Birthday Post

I walked today around the lake at Sharon Woods.  I would have run, except that I was feeling lazy--I'll at least walk, I thought, figuring I would walk through my neighborhood for 30 minutes.  But as soon as I left I headed as I often do to the park, and found myself walking for an hour, realizing that I was enjoying the various details I was noticing along my walk:  the duck with his little tail feathers sticking up as he dived for food; the triangles of ice in the gap where tree branch v's met the water; the slant of the late afternoon sun through the trees. 

Why not walk this year, I thought.  Why not commit to at least 30 minutes (I'm tempted to say an hour, but with other exercise, that might not happen), and commit as well to noticing life each day in these quiet, slower moments.  There are so many forward-looking ideas wrapped into this--taking the time to savor the days and in that way try to stem the tide against what I fear may be the rush of days into my future.  The potential for meeting people which I generally don't do and would like to.  The opportunity to stop and look and notice the things I too often miss.  I was excited about this as I walked, and thought I'd like to commit to 365 days of walking--every day, no matter what.

As I sit here two hours later, I wonder if this seems reasonable/feasible/workable/what I want to do/another distraction.  But, I think, if it replaces my other blog and continues my efforts to exercise, it can't be all bad.  And perhaps the change of focus will be useful in this my new decade (the hell with 50-60, it's 55-65 that counts--65!!  I'm not wanting to be there, and yet, inexorably, I'm headed in that direction a bit too quickly for my preferences). 

And so . . . .  

Here's to walking, not running, through the rest of my life with time to savor and explore and notice and learn and enjoy along the way.