the necessary compulsion of excercise

On Saturday morning I take off on my bicycle with a couple thousand of my closest friends - including Lance Armstrong and some of his Team RadioShack teammates - on the Harpeth River Ride. I am doing the 62-mile course with mixed emotions. (Not sure how far Lance is riding or what his emotional state is.)

On one hand I love riding my bike and I see the benefit - or more accurately the necessity - of riding to get in better shape (another way of saying, "need to lose 20 pounds ... again"). On the other hand, after a long winter hibernation and then an early spring surgery, I'm not in the best shape of my life, a condition that both motivates and discourages the obvious cure. So I know full well that not all of the 62 miles promise to be fun. In the short time I've had to get ready for this modest ride I've discovered that after about 25 miles the gentle rolling hills of Middle Tennessee are not always so gentle.

I was sifting through some excerpts from Albert Schweitzer's Africa Notebooks and stumbled on this relevant observation the great missionary and humanitarian made as he conversed with the natives of Africa. They were curious as to the differences between themselves and the people of Europe where Schweitzer was born.

So I go on to tell them that in Europe people row for pleasure, a statement followed by uncontrollable laughter. ... I don't attempt to make clear to them what sport is. The conditions under which they live in so many ways compel them to use their physical forces and take exercise to a greater extent than they like, that they cannot understand at all how people can do so except under compulsion.

We may have a choice whether to exercise or not, but in our corner of the world where food is abundant and many of us ply a trade that is sedentary, it's not surprising we put on jogging shoes or head to the gym or hop on a bike under a certain compulsion, too.

So will I ride for pleasure or compulsion on Saturday? I'm telling myself it is for pleasure. But halfway through I may not be able to fool myself any longer. As is so often the case in life, the answer is a definite and resounding, yes.