Briskly Walking

It’s been a long time but I am finally back on a regular walking schedule and I am feeling pretty good. My feet and legs are still bothering me a little but overall I feel pretty good. When I first started this blog I was walking regularly, not a lot of miles, but walking, and walking briskly, regularly. I felt great. I reported about a terrific low blood pressure reading in this blog. Through rain, snow, everything I kept walking. I walked inside at the gym if I had to. And then came last summer.

I am not sure what happened but I know we had to work hard on our patio and I often felt too tired to walk. I put pressure on myself to walk longer distances and I did and I walked most days. But not all. I don’t think I was walking as briskly. Funny how that works. When I walk at our local city park, Buffalo Park, I can walk briskly and keep an even, steady brisk pace. Buffalo Park has a two-mile dirt course with quarter mile increments marked. I can keep track of how fast I walk between these increments and I do. On good days I try to go faster than ever before. Today I felt great and even walked/jogged parts of it. On bad days I just do my best and keep an even steady brisk pace. I think I do really well. Get me off of a course like this, however, and I go to la-la land. My pace slows way down.

I always thought I was a fast walker. My Mom was a fast walker. I thought I would have gotten it from her. My first indication that I wasn’t was when I talked a friend into doing a 5k walk with me, back when I lived in Utah. We started the walk off great and had a fun time visiting. It was a blustery late winter/early spring day or late fall/ early winter day. I hardly noticed all of the runners/walkers passing us by as we made our way through the course. In our/my defense- I have to pause here, my friend is quite athletic, she was just keeping me company- we actually stopped at one point to help an elderly woman cross an icy street with her groceries. But still I was shocked to get to the end of the “race” to find everyone packing up the food and everything. We were one of the last two people to finish the course.

I was talking with a friend the other day who was remarking about how she just goes faster and faster as she walks about the neighborhood. I admire that really. I have another friend who also can’t help going fast. I know it’s good for you.

I read a New York Times article the other day about the best exercise. I think they ultimately decided running up and down stairs was the best exercise, but walking briskly was right up there. Even 30 minutes a day.