I’ve always heard that things start to slow down as a person reaches my age. Considering how much of myself I put into everything, I never really believed it until today. But, man…
I suffered through yet another near sleepless night. The person in the room next door decided to be a total jack ass and try to open the adjoining door between our rooms. This resulted in my eyes popping open and vaulting out of my bed like a maniac. It was difficult to return to slumber after that.
I woke with my alarm at 5:30, wondering why the hell my alarm was going off at 5:30! When my senses cleared and I remembered where I was, I hopped out of bed and started my day.
The first half of my morning was pretty standard; administrative testing in multiple choice form. Although still a touch on the stressful side, it wasn’t anything I haven’t done many times before. The hard part would come later as I would have to run a physical assessment.
I chose to skip lunch, as eating would have had me running the test on a full stomach. This means that although I wasn’t feeling full or bloated when I got to the physical test, I was certainly hungry, which isn’t much better.
When my turn came to run, I took the starting line. I felt confident. After all, this was also a test I’ve done many times before. That confidence may have proved to be exaggerated. The first three out of six laps were easily doable and I was able to maintain a decent pace.
Right around the midway point of the fourth lap, the muscles in my legs turned lactic and I started to struggle. By lap five, my lungs turned to liquid fire and my legs and body decided to start ignoring the signals I was sending them to keep going. I forced myself through the final lap and moved on to the resistance aspect of the assessment, which included a number of semi-circles using a specialized weight machine. All of this had to be done within a specific number of minutes. As I had been warned I was nearing the time limit, I gave myself a final push and completed the last two semi-circles.
on the last semi-circle, the sole of my left running shoe dragged on the floor for about a half inch. That’s all it took. My weakened legs buckled and I went down. Then I drove all 210 pounds of my bulk head-first into the brick wall and crumpled to the floor unceremoniously.
Next thing I know, I have the instructors and several of the candidates standing over me. My face was numb, the left side of my skull was throbbing and I was seeing stars. My only concern was whether or not I had passed the test. Evidently, I made it but with only seven seconds to spare. I knew I had a hard head…
I took a couple of minutes to collect myself and finished the remainder of the test, which was an untimed portion. Once I knew I had passed, I stumbled back to my hotel and grabbed a shower and passed out for an hour. I think it may be time to get some food. This was day 2 of my strange odyssey. I have to make it through a full week. I wonder what the following days will bring…☯
