"This one step -- choosing a goal and sticking to it --
changes everything."
--Scott Reed
Copyright © 2017
by Ralph F. Couey
January is traditionally the time when people set goals, a process we know as "New Years Resolutions." I have, for a long time, declined to take part in what I always considered a process that almost always ended in failure. Got cynicism? But on one cold night in January I was sitting in front of the computer looking at my stats on running/hiking/walking from 2016, courtesy of Map My Run. I intrinsically like round numbers, and that total of 822.35 miles kinda gnawed at me. Surely, I thought, I could have somehow squeezed an additional 177.65 miles out of that 365 days. It got worse when I did the math and realized I only needed an average of .48 miles every day for the year to get to the magic 4-digit number. Less than a half-mile per day. Hmmm....
So out of that doleful rumination arose a -- -- New Years Resolution. For 2017, I decided, I would commit to bipedally locomoting a thousand miles.
Having made the decision, all I had to do was figure it out. And then carry it out.
First, the math. To do 1000 miles in a year, I would have to average 20 miles per week. At my normal activity level of 5 days per week, that would be a measly four miles each time. But January was almost gone, so I had to refigure for a 47-week year, which raised the weekly a smidge to 22 miles per week. I knew that weather would be a factor, and the inevitable times of sickness, plus the usual responsibilities of life which would create days where walking would be displaced by duties.
January was a time of transition for us. I retired, we sold our home, moved to Colorado to stay with our middle daughter and her husband while we sorted things out. Cheryl left her traditional job and chose to become a travel nurse, working 13-week contracts, something she's always wanted to do. If you read my posts from that time period, you will know that I was also dealing with some personal angst. So, with all that going on, it really wasn't until early February that I really began whittling away in earnest.
My daily distance through the previous years had been about 5 miles when running, and anywhere from 4 to 10 miles when hiking. So my first task was to add distance. Gradually, I stretched it out. I had abandoned running after my doctor warned me that the continual and vigorous pounding would guarantee me a wheelchair before I reached the age of 70. I turned to hiking, which is a total joy when you live close to the Appalachian Trail. Now in Colorado, I turned to the large network of urban "trails," in reality just really long sidewalks. Down to one car, my access to the interesting dirt trails that populated the foothills on the other side of Denver was limited. Plus, I really wanted to wait for warmer weather. So on those footpaths in and around Aurora, I set to work. Also during this time, I was acclimating to the higher altitude. I was chronically short of breath, but the only way to get my Colorado lungs, was to push ahead. By April, I was up to 7 miles per day. In May, my lungs had acclimated and I was putting down ten miles five days per week, and finally hiking some really interesting foothill trails as well. I was now ahead of the required pace.
In June, we relocated to Casa Grande, Arizona, south of Phoenix for three months. I blithely assumed I could walk and hike in an Arizona summer. After all, it's a dry heat, right?
It didn't take but a day or two before I realized the fallacy of that assumption. In order to get my distance in, I had to be on the street or trail close to sunup, and off the same by around 9 a.m. The heat was incredible, and things just got worse. In late June and early July, the temperatures shot up to 120 degrees. Fahrenheit. There's something spiritually debilitating about turning on the ten o'clock news and being told that it was still 110 degrees outside. I realized that like the altitude in Denver, the heat in Arizona required time to get used to.
By being smart and careful, and drinking gallons of water, I was able to get six to seven miles in almost every day. In southern Arizona, mountains stick out of the ground seemingly at random. They are not terribly high, as mountains go, but they are rugged and filled with the kind of hazards you could only find in the desert. Along with rattlesnakes and coyotes, there is are nasty little buggers called cholla, a type of cactus that drop items that could best be described as spiky ping pong balls. I had a lot of faith in my Hi Tec Altitude IV boots, but many was the time when I had to stop, sit carefully down, and forcefully remove the cholla from the side of my boot, and then remove my socks and pick the spines out of my foot. Nasty.
Around Labor Day, that contract was complete and we returned to Colorado for a quick three-week turnaround. There was a lot to do, including snagging the next contract. Honolulu fell through, Woodland Hills had to be turned down because there was no affordable place to stay, UCLA Medical Center was stolen out from underneath us. Finally, Cheryl landed a spot with a small community hospital in Covina, California. Southern California in the fall! After winter in Colorado and summer in the desert, we finally nailed the seasonal thing.
At least until the Santa Ana conditions made an historic showing. For the better part of two weeks, temperatures hovered around 100 degrees. While locals complained, after Arizona, it was actually kind of pleasant. So I was back to the pattern of hitting the streets at daybreak and getting done before the heat really got started. Fortunately, the hotel was in the town of San Dimas, a delightfully picturesque community that abutted other delightfully picturesque communities. Walking here was a real pleasure. As I tallied up my distances, I was getting very close to my goal. Then my knee started acting up. I could feel a grinding in the joint, and I had a pain that seemed to around the edges of the kneecap. Hoping that it was just a strain, I took a week off and Advil. With less than 20 miles to go, this was an annoying setback. But after a week, I felt a lot better. I got back at it, reducing my distance and slowing my pace.
Then finally, on November 2nd, after a prosaic walk around a shopping center while my car was being serviced, I hit my goal. A thousand miles done, with two months to spare.
So, I did it. I set an ambitious goal and not only met it, but ahead of schedule.
This was important, especially given the events that started the year. I had to prove to myself that I could accomplish something meaningful outside of my former professional life. That, along with getting my first book published, provides a nice set of bookends to what has been a chaotic and stressful year.
What will I do next year? Haven't decided yet. I need to have my knee looked at before I make any plans. But now I know what I can do when I set my mind to it, and that's the best kind of knowledge for me.
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