One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Today is already worse than yesterday, and it has no chance of catching up. It’s been boat raced. I’m sitting here writing this with an ice pack on my back. I thought today was going to be great. I woke up after a good night’s sleep. I had a great breakfast. I was out the door and headed to the gym relatively early. Then, barely into my workout, I felt a little pop in my lower back. What’s frustrating is that I wasn’t doing anything wrong. I’d warmed up just like I always do, and I wasn’t lifting heavy. I was lifting about 65% of my maximum. I wasn’t pushing it at all. I wouldn’t be so angry if I had been acting like an a-hole. I hate that I don’t know if this is a part of getting old, the vagaries of the muscles in the lower back, or a combination of both. I dropped everything and came home. It’s not a bad pull. I could’ve worked around it or pushed through it, but I’m trying to stay true to my new philosophy of training safely. But honestly, I’m having a crisis of faith. What’s the point of playing it safe when it seems there is no such thing? This seems to happen to me every time I get back on schedule. I get into a comfortable routine and then something derails me. I hurt myself or I get a cold or a hurricane hits. All I want to do is get in better shape, but my body fights me every step of the way. I’d stop doing the exercises that I injure myself doing, but that would remove about 75% of my workout. Maybe I should just skip the next seventy years and join an aqua-aerobics class with the other geriatrics. The Y even has one of those elevators that lowers invalids into the pool. The other people in the class can tell me what it was like during the Spanish-American war and when Oklahoma became a state. My back hurts and I’m not dealing with it.