Wednesday,
September 27, 2017
It was Lobster Dinner night at
Fisher’s and Miggie wanted to go there desperately. I like it, but could do without. I have been suffering with pain in the ball
of my left foot and had stopped earlier to pick up a Dr. Scholl’s insert in
hopes of mitigating the pain.
“I’ll meet you down there. I’m going to walk. Bring me a dry t-shirt if you don’t mind,” I
said when she called. The night before
I’d gotten cold while eating dinner in a sweaty t-shirt.
I had an hour before I had to
leave for the restaurant and chose to go the Deep Lock Quarry Metropark, which is within the
boundaries of Cuyahoga Valley National Park and abuts the Towpath. I’d driven past it many times and wondered
what terrain it offered and if there was a hole filled with water where I could
swim. I was thinking I might run the
trails and had put on my running shoes with one of the inserts. Once there though, I realized this might be
the place to re-create my Survival Workout.
It was loaded with heavy rocks and downed trees – two key ingredients.
I hiked the 1.5 mile loop trail
stopping to lift things as I did. There
were numerous park benches where I could prop up my feet to do push-ups and to
use for dips. The quarry itself, abandoned
since the early 20th century, had rocks the size of houses down to
ones about the size of a toaster oven. I
lifted the latter when the former wouldn’t budge.
My shoulder is still sore from
the exertion of pitching while Jack was home so I went easy on the calisthenics
and rock-lifting. Over the next hour, I
performed seven sets of lifts and none to exhaustion. I returned to the car with a mild pump,
encouraged that this would become the new home of my workout.
I’ve been slipping physically
over the past two years. I haven’t
written for some time because my workouts have been inconsistent. Jack has encouraged me to write again, but I
needed to be working out to write a workout blog – or so I’m told. I’ve lost tone and flexibility – things I don’t
want to lose as I age. I have too much
to do and a lot of it is physical. Deep
Lock should be getting a lot of press from now on.
I took a quick shower when I returned
home. I wanted to be clean once I
started sweating on the hike to Peninsula.
Though it was only in the upper 80’s, the humidity was somewhere near
what we had in the steam room of the old Cleveland Athletic Club. I was drenched when I climbed up the road from
the Towpath and into downtown Peninsula.
Miggie had brought me a dry shirt, but I didn’t want to change in the
parking lot, which was packed for Lobster night. I figured I could do it in the bathroom once
we ordered.
I walked in the door and up to
the hostess station for seating just as a waitress was writing the words ‘lobster
sold out’ on a dry-erase board.
“Couldn’t you have walked a
little faster?” Miggie said.
Well…no…I’m old and slow.
Hike:
Two hours and 10 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 80-100 bpm.
Calories
burned: 1,200.
Bonus:
26,300 steps.
Tuesday,
September 26, 2017
I didn’t work out over the
weekend, though I did plenty of work. I
painted the side of Mimi’s garage, which gets a ton of sun throughout the day
and leads to cracking and blistering paint.
It was too hot for such work, so I started early both days and finished
up before noon. Somehow, I managed to
rake together a full tarp of leaves and haul them to the woods…a true workout
when they get heavy in a couple of weeks.
Monday and Tuesday remained
unseasonably hot as record high temperatures in the 90’s continued. I had to finish my roof project, and did on
Tuesday. I sweat through my clothing to
the point where it looked as though I’d fallen in our pond. I had a headache and couldn’t stop sweating
for an hour after and decided what I needed was to go home and hang out in an
air-conditioned house. That lasted about
an hour.
I sent a message to Miggie
telling her I would walk to Peninsula – a little over an hour away on the
Towpath – and meet her at Fisher’s. It
was rib night and like any smart, older person, I was always hunting the deals
for food. An hour is a long time to hike
alone and for me becomes a time to go deep into my head and think of the
tougher things I face. One such topic
was retirement.
I will admit I consider this
constantly. I think the only thing
holding me back is the uncertainty of my finances once I have. Sure – I will have a check coming from the
Social Security office and yes, I have pension money. I think I have a handle on how much it will
cost me to live in Peninsula, but I still have equity tied up in my former home
and won’t have access to that until Jason gets traditional financing on it and
I have the equity to invest. There is
also the question of health care and this is the biggest concern. The last thing I want is to run out of money
someday because of illness and need help from my kids. For now, I’ll keep working and doing side
jobs. I know I can continue the side
jobs after retiring, as well.
