Where to Go?

Back when I worked for big industry, Hughes Aircraft Company, to be exact, I used stop at Craig Park in Fullerton, CA on my way to work to do my reading, writing and  sometimes-meditation.   Craig Park is one of the beautiful and expansive parks in the Orange County Regional Park system, this one built into a hilly piece of land near the 57 Freeway.  Every morning, a small brown woman in a traditional saree would walk slowly by, stopping to say, Good morning, Sir.   She shuffled more than walked and up close I’d have guessed she was in her eighties but she still navigated the three mile perimeter of the park everyday.   After a while, we began to talk, her about her family here in California or her life in India before moving here to live with her son, I about what I did sitting in my car by the lake every morning and what I did for a living.   Her name was Hasna, and we became friends, even though she always approached my car as if she were afraid to interrupt and never stopped calling me Sir.   She told me that it was hard living with her son because her daughter-in-law didn’t like her, which was why she walked so much.   Still, most times when I asked, How are you doing? she would simply respond, Oh, I’m alright for a woman my age in an Indian accent so heavy that I sometimes had to ask her to repeat herself several times.

Small Things

Last night, I set out on my walk later than usual, needing about 4000 steps to reach the daily quota dictated by my Fitbit.   It was springtime warm and  to be honest, these old legs didn’t want to go.  Often when I need motivation to walk … and perhaps something upbeat to give me a brisk rhythm to walk to … I put on my Uplifting Tunes playlist, which is an assortment of favorites like Moondance, Rise, and Dance with Me.  Guaranteed to lift your spirits.   But my legs said, Put that crap on and we will go on strike.  So instead, I put on Linda Ronstadt’s Hasten Down the Wind, a beautiful mix of mostly slower songs better matched to my mood and my condition.   And how can you go wrong with Linda, on of the most incredible voices of my lifetime?

Spring Walking Music

Winter is fighting hard to stay around this April.  During two consecutive days last week we had temperatures in the 70s only to awake to the following day to three inches of snow.   The saying is that April showers bring May flowers but we’ve had as many snow showers as rain showers as well as that undecided precipitation known as wintry mix.   As a California transplant I have learned to walk in the cold but I draw the line at snow and wintry mix, mainly because I don’t want to risk a fall at my age.  I have managed to keep up my 6000 steps per day by store walking (thank you, Home Depot, Target, Walmart and Costco) but I miss my music.   No, I don’t  know why I don’t just put in my earbuds inside but I don’t … maybe I’m afraid the sight of an old guy singing along with Bohemian Rhapsody would frighten the clientele.

Cold

It has been an unseasonably warm October here in Utah, at least according to my daughter who has lived here for five years. I had been looking forward to Autumn and in spite of the warmer weather, the trees were doing their part. turning yellow and gold and red. But I wanted some cool autumn weather. Watch what you ask for. Sunday evening it was in the low fifties at bedtime but we woke to sub-thirty temperatures … and SNOW. And it has remained in the twenties and thirties since then.  Welcome to Utah.

Stretch, Dammit

You wouldn’t guess it to look at me now but in my forties I was pretty serious runner, logging about 30 to 50 miles a week.   I read the best-selling Jim Fixx’s The Complete Book of Running. I subscribed to Runner’s World.   I even bought a book on stretching.   After all, everybody said, You should stretch before you run to avoid injury.   I tried stretching, I really did, but I hated it,  Yes, when I was waiting at the start of a 10K or a marathon, I stretched like everyone else just to fit in and avoid the possibility of someone saying, You should be stretching.  I’ve never reacted well to criticism. I did have injuries … plantar facietis, illiotibial band syndrome, a torn meniscus and shin splints.  Sometimes I stretched to help recover from an injury, but once it was better, I’d stop.   An aggravated Achilles tendon finally put an end to my long distance running.

The Old Guy Triathlon

In the 1980s, I went through what I would call my athletic phase.  My place of work had a locker room and shower, ideal for running at lunch, and was within a few miles of a public Olympic sized pool for lap swimming.   I began running regularly with a group of guys that did 7 miles through the hills every day.   It was a good natured, easy run until we were a mile from the office, at which point one of our gazelles would take off and the rest of us would try to keep up.   One thing led to another and before long, several of us were training on the weekends to do the Long Beach Marathon.   At the pool, I found a similarly serious group of guys that were training for a triathlon.   As a swimmer in high school, it seemed a natural progression from running.   I bought a racing bike and before long I was swimming four miles, running 30 miles and biking 100 miles a week.  Writing that now, it seems impossible that this old body was once capable of such feats.   I ran 13 marathons and a dozen or so triathlons.   Now when you say triathlon to most people, the think of the Ironman Triathlon held annually in Hawaii, a 2.4 mile ocean swim, followed by a 100 mile bike ride and a 26,2 mile run.   I’m not talking about that one.  Typically the races I ran consisted of a 1500 meter ocean swim, a 25 mile bike ride and a 10 kilometer (6.2 mile) run.  I was in the best shape of my life.