After days of being out of town and visiting my family – which was fantastic – there is nothing like getting back on the horse. Or, bicycle. It was a shock to feel my feeble arms struggling to lift the bike up the stairs (did my muscles atrophy over Thanksgiving weekend? Thank god I have only one flight of stairs to cross in my walk-up apartment, or I wouldn’t have made it), but otherwise my legs felt strong and exuberant as I biked home from the office, faster than ever before. I love that feeling when you realize your body has been aching for exercise… when it’s been stressed or cooped up in a chair for too long, and as soon as it begins to move it longs for more, harder, faster, an explosion and release of energy that leaves you tired and relaxed and happy at the end. I had to stay in the office to catch up on emails and such after the long weekend, which meant no time to get to the gym or to dance class. But one short, fierce bike ride home did the trick.