Of Being Tempted To Exercise

Anyone who knows me, knows that Exercise and I are not exactly soul mates. When I was younger, I was - amazingly - actually pretty sporty: I swam, played badminton, went horse-riding, and even learned how to do backwards somersaults on the trampoline. Heady days indeed. And how long ago they seem! After I became ill with M.E. at the age of fourteen, exercise was out of the question - for a long while I barely had enough energy to move from bed to the sofa. To be fair, a lot of the activities had stopped earlier ... but my illness really put the kibosh on any that remained. Thankfully, since I started university, my health has (touch wood), basically been fine, but even though I'd now count myself as pretty well completely recovered, somehow I've never quite managed to recapture that childhood enthusiasm for sporting activities... 

Even when I was younger, I was never a fan of team sport (well, I played netball for a while, but I think that was just because I liked the little pleated skirt you got to wear), and I have to confess to skipping the descriptions of hockey matches and tennis tournaments in the school stories of my childhood. All that whacking sticks around in the mud never quite appealed, and I think I just have an innate horror of anything requiring a gum-shield. Even quidditch never fired my imagination - I always thought that the beginning of Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire would have been vastly improved by a fat red pen slicing through 90% of the description of the World Cup.

I did, however, go for a while to pilates classes, and then did a term of yoga in my third year as an undergrad, which I actually really enjoyed. Unfortunately, when the enthusiastic American friend who came to yoga with me went back across the pond, I never quite made it to classes on my own the following year. But I've been thinking recently that with the amount of time I spend sitting hunched over a desk, if I don't want to end up a wizened old woman with a hump by the time I'm 30, I should probably do something about it. And recently I came across an excellent added incentive in this divine yoga mat and kit bag. The line has just been introduced by the wonderful oGorgeous:

Now, this is really my kind of exercise bag! The bags came to my attention thanks to a feature on the fabulous style and lifestyle blog Modish, and they come in various designs, although the one with the bow (rather aptly called Fashionista) is far and away my favourite. It would go so nicely with my current handbag... If anything is going to inspire me to find a new yoga class, this is it!

And as Sir W, in his essay 'Of Life, and the Fashions of Life' (1600) reminds me, when I enjoy Good Food as much as I do, a little exercise once in a while may not be such a bad thing...

'I am afraid our much Eating, and little Exercise, is the cause of this our lowe flying, and heauinesse: our many Crudities send vp dull heauy vapours, that makes vs like better of a bed, then of a saddle.'