Among the very odd things about growing up in the New Age hotbed of my house in 1970's, with its western states ideas of self-sufficiency mingled with Mormon ideas of communalism, was the enforced belief that no one was allowed to win anything. We played the Ungame and getting to the birthday cake took *forever* as we had to go around the room and sing for each and every person there, blowing out a candle for them (can't have Ray feeling left out on Jeffrey's special day).

So as I hit puberty and my testosterone started to go up I was more than the normal conflicted: I wanted to compete and win, but I didn't want to make anyone feel bad. I usually just ended up retreating into a dreamworld where I always won and the other people didn't exist so I didn't feel bad that they lost. One of the many downsides of that was I spent most of my teens and twenties rather doughy and unfamiliar with the value of pushing myself physically.

In trying to correct the doughy problem in my 30's, I stumbled on the heady rush that comes with victory. The flood of endorphins when you've strained your muscles against weights and gravity and won, the burst of ego when people applaud your victory and you know you earned it.

So it came about this summer that my gym was having a competition. The goal: lose weight, gain strength. The prize: a $4,000 elliptical trainer. With my trainer's encouragement, I signed up. It made for a very long, expensive, summer (I could have bought one of those ellipticals with the money I spent). Didn't eat out, didn't eat much at all. Spent an insane number of hours in the gym. Got awfully cranky.

At the end of the 12 weeks I got measured again. Strength was up (particularly in pushups and situps) but body fat % didn't go down much. I was crushed. I didn't think I had a great shot at winning (it was a national competition, thousands of entrants), but now I knew I was out for sure. Still, I sent in a really bad "before" photo that was me at my worst. Then I went out and got a pizza.

A few weeks later I'm coming in for my regular workout (no more pizza--I still have some weight to lose) and I'm surprised to see one of my two favorite trainers there. Then the local franchise owner comes out from the back and says

"Hi, Jeffrey, does it seem odd that I'm here so late?"

"I was thinking you aren't normally here, what's up?"

"Do you see these balloons here?"

A moment as the flood of suppressed observations comes up:

Trainers are there who normally aren't
Balloons
The owner
The trainer who saw me pull in and ran to the back before I got out of my car

"you are shitting me"

"I wouldn't do that, well, not on something this big: you won the NATIONAL! You are getting an elliptical!"

"don't fuck with me on this, I can't handle that"

"never"

Looking around to see if anyone's gonna yell "gotcha"

"I won!?!??!"

"You won--not just local or regional, *national*! Now your picture will be all over the country"

"oh no!"

I don't think I actually smiled because I was in too much shock. Fuck the Ungame, no sharing my prize with anyone (well, I did thank all my trainers and MLEIV, but that's cuz I'm gracious), I WON!!!

<does victory dance>