“I’m learning to walk again.
I believe I’ve waited long enough.
Where do I begin?”
–Foo Fighters, “Walk”

Let me tell you a story.

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

Not so long ago in a big concrete building full of shops, there was once a girl.  Well, I mean, there have been–and continue to be–lots of girls in this building (which isn’t a castle), but I’m talking about a specific girl.  One day, this specific girl found a specific pair of jeans for a spectacularly low price.

She was elated, but her heart sank when she saw another number on the tag–a number that was not her size.

The girl told her hand to put the jeans back on the rack, but her hand wouldn’t listen.  Then she got an idea.

I know! she thought.  Maybe I could be that size!

But that would be a silly waste of money, a tiny voice said in the back of her mind.  If you don’t shrink those few sizes, then you’ll have wasted two dollars.

I can do it! the girl resolved.  I will buy these jeans and they will be my motivation.  I WILL WEAR THESE PANTS.

So she made her way to the cash register and forked over two dollars, probably in quarters.  When she got home, she hung the jeans on the back of her bedroom door so that they were one of the first things she saw in the morning and one of the last things she saw at night.

I can do this, she told herself again.  I will wear these pants.

Every time she passed them, a small thrill of excitement would race through her.

For a few days, anyway.

The girl got distracted.  Many mornings, she would roll out of bed half asleep and already running late.  At night, she would go into her room and collapse or busy herself reading until she couldn’t keep her eyes open.  Eventually, the jeans on the back of her bedroom door became nothing more than a fleeting streak of denim in the corner of her eye.

One day not so long ago, she awoke to find the pants crumpled on the floor.  The hook they hung on had broken.

The girl sighed, picked them up, hung them in the closet, and began her day.  The jeans stayed on their hanger until she nearly forgot about them.

Not so long ago, in a house not terribly far away, that girl decided to force herself to remember.

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

On the whole, it’s probably a bad idea to buy clothes that don’t fit and hope that you could someday wear them.  I know that Stacy and Clinton from What Not to Wear generally advise against it.  Some might call it altogether stupid.

Well, it’s too late for me.  I’ve already done it, and the only way to justify that two-dollar purchase (I know, right?!  A pair of jeans for two dollars!) is to get myself into them.  I happen to have a plan this time, though.

I’m going to walk/run/bike/somehow go 1,500 miles by the end of the year.

IMPORTANT NOTE:  On my treadmill or a machine, probably.  I’m also probably not going to run so much.  I’ve never been a fan.  I’m not Forrest Gump. 

I’m calling it my 1,500 Mile Project.  Now, how did I get decide 1,500?  It’s really very simple.

Including today, there are 267 days left in 2013.  I decided that I would try five miles a day, which would be 1,335 miles total.  Well, I wanted my overall goal to be a rounder number, so I upped it.  Fifteen hundred miles averages about 5.6 miles a day.  I’m sure I’ll never stick to exactly that every single day, but as long as a I walk/go some distance every day, I can definitely get to 1,500 overall by December 31.

I’ve also made myself a couple of rules:

1. I’m not trying to fit into a size zero.  The jeans are a very achievable, “regular woman” size.  If I work hard, I can definitely get there.  However, my goal is not to just fit into the jeans, but to get healthier overall–which means making better meal choices, being more active, and having more discipline (which I hope will help with my writing, too).
2. I’m going to start blogging twice a week–I SWEAR.  Every Monday, I will check in with my progress on my 1,500 Mile Project journey and trying to get healthy.  At some other point in the week, I’ll post something else so that I can keep some variety.  I like variety.
3. I’m not going to wear a pedometer to count how far I walk at work and such.  Only miles gone when I am consciously making a point to work out count.  To get healthy, you have to do more than what you normally do every day, and that is what the 1,500 Mile Project is for–extra.
4. I can/will do additional workouts (weight lifting, aerobics, whatever), but there is no conversion of physical activity to distance.  Basically, I cannot ever say, “Well, I did an hour of zumba, so I’m going to say that’s basically my five miles today.”  I must actually be able to count the miles.

I’m going to go 1,500 miles, starting today.

Goal Jeans, here I come.