My heart pounding. Lungs burning. The sub-freezing air cuts into my chest with every stride. I gingerly plant one foot in front of the other through snowy terrain to avoid dangerous patches of ice lining the asphalt. My head is now pounding as I push myself to keep pace amidst snow slicing away at my ankle line. Finally the cranial pressure is too much, the white-out glare is magnified—I heave myself across one last stretch of my legs and drop. Hands on my knees. Panting. Gasping for air.

I’d been jogging for 3 minutes.

Loveland, Colorado is about 5,000 ft above sea level, which is about 5,000 feet above my Berkeley apartment. Accordingly, the altitude has its own special way of greeting the out-of-shape. It’s unfortunate that I subject myself to the pain of these Day Ones more often than not over the course of the year. So, it wasn’t any surprise that as I returned from a fruitful fall semester to the great state of the Rockies I’d find myself back in the panting and heaving state of Day One of getting back in shape.

About a week ago, I met a young gentleman from University of Florida at the airport just before my flight back. We’ll call him Marcus, since that’s the closest resemblance to his name that I can recall. Marcus, a relatively big guy, strutted up to me in baggy sweats carrying a long board as I waited in the Southwest Airlines on-deck line and immediately proceeded to compliment my shoes. Feeling good about my shoes, I struck up a conversation, and I would later learn that Marcus plans to attend dental school and used to play football before a shoulder injury. As the conversation progressed, I commented to Marcus that I see college as life in the extremes. We’re not sleeping one night for one reason and still not sleeping the next night for another. Whether or not it’s a choice or just the lack of maturity to commit to a consistent healthy lifestyle, college is a grand ol’ time to subject our bodies to the extremes.

I call it “rubber-banding.” And for me, exercising definitely falls into the rubber-band category. Regular workouts seem to only be either full on or full off, binary in nature. Hence, I find myself at Day One. The cycle generally involves me in some type of macho getting-buff competition during the Summer and betraying all efforts in the Fall as the schedule fills up. It’s just easier to rubber-band. I’m sure I’ll grow out of it when I’m older. Kinda like water wings.

Regardless, I figured it would be more auspicious to avoid making my Day One the first of the year since New Year’s Resolutions get a bad rap. And, I’m trying the keep the plan simple and stay realistic. There are two main steps. 1) Get Outside. 2) Move. And eventually we’ll build up to more extreme things like frozen lake parachute skating (I swear I just saw that the other day) and lifting big rocks.

So, here’s to the Day Ones, here’s to breaking the rubber-banding cycle of my exercise regime along with many other habitual extremes. Don’t worry, I won’t blog religiously about Day Two or Day Three, but you can do me a favor and send good vibes in hopes that this’ll be the last Day One at least for a little while.