My Hikes...My Half-Mary....MY LEGS!!!!!!!!

For those that don't know or can't quite get what exactly is happening in my life, let me be candid for a moment. I went to see the doctor in January for a respiratory bug I had. The assistant dude--nice kid--always weighs me. I find it INFURIATING, but whatever. And it's one of those doctor weight things. The kind with the sliding weights--you know what I mean? Sheeeeeeesh. Well, in January, I weighed in a paltry 292 pounds. WITHOUT my shoes on. 292. I was 8 pounds from 300. This, the guy who regularly goes out and teaches, announces, and makes other public appearances. 292. I stood there looking at the scale for a second with the P.A. walked away and thought, "What have I done?" The answer was simple.

Not a dang thing.

I've made some half-hearted attempts over the years to lose weight here and there. But the bottom line was that as of January, my 44 inch pants were TIGHT, and I had already "moved up" to XXL for my shirts long ago. Another minor eyeopener was for Christmas, my mother in law (The Mudda!!) gave me a VERY expensive dress shirt. One of those dress shirts made by two dudes with different names. Like...PEP...and BOYS. Something like that. She gave me a shirt with an 18 1/2 neck! And it FIT NICE. I was a lazy and sedentary oaf, I wasn't doing ANYTHING for me, and I decided...I had had it.

With the support of my wife with the disclaimer of "You've done this before" (insert--rolled eyes! LOL!!!) and not really believing I was going to do anything long term, and coupled with the threat of taking away my 24HR Fitness Card, I started my journey. You can read back on my Facebook status updates of how I was pretty religious about posting what I was doing when I was doing it. It was my game plan--and Facebook was part of it.

You see, I am ALWAYS being made fun of. That's because my personality is such that I'm usually at the receiving ends of jokes and jabs, and that's cool. Always been that way. But I do hate the pain of being "called on the carpet" for something. And in this weird reverse psychology "plan" I had, I figured if I just started posting a TON of physical fitness updates and results, that I would show that I was in fact SERIOUS, people would notice, and then....THEN...if I got LAZY which is TOTALLY my M.O. (modus operandi for you non-Latin types), I would start getting CRAP from my friends. I was strangely motivated to NOT get crap from people because getting serious crap is embarrassing, and it ticks me off.

Then, using technology, I thought to myself, "Self, you should take pictures to PROVE you are actually doing what you say you are doing." So, I would take pictures of displays of various cardio-machines I was using over the last several months and started talking about my weight going down.

Then, two VERY unexpected things occurred.

The first and most important was HOW FREAKIN' GOOD I FELT!!! My attitude got better. My confidence got better. I stopped WORRYING and started DOING SOMETHING. I was being proactive about me. PERIOD. No one else "mattered" in the sense that I was doing this for anyone. I guess to some extent I could extrapolate I was doing this for my family (by living longer I hope), but it was not a motivator. I was doing this FOR ME.

Secondly, and almost as importantly, I started getting some very very interesting messages either on FB or in my email. They were from people that were telling me that they were being motivated by me and my example. I had no idea, no plan, no intention of doing that. Seriously. I was so motivated by MY failure and to change me and to be accountable to that, that I simply didn't even think of what others would think and DO SOMETHING like I was doing BECAUSE I was doing it.

You want to talk about motivation. When I have some pretty big names privately telling me good job and they were doing something themselves, I realized the power of example, and of course the power of FB for GOOD. But more importantly, because I was kicking my OWN butt on a regular basis, others were thinking, and rightly so, "if that fat butt can do it, SO CAN I!" I was PUMPED UP!!! It MATTERED what I was doing beyond my paltry self. It was not a prideful thing. It was a moment where I thought that I was really helping and really making some kind of difference in my own, "H"-powered way.

But then it became a moment of asking myself "What else can I do???"

About the time I started asking that question, and I was starting to feel the Demon of Laziness coming back into my body after a great first four months of being dedicated to working out, an old former drill designer/drum corps brother contacted me via FB seemingly out of the blue-Dave Tuttle. I had seen his status updates where he was out running and logging his mileage electronically with a Garmin GPS device. Thought it was cool. And so we started chatting online, trading compliments back and forth for working out, and insults against each other's drum corps we marched in (he the Blue Devils, me the ever-powerful Velvet Knights). And in what I call a moment of "put up or shut up", he did what any good drum corps brother would do. He challenged me....to be BETTER. He said I was probably ready to do a half marathon.

Now I had other people tell me the same thing "in passing"...like my former horn instructor with VK--a great guy by the name of Dave Elder. He's a runner, and said I should join him on a half-mary. A fellow dispatcher from Ventura County Fire I worked with last summer on assignment in Riverside said the same thing to me, and I ignored her statement as that of someone who totally overestimated my abilites. But Tuttle's challenge to me was different.

