TAKE A HIKE

Ellen DeGeneres said, “My grandmother started walking 5 miles a day when she was 60.  She’s 97 now, and we don’t know where the heck she is.” Finding Ellen’s grandma, not-with-standing, U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy has recently issued a prescription for sedentary Americans to “take a walk!”

Driving 5 miles is a piece of cake. However, walking 5 miles takes a bit of stamina. Somehow, the recommendation to walk 10,000 steps a day became a goal of the gullible. Depending on your stride, supposedly 10,000 steps can be achieved on a 5-mile walk. The origins of the 10,000 steps recommendation aren’t scientific. Pedometers sold in Japan in the 1960s were marketed under the name, “Manpo Kei” which translates to “10,000 Steps Meter.”

If it’s any comfort the CDC recommends 150 minutes of moderate activity a day. I know that I can walk at least 2000 steps back and forth to the refrigerator in that amount of time. I take great pleasure in hiking nature trails in the mountains. Of course, there is a difference between hiking and walking.

Hiking means; rocks, dirt, bushes, fresh air, and little gnats that fly up your nose. Hiking up a hill is tedious and slow, but it relaxes the mind when you focus on not brushing up next to a cactus or stepping on a rattlesnake.

Walkers go on concrete, asphalt, gravel and sand. Hikers seek the natural environment. Walkers seek Starbucks. Hikers dress the part with sturdy boots, natural fiber clothes, hats with broad brims and walking sticks. Walkers look like everyone else wearing flip-flops and carrying water bottles. Hikers take essentials to deal with an emergency. Walkers take a house key and plastic bags for dog poop. Some walkers go around and around in shopping malls. They keep walking until the stores open. Then walking can get expensive.

Somnambulism is a form of walking, but people don’t know they are doing it, because they are asleep. One night, when I was on a riverboat, there was a knock on my cabin door at 2 a.m. I asked, “Who is it?” And, from the other side of the door, my cabin mate said, “It’s me.” I opened the door and although she looked awake, the blank expression on her face let me know she was asleep. She said, “There was no one at the desk,” and went back to bed. She didn’t remember any of it the next morning. I don’t know how far she had walked, but I know she wasn’t wet, so she hadn’t been walking on water.

Jogging is an annoying mutation of walking. It is an activity for people who enjoy sweating and pain. P. Jones said, “The trouble with jogging is that by the time you realize you’re not in shape for it, it’s too far to walk back.”

My recommendation for those who walk or hike or even jog is to stop once in awhile, and look behind you. The reason is, because, like everything else in life, you don’t really know where you are going, unless you appreciate where you have been.

Esther Blumenfeld  (“I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me”) Noel Coward.