the things i do for you.

Last Saturday, dear Kolton and I were sitting around with not a whole lot to do.

It had been a long week of school and we were definitely enjoying the day off, but there are only so many hours you can stay cooped up in a little apartment listening to your next door neighbor practice his trombone...or is it a trumpet? All I know is that it's not exactly the kind of music I would choose for an afternoon serenade. 

Anyway.

So while we were sitting around being bored and stuff, Kolton suggested we go for a bike ride.

I perked up at this idea and thought what a lovely idea it was, and what a perfectly smart/romantic/good thinker husband I married.

So I changed into a leisurely bike ride around town outfit and bounded out the door so excited about this idea.

Thirty minutes later, straddling my bike and staring up at a succession of three giant hills, I wasn't so excited about this bike ride idea.

Cue: pathetic whining

"But hooonney.....that hill is huge. like, huge.

I can't do it.

I don't want to do it.

I have no desire to do it.

You tricked me into this."

Cue: eye rolling from Kolton's general direction as he starts to pedal away from me

"C'mon...just put it in a low gear. It's a piece of cake"

Cue: grumbling from my general direction about how I didn't know we were aspiring to be olympic-level bikers and that I thought this was supposed to be a nice, leisurely bike ride where we could have a conversation instead of panting and sweating our guts out. 

But as Kolton was already halfway up the thing, I decided I'd better get a move on. 

So I pedaled, and pedaled, and pedaled, panted, sweated, and shifted down gears til there were none left to shift.  

Kolton occasionally looked over his shoulder and shouted encouraging words.

When we made it to the top of the first of the three ongoing hills, I stopped to catch my breath. My legs were a little shaky, but I was still feeling okay and even a little bit accomplished.

Then Kolton decided it was time to move on. I grumbled some more, but eventually began pedaling again as Kolton gave me some words of wisdom about how it's "All in my head" and that "If I'll just tell myself I can do it, I can"

 I told him to stop talking to me.

By the time we reached the top of the second hill, I was done.

I declared that I was not going one more step...or pedal....or tire rotation uphill.

I was turning around and going home.

Kolton made me stop, stand on my jello-y legs and take a few deep breaths.

When I was functioning again and had gotten some oxygen to my brain,

I still hadn't changed my mind.

 Then he told me that if we went up just one, last, tiny little hill, we could take a leisurely ride through the up-class, huge-house neighborhood of Rexburg and then it would be downhill the whole rest of the way home.

I could tell he really thought this would be appealing to me.

What actually changed my mind was that I knew after the torture he had put me through, I could probably convince him to get some spinach and artichoke dip from Applebees later that night.

Hallucinations of those warm, salty chips and creamy delicious dip were the only things that could inspire my last ditch effort to make it up that stupid hill.

(Kolton still thinks it was his pep talk. Silly boy!)

And yes, I did actually make it.

I didn't enjoy one second of it, but I made it.

And it was downhill the rest of the way, which might have been slightly scarier than the uphill part.

But I did get my spinach and artichoke dip and I even convinced Kolton to watch "The Help" which he actually mighta sorta kinda enjoyed.

In his words, "It was no Gladiator....but it was okay"