps the only thing more horrifying is the fact that my power walking takes place along the side of a highway, so truckers are always honking their huge horns at me. Are they ‘you go girl!’? Or very, very lonely & misguided people?? I’m not sure.
It reminds me of when I used to live in Chicago, and I’d don similar garb (with the addition of ice spikes for my shoes) to go for a jog in the middle of winter or, even, a snowstorm. I’d be the only person out on the sidewalks, and the occasional driver on the road would honk, or waive, or roll down their window to stick out a thumbs up at me. I like to think that, the majority of the time anyway, these people weren’t making fun of me but encouraging me. Cuz, no matter what I looked like or weighed, I was working it. Right there, in 9 degree weather, in mid-winter Chicago.
My athletic abilities have never been astounding, but they’ve been consistent since I was little. When I played soccer, people would give me the ball cuz I could kick hard & far. When I played field hockey, people gave me the ball because I could hit it hard & far. When I played volleyball, people gave me the ball because I could smack it hard & far. Sensing a pattern? When you the tallest & strongest person on the team starting at age 6, you have certain advantages and skills that don’t have anything to do with ‘talent,’ per se, and everything to do with physics. As I grew up, I shied away from team sports and started working out on my own — things like swimming, running, and dancing. And by ‘dancing’ I don’t mean ballet in a studio or anything. I mean jacking up your stereo and Flashdancing yourself sweaty in your bedroom.
Anyway, these days, my athleticism is limited to showcasing my mad skills in the privacy of my own home (or for the viewing pleasure of the truckers of HWY40). And that’s a little about me today, and my mad, mad, mad fitness-ness.
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