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.