But how about what I’m SUPPOSED
to do in retirement. I want to hike,
bike, kayak and travel across the continent.
I want to see all the great parks in North America and ride many of the
rail to trail byways. I want to do all
these things for ME and that seems selfish.
I’ve worked hard my whole life and run the race giving it my best
effort. Won’t I just be cruising to the
life’s finish line if I’m not working or doing something important to help
others? I thought about this as I
walked, looking down through the trees to the waters of the Cuyahoga River
flowing a short distance away. I watched
that river, the flow of water around rocks and the eddies and wondered about the
course I would choose to run it. And
this train of thought continued alongside the selfishness. I’m guessing I will strike a balance…do
things I’ve always wanted to do and find something that gives me a sense of
fulfilling a duty to those around me…to helping those who cannot enjoy the
things I would like to do or to even have the time to ponder such things for
the miseries life may have visited upon them.
Yes…balance. I continued the
hike.
Hike:
70 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 80 bpm.
Calories
burned: 500.
Bonus:
20,300 steps.
Friday,
September 22, 2017
The heat wave continued and I
managed to suffer openly and for everyone to hear. I still had some roof work to perform, but it
was manageable. I hydrated throughout
the day, but never felt like it was enough.
My hips, after yesterday’s pack hike, were doing well, but I was not
going to go two days in a row with the pack and re-injure them. I got home to the air conditioning and almost
succumbed to doing nothing. That would
have sucked.
I put on my cycling gear,
filled both water bottles, and headed out.
There are many hills out of the valley and I take care to avoid
them. Narrow shoulders, hairpin turns,
steep inclines all make them hazardous.
There is one straight shot – Major Road – so I climbed up and out on
it. The ride went on for two hours, but
the terrain is not nearly as challenging as it was when I headed east into farm
country from Highland Heights. The
valley is surrounded by urban areas and it makes getting to the open country
tougher. I will miss my old riding
routes.
Bike:
Two hours.
Training
Heart Rate: 120 bpm.
Calories
burned: 1,500.
Bonus: 23,800 steps.
Wednesday,
September 20, 2017
The summer that never was began
in earnest! With temperatures in the low
90’s, I found myself forced onto the roof of the run-in shed to complete the
papering and shingling that the volunteer group had been unable to complete. Unfortunately, they did not understand that
the drip edge needed to be attached prior to the shingles, so I needed to pull
the end shingle on 17 rows to add it on.
Once on the roof, I was quickly reminded why I’d never followed in the
family tradition of roofing for a living.
Those people are nuts!
I was up there for several
hours and feeling the effects of dehydration and overheating when I decided enough
was enough. I headed for Mimi’s after
work to do some landscaping, but told her I was a little out of it and would do
what we needed on Saturday. Once home, I
put on the air conditioning and decided that I would not be working out. Though it is cooler in the valley by a good
five degrees and I could have hiked in the shade, but I decided to settle for a
hard day’s work and let my body recover.
Bonus:16,000
steps.
Tuesday,
September 19, 2017
“Dad…you should take a half day
off tomorrow so we can hang out my last day before going back,” Jack said
Monday night as I was leaving.
Things were crazy at work and I
had a couple of projects pending, but how often do you get such a request…and a
chance…to spend time with your son?
Tomorrow is promised to no one, I remind myself regularly, and so enjoy
each and every step of the journey.
I did as requested and we
watched another episode of ‘Game of Thrones’ until I started nodding off. He noticed.
“Get your glove and let’s play catch,” he said.
I had had trouble sleeping on
my right shoulder the night before and chalked it up to the hay delivery from
Monday, but as soon as I threw the first ball I knew what it was.
“Oww…my shoulder really hurts!”
I said in a very manly voice.
“We don’t have to throw,” he
said in a voice that was willing to concede I was old and frail.
“Nah…I’ll throw through
it. It’s what real (dumb) men do,” I
replied.
After a dozen throws it had
loosened up and the sweat started flowing on the hot and muggy afternoon. I knew we’d be watching more TV and likely
sitting and just talking for a period of time, so anything resembling a workout
was going to take place right here and now and with a baseball as the
catalyst. We just threw and talked and I
couldn’t help but think of the countless hours I’d done the same thing with
Steve Mascaro growing up in Bristol, Connecticut. I told Jack how baseball was all we had back
then and all we did in our spare time.
