TREADMILLS AND TV

I just got home from yoga class.  It's Saturday and I hadn't gone all week.   I almost didn't go again today.  I stared at the kitchen clock, as I sipped my coffee, until the last possible minute before I had to leave to get there on time, trying to  convince myself it was fine to just be "in the moment",  "just breathe", overcome the "worthless energy expended on feeling guilty"...

Then I got my butt in gear and went.  Glad I did, of course.  Lovely, slow asana today with lots of attention to stretching for the low back and sciatic nerve.

I guess the reason I was feeling I could take a "pass" on class today was because I'd already done an early morning 50 minute stint on the treadmill  -- enough time to watch 2 episodes of the recently released Season 2 of "Catastrophe" on Amazon Prime -- a raucously irreverent Amazon Original comedy series about a couple who hook up, get pregnant, get married, have a kid... Now in Season 2 it's like 2-1/2 years later... I won't go on in case you check it out, but I was home alone walking the treadmill with earbuds in, laughing out loud...often!  You may hate the show and judge me for my twisted sense of humor (lots of sex -- sometimes a little too much and over the top even for me -- and swearing and life situations that are hilarious), but so be it.  I am looking for things that make me laugh out loud these days.  Politics isn't doing it for me.

But anyway, the treadmill thing is yet another attempt to discipline myself to get more aerobic movement (I won't say the "E" word) in my day.  My Fitbit dutifully records my steps, but really doesn't care if I'm running up hill or shuffling around the house in my slippers.  Hub got up this morning declaring that he needs to be more physically active (this as he was hustling about to go snowboarding) and has set himself the ungodly goal of a 5-mile brisk walk every day.    I know that is not completely realistic, but I know him too, and if he says it he will to it every day, I know he'll do it most days.

I added up the time it would take me to walk 5 miles.  I walk at a less than "brisk" 20 minutes per mile pace; I could push it, but then I'd hate every minute of it and that would defeat me in short order.  So, we are looking at an hour and 40 minutes to get my 5 miles in.  On yoga days, I'm already committed to a 90 minute yoga class with a 40 minute round trip drive to get there and back.  Pad that with another few minutes on either end for parking, set up, clean up, etc. and Yoga is a 2-1/2 hour commitment that I make most weeks at least twice, ideally three times.  Yoga and a 5 mile walk = almost 4 hours.  I read I'm also supposed to lift weights for 30 minutes three times a week, which I have whittled down to 10 minutes about every three months, but I could kick that up a notch, I suppose.  So if I added in some weight lifting I'm up to 4-1/2 hours, plus meditation of course, for brain and spirit health (let's say 30 minutes) and that's 5+ hours just for exercise and meditation in a day.  (You can check my math on that; I am deficient in that area and had to actually draw little clock faces and pretend my pencil was the hour hand -- I blame 1950's public education system for my woeful arithmetic skills and the humiliation of making me solve problems at the blackboard as part of a competitive team for which I was always the last chosen and the sole reason for many teams losing.  I digress.)

Now subtract 3 days a week care for  a one year old who is not on board with ANY of this personal improvement stuff,  meaning it would have to happen after 5:30 in the evening after a full day of childcare.  Also there is that twice/month volunteer commitment to my old social service agency.   Plus I have an active social life (instrumental for mental health, all the articles say) which gets me out to various breakfast, lunch, and/or coffee dates each week with my gal-pals.   And Hub and I are currently undertaking a big kitchen update project with requires meeting with contractors and shopping for granite and sinks and faucets and appliances, etc, etc. on the days we don't have the grandbaby.

The point is, it's very hard to do all this walking, lifting, yoga-ing, meditating, teeth flossing, bill paying, vacuuming, shopping, cooking, gardening, reading, talking, socializing, traveling, Facebooking, blogging, and sleeping in a time frame that makes any sense at all.  No wonder I get overwhelmed and occasionally (often) just grab a book or a magazine and read about what I should be doing instead of actually doing it.  Oh, and I'm also a sedentary person by nature.

Hub really will go for his long walks because he actually enjoys it.  I enjoy the occasional long walk outdoors, but I'm more content on the treadmill where I can read or watch TV to distract me from the effort of what I am doing.  I do fret occasionally that the incline feature on my treadmill is broken, so I can only walk on "flat ground", but then I remind myself that I have a skewed vision of altitude challenges.  People who don't live in Western Washington have flat-land as their natural terrain.  I should know; I grew up in Northern Illinois where a big hill was a topographical anomaly.  At my house now there is nowhere I can venture outside my front door that is flat.  It's all up and down -- either hard on the knees or or the calves and takes me to an anaerobic state just to get gratefully home again.  But if I don't struggle, I feel like I'm cheating.  May need to work on that with my therapist.

I know I need to step up my game to ensure a healthy longer life and I've been meaning to do that for about 30 years.  It's starting to be (ok, past) time to get serious.   So I'm beginning (again) with baby steps into this thing.  I will never, ever be able to keep up with Hub.  It takes most of my energy just to get my ugly walking shoes on, so 5 miles is out of my range and beyond my attention span.

I'm gonna do it by TV episodes.  Starting out with two episodes of Catastrophe most days of the week until I get through Season 2.  Then on to Transparent, which I only managed to see for half of the first season.  I also have Mozart in the Jungle on my "to watch" list. (UPDATE:  Its' GREAT!).  Outlander, Season 2 starts tonight and I will do a bit of weight lifting, sort of like a drinking game, every time Jamie says "aye" in that sexy Scottish brogue.  See?  All of these TV shows actually make me want to get moving!

Whatever works.

At least, that's the view from here...©