Losing a part of me

I thought I did pretty well yesterday, although I did have some goldfish crackers – the last of them. Unless I go shopping for treats, I have no more temptations in the pantry that I can think of. I have no further need to shop – I went to the supermarket last night to pick up an onion and to collect my dry cleaning. I want to be able to wear those suits in a month; unless I stay on track, that is unlikely to happen. So, I will stay on track.

Yesterday, I bought my ticket for Disneyland. There are not a lot of options for getting discounts, and rather than spending excessing time on this, I decided to just pay full boat. I am disappointed that my friend will be out of town – his wife works for the company, and they could have signed me in for free. I am really looking forward to it though – Leslie and her son are worth it!

There is no rain in the forecast for today, and that means I will head out for a good walk. There are a few reasons for this, not the least of which are the consequences I mentioned a day or two ago. In truth, I am still trying to make fitness walking habitual. I am long past the stage when I worried if I was able to walk well, and most of the time when I embark on a fitness walk, I am going to try for a certain distance (almost always in excess of 8km). However, I have still not become addicted to it. I still have to say to myself on any given day, ‘Okay, I should go for a walk. This is what time I am going, and this is the route that I will take.’

I really want fitness to be part of my nature that I just go. I want it to be an addiction. Of course, it will never be that simple… as it will never be as simple for me to lose and keep off all of my excess weight. I think, really I know that I will always have to work at these things. I have to admit that I was never a fitness junkie, which probably would have made a lot of things in my life much easier. If I had been, I likely never would have gotten to where I am. It is a sad realization maybe, but it is an honest one. Guys in my unit would wake up, roll out of their bunks, and be doing pushups before they even peed. I would always grumble something about coffee, even though I was in just as good shape as they were. I have never loved it… I just always knew it was good for me, and important to do. For far too many years, I ignored it. Wisdom comes with age, and at fifty years old I know that I can never ignore fitness, just like I will never be able to eat without thinking. That is a very certain recipe for failure, and I do not want that.

Aside from my walking, I will likely stay pretty close to home today. If he were around, I might invite my son the elder for a drink; he is on the west coast with friends, so that’s a non-starter. I might reach out to a friend to see if they want to sit and chat, but I suspect that Lyle is busy preparing for his aunt’s visit. We’ll see.

Speaking of my son (and his absence), I am going to have to get an Uber to take me to the airport on Thursday. That’s usually an opportunity to see my boy, but with his not being in town, I am deprived of that option.

As it turns out, Lyle is free for a cigar. After my walk I’ll have lunch around 1:00pm, and then drive over there for a couple of hours. I do not plan to make it a late night – or even evening – because I am going to do laundry this evening, so that tomorrow afternoon everything that I want to take to Dallas (and of course to California) will be clean. I won’t pack tonight, but I will try to fold and organize everything.

I was speaking with Leslie this week, and I told her that I am going to bring a lot of my summer clothes and just leave them there. After all, by the time I am back (October 16) it is a safe bet that the short-pants weather will be behind us for the season. When she asked if I won’t need them in the spring, my initial response was that I could bring them home in time for that. When I gave it some thought, I was happy to tell her that if all goes according to plan, all of the shorts that I am wearing now will be too big for me by the spring, and I will need new ones anyways. Despite the bumps along the road (like this past couple of weeks), my goal is to be down another fifty pounds by next spring… if not more. Leslie agrees that if I am able to accomplish that, it will be a pleasure to have to buy new shorts!

I have procrastinated enough. It is time for me to hit the trails. I am not sure now steady my knees feel, so I am going to plan for an 8km walk, with the option to extend it if I am feeling up to it. I will walk through the park to Appleby Line, up to Dundas Street, then back down. If I am feeling ambitious at that point, I can continue down to Mainway for the extra couple of kilometres. We’ll see. For now, I am going to start by suiting up and heading out.

Have a great day!