“No one uses a playground for
pick-up baseball anymore and kids don’t know how to play the game unless they’re
in an organized program. I remember how
you didn’t know where centerfield was when your first coach told you to go out
there. We had our older brothers to
teach us when we all headed to the sandlot after school and on weekends. No parents watching and no one worried that
we’d be abducted. Well…my mom and dad
were probably hoping someone would abduct Uncle Jim and me,” I said.
And it was the case. We learned the game that way…without adults. We learned to resolve disputes by throwing
bats and gloves at each other, screaming and arguing, but in the end coming to
some kind of mutually acceptable outcome so the game could continue. No one watched or sat on a bench. Everyone played. No one was very heavy and most of us were
skinny. Ah well…
Jack acknowledged how even the
soccer and basketball he played as a child, something we didn’t do, was all
organized. “Yeah…I guess we never just
went down to the playground until we were in high school for hoops,” he
said.
We talked about his career and
the lives of his siblings now…and ten years out. He has a solid plan and will execute it
well. We ended up back at the TV and
then onto another heavy, German dinner.
I waddled to the car with only 10,000 steps for the day, but a very
healthy dose of what really mattered…time with family.
Bonus:
10,500 steps.
Monday,
September 18, 2017
“We’ve got 370 bales for you
and they’re about 60 pounds,” Eli reported as he pulled alongside the barn with
a trailer that stretched from here to Columbus.
“Did you say 370? That’s 100 more than you’ve ever brought
before!” I said.
I was already fatigued from
moving thirty sheets of plywood and piles of heavy material we’d taken to our
charity event from Saturday. I’d picked
it up and returned it all to the farm before the hay’s arrival. We moved the 50 bales already in the loft in
an effort to make room for the delivery.
And it was hot.
I don’t mind a good workout and
since I was going to see Jack after work and have a heavy, gravy/fat laden
dinner, this was a good thing. We spent
the next 90 minutes moving and stacking hay and by my calculations, which are
nothing if not precise, I handled over 11 tons of the stuff. When I finished and came down from the loft,
I noticed by legs and arms were trembling.
It was a lot and I knew I needed some recovery time.
I went home and picked up
Dakota and Heidi and headed to Jason’s place, my old home, where Jack was
staying. We watched some more of ‘Game
of Thrones’, but I was struggling to stay awake, so Jack suggested we go out
and play catch.
He had a catcher’s mitt and had
wanted to do some pitching, but after a few quite errant throws, offered to
catch for me. He was anxious to see if I
could throw strikes since I always seemed to get the ball right to him when we
were playing catch…something that puzzled him since I hadn’t thrown a baseball
much since he was a little boy.
“Muscle memory,” I said. I explained that, as a young man, I’d thrown
a rubber ball against the garage door simulating an entire game between the Yankees
and the Red Sox probably over 100,000 times.
I did this until I was fifteen when I could pick a mosquito off a hitter’s
hat at sixty feet, six inches.
I stepped off sixty feet and he
went into a catcher’s squat. I threw
about 40 pitches, two wild and a couple where he had to move his glove
significantly, but the remainder found their target quite nicely.
I will probably pay the price
for those throws with a sore arm, but so what?
I’m 62 and can still find the strike zone consistently. And my son still wants to play catch. Life is so good…
Hay
Delivery: 90 minutes.
Training
heart rate: 100 bpm.
Calories
burned: 1,000
Bonus:
18,000 steps
Sunday,
September 17, 2017
Oh, I am a lucky dad. Jack is home on leave and has spent the past
ten days staying with his sister mostly, and then his brother. When he comes home, he wants to spend all of
time getting up late, relaxing and spending quality time with his immediate
family, which includes me. Saturday, he,
Savannah, Heidi and I took in an Indians game and watched them begin their new
winning streak. He and Heidi came home
with me and spent the evening. “You need
to watch ‘Game of Thrones’ with me and tell me what you think, dad,” Jack had
said. And so we did. I had worked at Mimi’s Saturday morning and
gone from that right into heading to the game, so the only workout I’d gotten
was yard work (some sweat) and the steps to walk from our parking spot to the
game – which is a considerable distance since I WILL NOT pay for parking
somewhere close by.
I knew the day was going to go
something like the previous one, though the guys were coming over for a
spaghetti dinner and a baseball movie.
We were planning a hike, but nothing rigorous so I donned my running
shoes and headed out for a jog while the kids slept. I headed for the towpath and ran from my
place to Ira Road – a little over 10 minutes – before turning and heading
back. At the 15-minute mark, my knee
began to hurt. I ignored it for several
steps before realizing it was not going away.
