Life conversations with Shawn.
He says we are closer to the end than to the beginning. It is a bit morbid and honestly, I don’t really love looking at life that way. He’s a very matter of fact kind of guy. One thing I do know is that I love the place I am in life. While youth is not looking back at me in the mirror, I love my home, I feel the strength of my family, my daughters and am active in their lives unfolding. I feel vigour in a way I hadn’t felt before, most likely because I know that time is precious and I want to make the most of every day.
I yearn for the drive to keep focused on the things that make me strong like eating great meals, making time for friends and generally nurturing my mind and body. I play pickleball, and am addicted to pickleball! I enjoy walks through the forest with my rambunctious dogs and I love food (and wine). We should live every day like we might our last but realistically, there are chores to do, dinner to make, work to finish and dogs to walk. Important is to find joy in all of those things no matter how trivial and mundane.
Many of my friends talk about similar things, among them, feeling healthy, ways to live longer, living better. I discovered that I have beginnings of arthritis in my back. I see my father struggling to regain mobility after undergoing a knee replacement, his day now occupied by exercise that will help him strengthen his muscles. In reality, my dad has been active but not as active as he could have been. He spent many hours at a desk over the course of his life, speaking with clients, researching files on his computer. The transition to a wheelchair can be sudden and it is surprising how quickly muscles degenerate.
Discovering Rucking
I realized on a recent trip to visit my daughter - (Olympian daughter) in Victoria after she asked me to go walking with her which involved walking along a beach with giant pebbles, up and down a winding rocky trail and up a mountain. I wasn’t as sure-footed as I had thought. Coincidentally I had just listened to a story about the benefits of Rucking from a favourite author about aging well, Peter Attia. I had honestly never heard of rucking before but I was intrigued. On my flight home, I decided to give it a try. It’s not for everyone but it is a way to level up a daily walk and will help increase strength in your back, arms, legs and especially knees.
So what is Rucking exactly? Believe me, Shawn asked me this while holding in a laugh as I explained it to him. It started out as military training in WWI, using a weighted (I’m talking over 100 lbs) rucksack to go over rugged terrain and long distances. It’s like pickleball in that you don’t need much equipment other than a knapsack and some weights to put in it and one doesn’t need to begin with 100 lbs!
What I like about rucking, is that my heart rate increases and it benefits everyday movements like bending over, picking up groceries, running around the pickleball court and strengthening my muscles thereby increasing agility. Since I’ve been doing this, I’ve noticed less back pain from arthritis. I’m hooked. Not as hooked as pickleball but close.
I use a regular knapsack with some weights, just dumbbells I already have and off I go. I started with 10 lbs and I’m up to 18 now hoping to get to 20 next week. You may wish to wrap them in a t-towel so they don’t move around in your pack. I walk briskly, ideally up and down hills, but flat trails are fine too. Hard to find many hills here in my town but they do exist. Ideally I like to undertake about 5-7 kilometers every day but any distance is fine. Whatever works for you and feels right and there is no magic number as to how many times a week is important. Do what you can in moderation. I guarantee, you will feel good, your heart will feel good. I feel like I can take on anything. We shall see where that gets me. Stay tuned.
Funny that this episode is on rucking ( and yes, I can see Shawn’s amusement …) . Just finished 5 days on the Camino de Santiago having walked about 120 km with my belongings on my back. A profound rucking experience . A lot of the conversation on the trail revolved around what were carrying: Did we bring enough stuff? was it weighing us down? What could be left behind and what was essential? It was not lost on most hikers that this conversation was happening at both a practical and metaphorical level. Something to be said for putting one foot in front of another with your junk on your back!