Picking Up Sticks, Channeling Mom

Retirees need physical exercise. While they were in the labor force, if they had strenuous jobs, they could ignore the gyms and weight rooms and still stay in shape from work alone. Now if I don’t work out, I will quickly turn into jelly and become an old man. What to do? Should I get on the exercise bike or lift my dumbbell? BORING! How about a 3-mile walk or long bike ride? Still sounds like work to me. What if I did a morning of yard work? My spouse would certainly approve of any improvements, I’d be out in the sunlight and fresh air, and my sour winter mood and self-esteem might rally as I viewed my accomplishments. Yes, yard work seems the way to go.

The leaves are all down and in my compost piles now, clearly showing the structure that needs to be pruned and cleared in the fence rows and woods. What needs to be done reveals itself to me, one step at a time. There is some variety with each new task and I work at a steady but unrushed pace…an entire morning of moderate exercise versus the thirty minutes of more intense stationary bike or weight lifting. The whole time I am outdoors, the house thermostat is cranked back very low and our sun porch is gaining warmth to heat the house this afternoon. As I pick up dead branches and drag limbs to the fire pit where I know there will be a bonfire later, nature works its trick and my winter funk lifts. I don’t use any power tools as the noise would disturb the quietude.

When we were growing up, Mom always wanted a farmhouse on a hill with a woods and a spring and flowers. In her golden years, that is precisely what she got, right on the edge of the suburbs. During the last 20 years of her life, Mom stayed in shape walking up and down that hill past the spring house picking up sticks and carrying them handful by handful to the fire pit where they would remain until the family had our annual soup-making cookout. Dad would get winded if he walked up that hill one time, but not Mom; she had stamina.

I’ve only visited Mom and Dad’s mausoleum one time since they died…I didn’t feel any real connection. There are pictures of them on our living room wall which I stop in front of only maybe once a week…not as much connection as there should be. But when I walk up and down this rise in my woods and pick up twigs… I channel Mom all morning long.