I walked for a couple of minutes and tried again, but nope, it still
hurt. I walked the remaining distance
having to satisfy myself with a good sweat and a couple of miles of running.
The hike canceled and so the
run became the total workout. Well…it
was something and the preparation for the trip into the backcountry of the
Adirondacks the first weekend of October continues. I’ll get back there and I’ll get up the
peaks, but I wish I had more time and had done more training.
Run:
16 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 130 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 250
Bonus:
16,000 steps for the day.
Sunday,
September 17, 2017
Where did Thursday through
Saturday go? Workout wise – nowhere –
though Friday was 25,000 steps and 12 hours of hauling heavy things to the
Chagrin Valley Hunt Club for the annual Chef’s Unbridled fund raiser the
Fieldstone Farm sponsors. I finished
that day quite exhausted and ready to just collapse at home and listen to the
Indians game. Miggie had other plans for
me, though.
I went to her daughter’s place
enticed by ribs. I love ribs and they
had TV and the Indians, recent owners of Major League Baseball’s longest
winning streak ever – 22 straight games (the New York Giants of 1916 own the
longest unbeaten streak of 26 games.
They had a tie between win 12 and 13 of that streak) would be shooting
for number 23. I have been watching, but
not writing, about this streak for the quite obvious reason that I did not want
to jinx it. True baseball fanatics understand
this concept without question; lesser mortals are confused.
“Do you really think anything
you do has any impact on the outcome of the game?” Miggie asked with surprise.
Simply asking such a question
categorizes her someplace I do not want to be.
Before leaving for her daughter’s house, I had gone into my closet to
retrieve an Indians 1965 game jersey that had been hanging there since a member
of the Cleveland Athletic Club had given it to me in the early 90’s. I had believed it to be the jersey of Sudden
Sam McDowell and felt that Tee, in whose house I would be eating ribs and
watching baseball and who was a true sports maniac (he understood curse issues
without question) should have and display it.
He was thrilled, but when we did some research on the jersey number – 32
– discovered that it belonged to Ralph Terry, not Sudden Sam.
The Indians went on to lose
that night and thus end a most incredible streak. It may stand for a hundred years and be the
signature item of this team and the franchise and what it has accomplished over
the past several years accumulating and developing such a talented group of
players. The following morning though,
aware the streak had ended, I contemplated what I had done to cause the shift
in the cosmos and the resulting lost.
And then it hit me. I called my
cousin…
“Donnie – I figured it
out! You know how we lost the World
Series in ’95, ’97 and 2016? Well – it was
because I had that jersey buried in my closet instead of out where the world
could see and enjoy it! I was a horrible
fan and the Tribe paid the price. Now
that Tee has it and will display it, we’re a cinch to win the World Series this
year!”
Miggie was listening and
rolling her eyes in disbelief. Donnie –
on the other end of the line – was all in.
“I think you’re onto something,
Maddox Man (another day’s story),” he said in complete understanding.
I went to the game later that
day with three of my children and Miggie and the Indians won, starting a new
streak. Thank you, Ralph Terry. Go Tribe…the World Series is yours to take.
Wednesday,
September 13, 2017
Family members can do the
damnedest things to each other. I spent
a portion of my day in Civil Court where a woman I have known for many years
asked me to be a witness in her custody battle with the father of her daughter,
and her sister. The circumstances of the
birth of this child are irrelevant, though it is safe to say the father is a
piece of human garbage who never acknowledged his financial responsibility to
raise the child until the courts forced him to a year ago. He owes $18,000 in arrears, which that little
girl will never see. The sister could
have and should have supported my friend over the years, but instead had chosen
to try and wrest the child from her mother to raise as her own. She used the human garbage to help her and
yesterday in court succeeded in getting interim custody because the mother is
underemployed and living with a friend after a recent eviction. The court views it as a risk for a parent to
not be in a living situation with a lease as there is no legal protection from
being without a home overnight. I guess
that’s true, but how many people are taken in by friends and family in times of
need? This would have gone unnoticed
except for the sister taking advantage of the situation to put it in front of a
judge.
The mom is a loving, caring,
nurturing woman who always has the best interest of her daughter first and
foremost in her life. She is also
ridiculously bad at handling finances and making decisions that affect her
ability to provide. Still, she soldiers
on and has spent thousands fighting a legal battle she lost yesterday. It didn’t have to happen and the victim will
be the 5-year old, but there it is. I
suppose there is a special place in hell for people who act in this
fashion. Though I imagine the sister
thinks she is somehow doing the right thing, I know her and her warped sense of
right and wrong as I understand the principle, and maybe her hell will be, like
Paul in the Bible, when the scales fall from her eyes and she realizes how
messed up she was and that there is nothing she can do to fix it.