Of course, I denied my ability. Thought of a thousand reasons why I couldn't. Figured I could get a doctor's note saying that I was in fact out of mind, simply too fat, and directing to Tuttle to stop playing mind games with me. But he persisted. And then, in TRUE drum corps-level competitive spirit, he said two things that motivated me.

First, he said, "Yeah, that's ok. I'd still beat you in the race anyway--just like the Blue Devils should beat the Velvet Knights." I bleed red and gold, and them is fighting words. But then...he invoked the "Back to the Future" weapon.

He asked, "What....are ya chicken???"

Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly I became. And I said, "Great timing. This will put more wind into my sails, get my goals reset, and provide me the motivation to get OUT of my comfort zone." Ummmm...yeah Turner. 13.1 miles is WAY THE HECK out of my comfort zone. You should have seen my wife's face when I proudly announced I was running the Fontana Half Marathon. She grabbed the White Pages and started to furiously thumb through, frantically looking for a listing. "What are you doing!?" She said something about "I need those men in the white coats for you, 'cuz you done lost your mind!!"

So last weekend, with nerves jangling, knees knocking, stomach churning, and my brain screaming at me to "STOP THIS FOOLISHNESS--FIND A DONUT STORE NOW!!!!!!!!!!!", I embarked on a personal voyage that took me out of the mountains of the Lytle Creek area, and down to the Fontana City Hall, 13.1 miles and 2hrs 43mins and 59 seconds later.

I admit it. I cried when I crossed that finish line. Because no matter the pain I had, the drenched clothes I was wearing, and the lack of experience that was mine, I DID IT!! It was an amazing thing. And there was Tuttle, who I paced for 10 miles and eventually did pull ahead, and as a Blue Devil should, beat this Velvet Knight, but who as a true drum corps brother and friend, was RIGHT THERE at the finish line giving me a high five.

For those that haven't marched drum corps, you may not understand the connection us "band geeks" have. But that was a moment that's seered into my memory...me crossing the finish line, and having a drum corps brother there to make sure he saw it. Next time Tuttle....VK BEATS THE BLUE DEVILS!! :-)

This hike today, and the other hikes I've documented have been part of my seemingly never ending desire to continue to challenge myself on MY terms. When I hiked the Henninger Flats a few weeks ago, I hadn't done that in 20 years! I knew it was going to be challenging but I knew I HAD to do it. And I did!!

Today, after reading about it on line, and knowing about it all of my life, I finally decided to try the Mt. Wilson Trail above Sierra Madre. It's regarded by many as a difficult hike. I SHOULD THINK FREAKIN' SO!!!!!! There are three "stops" on the way...First Water, Orchard Camp, and Second Water. The LAST stop is 7 miles up, at an elevation of about 4000'. Give or take a few. Hundred. My goal this morning--at least what I told my wife--was to go "4 up and 4 back." Heeeeee heeeee...silly boy. I forgot about that OTHER demon that got into me recently that won't let me look at signs on a trail without having the unquenchable need to be say, "ohhhhhhh I can do THAT!" At First Water, the sign beckoned me. Only 2 more miles to Orchard Camp. "Ohhhhhhhhhh I can do THAT!!!" Then the stupid sign at Orchard Camp...only 1.5 more miles to Second Water. "Ohhhhhhhhhhh I can do THAT!" Before I knew it, I was sitting on a bench at a place called Manzanita Ridge, looking up at Mt. Harvard and Mt. Wilson, and LITERALLY saying out loud, "I should go home now..." and my brain yelling back, "But YOU CAN DO THAT!!!!!!!"

My mileage may not be exact, but I made it to place that I visited back when I was in my early 20's. I LOVE Mt. Wilson. There's an observatory up there, and all those TV towers, and other weird things. And I would regularly drive up there and hike around by myself--nothing major. Just exploring. And where I eventually hiked to was at the bottom of the old "toll road" that zig zags down from Mt. Wilson to where I was standing at the base of Mt. Harvard. I remembered 20 some odd years ago standing at that spot, and then, in typical "H" fashion, ignoring the signs saying STAY OUT and walked to the top of Mt. Harvard to see the super secret construction on some transmission station. Well?!?!? They should have locked the stupid gate. But it was cool standing there.

Anyway...this is REALLY long and I sort of don't know why I'm babbling on. But the mileage wasn't important. What WAS important was that I kept challenging myself today, and even though I'm injured minorly--left knee is a little "inflamed"--I pushed myself and I "won".

Just a side note--if you want to have a TRUE physical work out....do the Mt. Wilson trail from bottom to top. And then, realize, that those steep switchbacks you went UP....you're going to have to COME DOWN. And in true irony, it was HARDER for me to come DOWN the stupid trail then it was to go up. Hence....my left knee.

Hope you enjoyed reading....