Why I Love Exercising in the Morning

I've always been a morning person.  I love to go to bed early (even though I struggle to achieve it now more than ever!), and I love waking up to hear the birds singing their morning songs.  

I love getting out in the early light, and I love the way the air smells in the first part of the day.  I love the way early morning exercise pumps energy and life into my whole day, and I love the way the time in the open air gives me time to think and pray.

The thing about living in south Texas in the summer is that even if I didn't love all those things, I would need to exercise as early in the morning as possible because it's the coolest time of day...which is about 80 degrees, of course.

And so I see all the regulars out on the path in the mornings, they too avoiding the hot part of the day--the lady walking with weights, the man on his bike who stops to do stretches and exercises at different intervals, the two women walking and talking together shading themselves with flattened cardboard boxes, the gentleman wearing the fire department t-shirt who told me all about the community garden next to the fire station when I stopped my run to find out about the hedge of grapes growing there.

Mr. Turtle on the path was a surprise, though.  His kind usually dwell down in the canal, and scamper into the water as soon as so much as a shadow crosses over their sun-drenched shells.  

I came upon him when I was feeling discouraged one morning, praying for God to help me overcome it, and you know what?  Mr. Turtle was a great distraction from my dark thoughts.

While he tucked his head under his shell, I stopped to look at him more closely.  His shell had a dent from an injury, but he was otherwise in tact.  What he was doing so far from the water's edge I couldn't tell, but I waited breathlessly until he peeked out to see where I was. 

Too close.  That's where I was.  The head disappeared again. 

I stepped away a space, and watched again.  I wanted to be sure he could find his way home.  While I didn't want to pick him up myself, I didn't want him to spend the rest of his life wandering the dusty path, either.

Sure enough, next time he poked his head out, he decided I was a safe distance away and turned toward the bank and started down it.  I watched him until he made it home, and then headed home myself, more ready for the day after a cheerful distraction, convinced afresh that exercise and time with my Lord in the morning is the best way to start the day.