My Walk Club

I had several requests to pick up the pace on writing again so I will try harder.   Noel is always telling me to pick up the pace when we walk.  Women walk faster than men is my theory.  As I write that, a memory from long ago walking with my Aunt Louise,  from her restaurant to her uniform shop and barely being able to keep up with her comes flying back.   Did I mention my mother won a walking contest when she was a teenager?

One email I received mentioned that my walking seemed like fun and not work.   Well it may have seemed like a labor when I started years ago but now I do look forward to walking.   Your body has chemical reactions when you walk that help to destress, but more importantly your perspective is changed by the changing world around you.  Last spring when the country seemed depressed as a whole, life was blooming each morning as I walked.  Forsythia and crocus were in bloom, but also the ducks and geese had their young swimming in trim lines behind them.   New life, new hope seemed to be the theme.  Even now I am looking forward to that transformation this spring.

Our personal worlds are such a small part of the grand procession happening all around us.  Go take a walk and enjoy that procession.  Be a part of it.

Keep Walkin,

Ron

I don't really care much for emails that if you don't send it out immediately something bad will happen to you.  It almost seems like your passing along a curse disguised in a gift wrapped box.  However I recieved this from my cousin and thought I would share it.

Keep Walkin,

Ron

Me that's who.  If anyone is still out there it has gotten busy and people are looking at houses again.   One couple is moving from California, people are retiring out of DC and first time home buyers are out in droves.

But I have missed my club here.  So am wanting to start posting again.

My little tribe has been walking and has seen modest growth with one more body.   The mornings are getting colder but it certainly helps to get you going for the day.

I also read a new book about walking.   I think the fellow picked a subject out of hat and started writing though.   The first chapter was good and amusing.  The second chapter started stretching from the subject and it went downhill for me.

One good point he mentioned walking as a form of medication and cited a study saying 3 walks per week at 20 minutes each was better than all the drugs to fight depression.   I think that is true.

Also we have been seeing more people out walking and I like that.  It seems the beginning of becoming more connected.  In a good way.

Till next time,

Keep walkin,

Ron

Years ago as a young boy, I traveled with my parents back and forth to Pa almost every weekend.  They remodeled a 4 apartment building into 10 units.  My mother had a theory that if we lived in the unfinished part it would encourage us to work faster at finishing it.

So that meant living in the attic on weekends with the roof half open.  It meant removing the rolls of insulation from our beds at night and living what I recall as a spartan life at times.

Once our work weekend was done we would slip into the car and head home for school and work.  That was a whole new expedition.  We would carry boards in the car, usually a station wagon.  That way we could get up on I-81 before it was open.  We would move or go around the barricades and then put the boards down and drive the car over them to enter or exit along the way.

Before I-81, the trip was several hours longer going through all the small towns.   I-81 was the promise of a much shorter and easier trip.  During those years for me, Pa was a place to get away from.  So shorter was better and I was a willing accomplice.

So one rainy winters day we started home, tired and glad to be going.  We made the pilgrimage to the unopened highway and started up the high mountain slope outside of Wilkes-Barre, Pa.  Nearly to the top my father said the car was not acting right.  Maybe it was the transmission.  Looking over the valley it would be a long wait till help arrived.  Dad stopped the car and started to get out.  It wasn't the transmission but instead 3-4 inches of ice on the road.  Instantly fear overwhelmed us.  No guard rails, an unfinished roadway with 1-2 foot drop offs and nearly to top.

I cried to get out and walk but Dad would not let me.  Somehow he backed that car down the mountain and got us off the frozen interstate.

My relationship with my parents is strained still.  After many years they still want me to go for drives with them in that same vehicle.  I won't.

In many ways my experiences are no better or worse than others, but the point is more what we learn from them.  My life is very blessed now and has been for many years.

At some point in my life I got out of that car never to return.  There have been many times when my parents wanted me to go for a drive.  They don't understand but I have found my own way, my own walk.

So if you find yourself  distressed, in a car going where you don't want to go.  Just get out and start walking.  Your own walk.

Keep walkin

Ron