XLVI. Repetition Elimination -

Four months before I again embark on the journey I consider to be academic escapism is a God-sent…Well, more like six more days left of twenty that was and is the period between my last college exam and my last return to campus for graduation. The rest of my four months will be spent either in a book-shop, a hospital or private medical clinic, or a sky-scraper in the financial district - still waiting on replies.

Not everyone equates home with relaxation. For a majority of those people I met in college, they could not relate to my love for home. However, they could relate to what, for me, home translated to.

Home, for me, when you break it down to its core, translates into a type of relaxation.

For those others, said relaxation occurs in resorts and modes of transport that either take them to tropics, such as the airplane, or occur within the tropics, such as bungee cords, boogie boards and other small water-travel floatation mechanisms that include, but are not limited to, canoes and rafts.

The past two weeks I have been at home I have been consuming about 800 or so more calories/day than when I am in college.

I no doubt feel a new layer of flesh forming over my once somewhat scarily exposed rib-cage. I was too scared to explore my rib-cage with my hand to the point of feeling underneath the bones farthest away from the chest, also known as the “floating ribs”. My fear was feeling some internal anatomy that should best be left untouched.

I knew that this whole recreation of eating would present itself but I was under the assumption that I would steadily be working off the newly superfluous unwelcome calories with long walks around my hood and innumerable sets of crunches.

I do enjoy taking long walks at a New Yorker pace, a little less hyper than race-walking, and in spectator-attire, not polyester-nylon blended/regardless of whether or not you are a size 0-flab-exposing work-out-wear.

Walking is my under-cover exercise.

Walking is my inconspicuous way of feeling the burn and is partially why I choose not to re-learn driving which can become burdensome when say, pouring rain is unleashed from the Long-Island clouds, but then again such torment is indicative of the validity for walking being synonymous to a full work-out.

However, after taking a walk around the hood, I became disinterested by my surroundings and came back home to the realization that I really didn’t want to go on a long walk around here again - on any of the three nearby avenues and certainly not during the summer when I have to shed my outer-layers because despite wearing the baggiest of clothing, the landscapers will still ogle, the elderly will still try to categorize you, and the youth will still mistake you for being their age and perhaps think they know you.

I felt bad. I needed to work out and living in a two-family house, dancing around will only cause the bottom story to shake, further making me feel heavy, despite the fact that a forty-pound baby prancing around would cause the same seismic effect.

I was saved by the rain. After that day I went on a walk, the next seven or so days it was raining and so walking was naturally out of the question.I do not find getting wet to be pleasant and yes, it is OK for you to conclude that I am not the most carefree of persons.

But today has arrived six days left before I have to wear my size 0 graduation dress, and it is pleasant outside. Seems like a good day for walking though every fiber of my being is resisting having to see the same sights and listen to the same uploaded songs on my Blackberry from three years ago.

It is time to work-out and eliminate repetition by joining a gym and running on the treadmill of all things.

The gym presents a major form of focus for me - the idea of spending money means that I have to make every dollar be utilized.

Plus, I would still have to walk to get to the gym, passing by Gurudwara on the way - a perfect self-motivator, not to mention to that everyone else in the gym will be focused on their own work-out, making their money count, discounting the repetitive interactions I would otherwise have with people staring and what not.

Until I attain gym membership, the tenants will just have to deal with my my makeshift-dance-studio arrangements.

Here’s to repetition elimination -