I shudder at the thought of not
being able to see any of my children except through a court-ordered visitation
schedule. Like I said, families can to
the damnedest things to each other.
I reached home depressed from
the goings on of the day. There is a respite
to be had though and so I took Dakota and headed for the park and a hike. I have been feeling the pain and effort of
carrying the 50-pound pack in my hips and left foot and elected to give both a
break and walk with nothing more than a leash.
We hiked past Indigo Lake and on to Howe Meadow before discovering that
it backed up to the grounds of the local school’s athletic fields and another
the size of a football field covered in solar panels. Our walk brought us across a portion of the
Buckeye trail, as well, before wrapping back around to the Towpath and the hike
back home.
I felt my hips on every
step. As is often the case, I try to do
too much too soon and end up injuring myself.
As the German saying goes, ‘too soon, old – too late, smart’. Ah well…soldier on – right Jack?
Hike:
75 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 70-90 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 625
Bonus:
16,000 steps for the day.
Tuesday,
September 12, 2017
I’d received a disturbing phone
call from my new next door neighbor at work telling me that she had found
Dakota outside.
“Dogs aren’t supposed to be
off-leash and someone pointed her out to me across the field and I realized it
was Dakota. She had knocked a screen out
and climbed out on the porch. She pooped
in the house, too. I got her back in,
but she seemed so upset,” she told me.
And she probably is. She got into the garbage outside the other
day and has been throwing up since. She
knows she shouldn’t go in the house and made an effort to get outside. Combined with the constant noise of the corn
cannons exploding, something they do all through the corn harvest on the farm
land all around us, she’s been constantly afraid. I feel terrible, but don’t know what to
do. I drove home quickly to access the
damage and get her out on a walk.
She had chewed up the screen
frame pretty badly and destroyed the blinds, but was otherwise okay. I put her in the car and headed for Furnace
Run Trail a couple of miles away. I put
my pack on, which seems heavier than ever, and began a trek up about 100 steps
and a very steep incline. Over the next
two hours we hiked rugged terrain with enough elevation change that I didn’t
feel the need to add step-ups. I
discovered the maps provided by the Cuyahoga Valley National Park at each
trailhead are good, but not perfect. They
don’t recognize private drives/roads that bisect the trails, nor do they always
get the bridges that have been built on the trails. I also walked one
trail that wasn’t marked at all. It pays
to have a good sense of direction and a general idea of where you are in
relation to the topography and roads in this park.
I returned to the car quite
exhausted and with a dog that didn’t seem any worse for the wear. She walked fine the whole time and gave no
indication of being sick. She moved
along partially because we could hear the cannons in the distance, which made
her want to be in the car.
My day ended with over 28,000
steps…my second biggest day since putting on the fitbit last Christmas. The ball of my left foot has been sore for
some time and I’m sure walking over 13,000 steps with a 50-pound pack did
nothing to help it. Soldier on, I
say. It’ll get better.
Hike:
Two hours.
Training
Heart Rate: 90-130 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 1,300
Bonus:
28,000 steps for the day.
Monday,
September 11, 2017
Let’s just say Sunday was a
lost cause. We had dinner guests planned
and that meant I had projects to finish around the house. I did manage to get out long enough to pick
up a new tire and tube for the bike after suffering two flats in consecutive
days. I think the towpath is the wrong
surface for my road bike. I did manage a
short hike to the beaver marsh and back with Paul and a little over 11,000
steps for the day. Monday, I vowed,
would be better.
“So how do you think you’d do
in a post-apocalyptic world, dad?”
I had stopped over Savannah's after work to spend some time with Jack and he asks the damnedest
questions. Our conversations often head places they don’t with anyone
else. He is home on leave for two weeks
and there is no one I enjoy talking to more.
“Frankly – I hope I go in the
explosion, but if I don’t, I think it would be tough to live thinking I need to
fight and kill for everything I need. I
don’t think I could do it unless one of my family was in jeopardy. Then I could do anything,” I said.
We had been discussing North Korea and 9/11,
since it was the anniversary. He was in
kindergarten at the time and has no recollection of the events other than his
mom coming to take him home from school.
