It clicks and whirs.  It whines and squeaks.  The hard, moulded plastic seat makes my tailbone hurt.  We bought it for $45 in 1999.  It sat in the porch of our first apartment for a year.  It moved with us to the house by Lake Eugenia, sitting unused by the piano while I got fat on crackers, cheese and Judge Judy.  It wasn't until I had a baby and was relocated to my parent's basement that we became "friends".  Turns out having a baby is hard on your body.  I had constant back aches.  My wise physiotherapist mom said a little exercise might help.

The bike was set up in the barn where stone walls sweat and rabbit cages hung empty and musty.  I would venture down when Zander napped, equipped with water bottle and a firm determination to be skinny and back-pain-less.  My little CD player would bounce The Elms off the walls and I would power through, panting, wheezing and sweating in an ugly blue tank top and grey cut-off sweatpants.  It hurt.  It worked.  My back pain stopped.

Eight years later.  It lives in the kitchen now.  I try to make it a priority - especially when my jeans feel a little tighter than they did the week before.  At least three times a week.  It's still horrible.  The odometer crawls along that long path to a completed 10 kilometer ride.  10 kilometers because it's a nice even number and because it's long enough to make me feel like it's too long so I figure it's got to be long enough to do some good.  I usually watch television, turned up way too loud to hear over the bumps and clicks. Or, if Scott's watching a basketball game or something equally as boring, I'll prop a book on the handlebars and get in twenty minutes of reading.  

Kilometers 7 and 8 are the hardest.  I'm tired by 7 and I'm thinking it would be okay to stop - no one's keeping track except me anyway.  By 8 my thighs are burning and I'm breathing a little heavy but when I pass 9 I know there's only 1 left and anyone can bike 1 kilometer, right?

I doubt I'll ever join a gym.  I'm no spinner.  The idea of being in a room full of sweaty men in wife-beaters and svelte women in spandex terrifies me.  So, I will limit my exercise experience to a stationary bike sprint in front of the kitchen window and the endless sport of chasing after my three kids who, when distracted from their video games, can really move.