Color me a non-jogger. The last time I jogged, or ran, was a few decades ago. My early morning exercise consisted of a fast mile… walk. Very fast. 12 to 15 minutes. Try it. 5-mph is easy to run, not so easy to walk, but a perfect way to push the cardio to healthy levels.

Earlier in the year I was out the door and stubbed my toe on the stairs, then stubbed it again on the sidewalk outside, then got splashed by the early morning sprinklers.

I gotta work on my timing.

Not feeling as though the day would be a good day I headed down the street to get through the exercise routine as quickly as possible.

Then it started to rain.

Unfortunately, where I was at that point on my morning route was devoid of a nearby tree and I didn’t want to turn back and go home un-exercised.

So, I started to run.

That’s right. Run. OK, maybe not run in the traditional sense. Jog. Maybe. No. Not jog. Joggers would be embarrassed for me. How about trot? Horses trot. So, I wasn’t really trotting, either.

What was I doing?

Let’s call it a shuffle. Yeah. That works. Shuffle. Think of my shuffle as looking like a run— arms and legs chewing through the air, sweat dripping off the brow, but feet in shuffle mode instead of lifting high and mighty— but at about the same speed as walking.

That was my shuffle. That replaced my morning fast walk exercise. If anything, it looked much better than walking. I called it a delicate slow-motion run.

Not run. Not jog. Not trot. Shuffle.

But if anyone asked, I called it my morning run.