Since I was in the Adirondacks at the time, I didn’t know anything until
that evening when I kayaked into Wanakana to pick up some milk at a small
general store. The clerk looked me over,
noticed the several day growth of beard and said, “you don’t know what happened
today, do you?”
We talked more about chain of
command in the military and whether or not the military could maintain control
of things if everything else broke down.
“I think it could as long as
commanding officers weren’t giving orders that soldiers knew to be immoral and
started rebelling,” I said.
“I don’t think I could ever
disobey a General. I’d figure they knew
something I didn’t and I’d just follow orders like I’d been taught,” he said.
I described Mai Lai during the
Viet Nam war and mentioned the atrocities of the Nazi’s during WWII. He saw my point and I’m sure it made him
think. He’s like that.
I got home and did some chores
before changing into my cycling outfit and hitting the road. It was 6:30 and I figured I had 90 minutes of
daylight. Maybe in Highland Heights, but
in the Valley…not so much. I pedaled
hard over the last twenty minutes and pulled into Indian Springs around
7:40. It was already darker than I’m
comfortable riding in. I know I need a
light on the bike, but think that if I got one I’d start taking more chances
with the dark and that’s not good. I
know they work well and that I can see illuminated bikes farther off and maybe
better than I see riders in daylight, but I’m still not so sure I want to be
one of them.
I will also admit that I’m in
horrible shape…for me. I’ve got a lot of
training to do for the next trip to the Adirondacks and time is running
low. I think I’m in a good groove again
and will keep it going into the winter provided the winter isn’t so tough that
I’m too exhausted when I get home from work to do much of anything but
rest. Poor old man…
Bike
duration: 70 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 135 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 1,000.
Bonus:
18,000 steps.
Saturday,
September 9, 2017
I spent the morning taking
apart a day bed, loading it into a truck and running another couple of pieces
of furniture from my old house to the new one in Peninsula. It was time consuming and I found myself
constantly watching the clock to see where – or if – I was going to get in some
kind of exercise. Finally, at day’s end
and with a little more than 90 minutes of daylight, I was suited up and ready
to ride the bike. Miggie noticed and
remembered that I’d given her a hard time about not taking advantage of the
park around us, and started changing to ride, as well. She could see I was in serious biking clothes
and offered to just ready at her pace – alone.
“No way. I can always ride hard some other time. I’d rather go with you and explore some parts
of the park you haven’t seen yet,” I said.
I wanted to motivate her.
We headed out to Hale Farm and
Village, just a little over a mile from our place, but on the other side of a
pretty steep hill. She struggled to the
top, having to walk part, and wondered aloud if she’d be able to return. I knew she wouldn’t and so took a roundabout
way back to the towpath where we could ride on level ground. By the time we
reached the house, she had it in her brain to ride the towpath to Peninsula
where we could grab a bite at Fisher’s Tavern before riding home again.
“I’ll need to change in
civilian clothes and pack some walking shoes.
I think we’ll need a head lamp for the return ride, as well,” I said.
“I’ve got a light on my bike,”
she pointed out.
I looked at that light –
something from a couple of decades ago – and decided the head lamp should come
along. We made the trek in about 25
minutes, had dinner, and came out to the bikes around eight. It was on the verge of darkness and I encouraged
her to hurry. She did her best, but lost
her chain trying to find the right gear in the dark to climb the hill coming
out of Peninsula. I can get chains on
with my eyes closed, which is pretty much about the light I had to work with.
We were rolling for about two
miles when I noticed I was riding low.
It would be my second flat in as many days. “What are we going to do now?” she asked.
“Walk.”
I offered her my head lamp and
told her she could ride home and I’d walk it in alone. It was about a 45-minute walk at that point.
“I’m not walking in the dark
alone!” she said, visions of bears, wolves and cougars playing through her
brain.
“It’s safe, but I’d love your
company,” I said and began pushing my bike down the path. She struggled along pushing hers in the dark
and after a mile, I took both bikes and walked in-between them pushing them
along. We made it back home in a little
under an hour with a most unusual workout, but a workout none the less. ‘Do something every day’ is my mantra – and then
write about it. So far – so good.
Walk/ride: 2 hours
Training Heart Rate: 70-90 bpm.
Calories burned: 1,000
Bonus: 15,000 steps.
Friday,
September 8, 2017
After finally getting back in
the writing groove, I ran into the weekend (I typically write the blog in the
morning for the previous day) and a very busy schedule working around the
house…which we’ll call BORING! Friday,
though, I did manage a workout.
