Day 36

I took a short break from walking this week.

I was going to try nine miles on Sunday, but it was my daughter’s boyfriend Devon’s birthday, so by the time I got back from jamming with the blues guys (side note: it is so much fun playing with those guys, but sometimes I feel a little out of my depth, like I do when I have my recurring dream about playing piano with the Stones, which always starts out great and ends badly, usually with Keith Richards hitting me with his Strat, and Mick calling me a wanker), and we’d had pizza and birthday cake, I just didn’t feel up to a long walk, especially while still recovering from Saturday’s basketball game (side note: I had the most backhanded compliment of all time on Saturday morning, when the Commissioner said to me after the fourth game, “You move better on the court than anyone I’ve ever seen at your weight.” Um, thanks?)

Then Monday night … I don’t know. Just didn’t feel like leaving the house, plus it had rained earlier and I didn’t want to get rained on. But mostly, I just didn’t feel like it.

Tuesday night was poker night. I finished 5th out of 30 in our annual championship, and then had fun in the cash game afterwards. For a hot minute, I considered walking off my adrenaline at 1:30 a.m., but remembered that I am not a vampire and went to bed instead.

Today, we had people coming over to the house at 9:00, so I got up early and attacked the day. I got some legal stuff done, picked up some cream of tartar at the store to finish my holiday sugar cookie dough, and checked my work mail and found a nice check waiting for me. Then I went in for my last workout with Art before our family winter vacation trip.

While doing sets of rows, I told Art that I’d been to the doctor on Tuesday morning and that the doctor had told me the same thing Art had been saying all along: no running yet at my weight.

My doctor was encouraging, however, saying that I was already doing the hard part by regularly exercising.

“Now, you just need to do one more exercise,” he said. “When you’re eating, do a push-away.” He then mimed pushing his dinner plate away, about as subtle as brick through a window. “You know, like when you’re eating pie, stop at one piece instead of three.”

Art agreed with my doctor, although he did observe that there was a fatal flaw to the “one piece of pie” advice.

“How big is that first piece?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.

Both of them said that my knees would not hold up to four hours of running. I’ve been dismissive of this, not having ever had knee troubles, but then, right on cue, my left knee started feeling wonky as I was bustling in the kitchen making Christmas cookies. The feeling passed the next day, but this was a kind of reality check, so after the holidays, I am going to try the “push-away” technique in earnest.

Tonight, however, I did get a couple of miles in on a beautiful cool evening (60 degrees with a breeze). I had not been planning to walk, but this was one of those evenings where getting out of the house keeps you from saying something you regret to someone you love.

And for the first time in this training effort, I took my beloved dogs, Penny and Sam. Exercising with the dogs has its pros and cons.

PRO: They have WAY more energy than you do and they pull you faster than you think you would walk by yourself.

CON:  You think the dogs are making you move faster, but paradoxically, you just feel like you’re going fast. In reality, you’re moving inefficiently and slower than you do walking by yourself.

PRO: This is because your dogs run like maniacs for a hundred yards, then they stop on a dime and sniff a clump of interesting grass. This gives me inexplicable joy, because I know they are luxuriating in 10,000 different scents, like a wine enthusiast basking in a glass of Chateau Lafite Rothschild, except without all of the pretensions. I am happy to wait for them to drink it all in until they remember that they are on a walk and dash away at 400 miles per hour.

And despite Art and my doctor’s warnings, I couldn’t help myself. I ran with these dogs for stretches, letting them open up their strides and feeling myself opening up as well. For a few happy moments, I wasn’t a newly minted 59-year-old, I was back in my prime, swallowing up the road, feeling fast again. So nice.

So maybe tomorrow, I’ll try the nine miles in the morning. 

Maybe.