Poor Acting and Long Distance Running

Yesterday I watched a terrible movie. Two of my friends had been planning on watching a movie starring Nicholas Cage for some time, and I managed to get myself invited.

The  irony of watching Snake Eyes, which was the show we settled on, on the heels of writing a piece about how much I love movies and how good I am at enjoying them did little to balance out the loss of one hour of my Saturday evening. 

Beyond that irony, my friends managed to enjoy the show much more than I did, if only because their sole endeavor for the night was to poke fun at every possible aspect of the movie.  

This incident was more of a side note which, rather like Cage's performance, doesn't really match with anything that follows. 

So I'll just jump right in. This weekend I went for a run on my own for the first time in maybe a year. I bring this up to point out a skill set I take for granted. It's easy to assume that something we had mastered at one point will always be with us. In this case I've assumed ever since my senior year that I had better aerobic endurance than most athletes just because I was a solid cross country runner my junior and senior years of high school. 

I've done next to nothing to maintain my ability, but this lack of effort only shows when I run. Since I have avoided running since the end of my senior year of high school, the problem was solved, so to speak. 

It's so easy to fall into the trap of believing that you're good at something just because you remember a time when you had a certain skill set nailed, but in the end giving ourselves extra credit for effort we haven't expended in months or years only builds unrealistic expectations. 

Today I put on a pair of worn out sneakers and went for a run. My stride rate was down, my shoulders didn't stay in a line, and most importantly, my lungs burned before I got to even three quarters of a pace I used to keep up for miles. But the feeling was amazing. Often when we abandon a skill set we don't just forget the details, we forget the whole reason we enjoyed doing a thing in the first place. 

I can only imagine that's how some people end up making the same facial expression into a camera for an hour at a time and get credited with acting.