I’m continuing to keep my eye
on the ball for heading into the back country in the Adirondacks during the
first weekend in October. I strapped on
the pack again and headed off on Oak Hill Trail for what would turn out to be
another two-hour hike. Though I hadn’t
had the pack on the previous day, I could still feel the fatigue in my hips
from the step-ups and the raw indentations my hip belt was causing on my
hips. I thought as I walked how painful
and fatiguing it must be to be out on a through-hike (extended hikes where you
camp along the way, carrying all you will need on your back as you walk from
point A to point B). I have been
contemplating my own trek – the Continental Divide trail as the ultimate goal –
for my retirement years and keep wondering if my body will take the beating of
a 2,700 mile journey over several months if a 5-miler feels as lousy as this
one felt. I’ll start with something
shorter and figure that out later.
Jack arrived home from Ft.
Gordon for a two-week visit and disparaged the Indians and baseball as
something quite less than LBJ and basketball.
Thankfully, I have Savannah, who loves baseball and the Tribe. We will be working on a fitness/running plan
for him to run that sub 12-minute 2-mile run he hopes to accomplish later this
fall. He’s a dedicated athlete and if I
map it out, I have no doubt he will follow the plan and achieve his goal.
Hike:
Two hours.
Training
Heart Rate: 90-120 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 1,300
Bonus:
21,000 steps for the day.
Thursday,
September 7, 2017
I was standing in line at
Subway’s, picking up lunch for the volunteer work crew that was building a
run-in shed in one of the pastures at the farm when I received a text from the
Equine Manager that the structure was in the wrong place. My face went crimson and I thought for a
moment that I might have a brain aneurism, but willed myself not to have one at
least until I could get back to the farm and rip into someone.
A certain someone on the farm
feels like she doesn’t need to include the Facility Manager – that would be me
- in discussions such as the location of a run-in shed. Instead, she will share the information with
someone else and let them, through a game of telephone, get the information to
me and from me Justin so he can level and clear the area we were to build in
the pasture. I don’t like it, but farm
management lets it happen and so I go along.
This time it would prove to be fatal.
I returned to the farm and told
the work crew of six to hold up while I talked it over with the Equine
Manager. They had laid the foundation
and built two walls, but the foundation was only sitting on top of the ground,
as is the case with these structures so they can be moved at a later date by
dragging them with a tractor. Ours was
12’x22’ and made with very heavy 6” by 6”
posts for the foundation. The walls
could come off and the foundation could be dragged, but I needed to be
convinced of the necessity and had to vent.
“I’m here 40-plus hours a
week. If this shed needed to be in such
a specific spot, why didn’t you come and get me and show ME so that I could
have spray painted the ground! And I
cleared this spot almost two weeks ago.
Why wasn’t it confirmed as the correct space – as I’d asked – at some
point BEFORE we started building. I look
like an idiot and I don’t like looking like an idiot!” I said.
She sheepishly explained that
the spot got wet in the spring (I’ve never noticed that over the past several
years) and that she’d told Lisa it needed to be over and back several feet to a
spot that was slightly higher. I knew it
was all bullshit and a play to make others look bad, but I was having none of
it and told her boss just that later. In
the meantime, we took the walls off and six men picked up and moved the
foundation after removing the lag bolts that secured the two halves together.
Ahh well…such is life. Retirement is on the horizon and based on my
discussions with the COO, the nature of this totally avoidable SNAFU (situation
normal – all f’d up) would be alleviated in the future. I doubt it as the person involved, though
reprimanded, remains determined to make miserable the lives of those with whom
she comes into contact.
Because I had to work late – we
were stopped when a violent thunderstorm rolled in around 6 p.m. – I was unable
to hike with my loaded pack.
I did, however, run my kiester off throughout the day and ended up with
over 25,000 steps. Tomorrow will be
different. My son Jack will be home and
I’ll see him. I’ll do a hike or a run
(it’s supposed to rain so no cycling) and keep the traction of my fitness
routine moving forward. That’s the plan,
at least…
Bonus:
25,000 steps.
Wednesday,
September 6, 2017
Several weeks ago I went to the
Adirondacks with a good friend from the farm.
He had been to the Rockies many times and hiked and climbed there quite
extensively. Like so many people who
have done that and then gone to the Adirondacks, he was surprised at the
ruggedness and steepness of the trails.
“I figured it would be easy
since we were only going up to 5,000 feet, but this is the toughest hike I’ve
ever done,” he said.
We were climbing Giant Mt. in
Keene Valley, which rises a little over 4,600 feet above sea level.
“Well…the trail is only 3 miles
and it rises about 4,000 feet in that space so no matter how tall it is, you’re
walking a lot of vertical,” I replied.
He mentioned that the steepness
fooled him. “In the Rockies, there are
switchbacks that make the grade more doable.
This is just straight up!”
He was right and I was feeling
it. I hadn’t done any training for the
trip thinking that a couple of people were coming who would not set a challenging
pace. They cancelled at the last minute
and so Justin and I were solo to the top…and he set a good pace. I pushed through the pain that comes from not
training, but vowed I’d change things when I got back and before the next trip
in early October.
“I want to pack into the back
country and climb those tough ones in the picture above your fireplace,” he
said when we returned to our campsite – one we’d driven into.
“If that’s the case, I’ve got
some training to do. It’s a rugged
six-mile hike in and that’s with a full pack.
The climb up Skylight or Algonquin is 8-10 hours round trip. We’ve got a month,” I concluded.
And so I’m on a mission. For the past three days I’ve hiked with a
pack weighing about 40 pounds on my back.
Yesterday’s hike included 230 step-ups done on logs and rocks I find
along the trail. They average 10-14
inches in height and stress the hips and quads and build the kind of strength
you need to climb all day.
And I need this trip for
another reason, as well. Solace and
serenity. My recent move to Peninsula
and the Cuyahoga Valley National Park was the right one for the place I find myself
in life, but it doesn’t change the fact that I miss my home of 21 years and all
the things it represents. Life as I knew
it there is in the rearview mirror. My
high school sweetheart and wife of 39 years is gone. The kids are grown and living their
lives. I’m looking to retire and trying
to figure out what I want that to look like. Yes – I need the mountains and the
tranquility they offer.
Hike
with 230 step-ups: One hour.
Training
Heart Rate: 100-140 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 750
Bonus:
21,000 steps for the day.
Sunday,
September 4, 2017
“…and I’ve been looking for
your blog now and again and I’m telling you that I want to look tomorrow and
read about the workout you just told me about…”
It was the end of a long
conversation I was having with my son, Jack, from Fort Gordon, Augusta,
Georgia. As was the usual, our conversation
had gotten around to physical fitness.
He was selected to be part of a special training group that helped
soldiers he needed to pass their PT’s – physical training – that included a
timed two-mile run, sixty seconds of push-ups and sixty seconds of
sit-ups. “I’m in pretty good shape, but
I need to set an example so I want to get my 2-mile time under 12 minutes. Can you help me do that?”
Easy, peasy…but he was sorely
disappointed in me for not writing. I
don’t think he cared for my excuse about not having anything to write about – I’ve
essentially given up working out so that I could work second jobs in the evenings
– he just believes I should write. I
told him I would and so I shall.
I wrote last January that I had
several important things on my agenda.
High blood pressure, atrial fibrillation surgery, getting my house ready
to sell and downsizing, retiring, and getting back to regular exercise and to
writing about it. I’m on blood pressure
medication, I had an ablation to correct the irregular heart rate (more on that
later), I bought a new place in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, and I’m
working more than ever!
Most importantly though, I’ve
begun to exercise with some regularity.
My weight has remained constant because I average around 20,000 steps a
day through work and short hikes. On a
recent trip to the Adirondacks and a climb up Giant Mt., I discovered with
certainty what I suspected…all those steps did little to prepare me for a climb
and having my heart rate over 120 bpm for an extended period of time. I struggled to the top over a climb of
several hours, but it wasn’t fun. My companion,
a fellow employee from the farm, was excited about the Adirondacks and wanted
to return in the fall and hike into the back country and climb more peaks. He had mentioned to me several days ago that
he’d been hiking for a couple of hours at a time with a 40-pound pack in
preparation for that trip. Shit. I needed to step up my game.
I ended the day with over
20,000 steps, but was fatigued throughout.
I’m way out of shape and anxious to get it all back. I need to find a place to do the Survival
Workout as well since I don’t want to lose the tone and strength I’d worked so
hard to regain. Jack is due in town for
two weeks starting Friday and he will inspire me further to get it going and to
stick with it. Thanks Jack. I’m on the road to recovery.
Hike:
Two hours and 30 minutes.
Training
Heart Rate: 100-120 bpm.
Calories
Burned: 1500
Bonus:
20,500 steps for the day.
