Making Michelle proud...an exercise adventure

“Ahh, Michelle is going to be so proud of me (I like to think Ms Bridges has a personal interest in my progress),’’ I thought as I pedalled off up our hill and out of the estate on Saturday morning.

My weekend plan didn’t exactly fit the Super Saturday session and rest day prescribed, but involved a 50-kilometre bike ride to a nearby farm stay, followed by a climb up a small volcanic plug on Sunday. The outing was to celebrate a month of birthdays – mine, my partner’s, and our good friends who are husband and wife.

The bike ride to the beautiful Henderson Park went fairly well, although it was horribly windy. I managed to burn off 1900 calories according to my Polar wrist gadget, no-one tried to run me off the road, and I survived the frequent stench of road kill.

Henderson Park is set amid beautiful grazing land interspersed with wetlands, birdlife and amazing volcanic plugs. The homestay is on the spring-fed Hedlow creek, allowing exploration of the area on canoes provided by the owners.

 

 

Henderson Park  - serenity, food and wine

 

 

We took a plastic table down to the creek and enjoyed a Hyacinth Bucket-like riparian repast. I must have burned off heaps more energy chewing through lunch – the food provided by my friend seemed never ending – prawn, cheeses, smoked salmon and so on. But I think I managed to not eat more than I had burnt off.

A quick reconnoitre and we had the canoes on the creek and set off against the wind and current. We could only find two paddles, so decided we could manage with one per canoe. My arms were already aching from my first session on the assisted dips machine at the gym the day before, so I initially relished the chance to work some soreness out of them. Although that soon wore thin, I didn’t want to admit to my paddling partner or our friends that I was in pain.

 

 

Funny, it doesn't look windy in this photo, but it was. Very.

 

The serenity of the creek with its overseeing windmills and eucalypts, the lowing of the cattle and sighting of an ambling echidna pushed aside the regular scream of  my arm and shoulder muscles.

We were pretty tuckered out by the time we got back to the cabin, and managed a ten-minute snooze. That ended with some good stomach muscle exercise, as I curled up in laughter when my man fell out of bed.

It turned cold. Luckily we had the campfire organised, and more good food, wine, scotch, port and birthday cake ensued.

I didn’t give Michelle a thought.

I awoke the next morning full of beans and after a mini-exploration of the property, decided I would ride my bicycle to the mountain we were going to climb. I knew it was only about 20 kilometres if I went back the way I had ridden in the day before.

My partner was going to drive home and pick up my son and some friends and meet me at the mount.

I set off and along the way was joined by my friend Lorraine, who lives nearby. We got to talking and, full of bravado, decided to take a slightly different route to the mountain.

It can’t be much further than the original way, we decided. Both roads ended fairly close to our destination.

We wended our way along Hedlow Creek, then cut alongside Lake Mary, a large wetland full of waterbirds.

Still in familiar territory, we bounced our way over the rough gravel road, splashed through some puddles, sang some songs and enjoyed our high spirits.

 

 

Lorraine and I while we were still dry.

 

As we diverged around a big puddle I sang – you take the high road and I’ll take the low road and I’ll get to the mountain before you…

Then we hit THE PUDDLE. Or more specifically, Lorraine went through it, the water suddenly got too deep, she tried unsuccessfully to get her cleats out of her pedals, and…down she went.

So while my shoes got wet (as I couldn’t make it through either), poor ‘Rainy had wet shoes, and wet cycling knix. It inspired new music from me …”I’m singing in Lorraine’’.

When we had wiped the tears of laughter from our eyes, and thanked the heavens Lorraine’s iphone was still dry, we soldiered on.

And on.

And on.

Every few kilometres Lorraine would say ‘the turnoff’s just up ahead, I’m sure of it.

The tenth time she said it, it was true. So then the mantra became ‘we come out onto the main road in a few minutes, I’m sure of it’

By now, we were wearing out. We’d been riding for two hours, and there was no end in sight.

Eventually we could see the mountain we were going to climb, although we weren’t too sure we’d have the legs for it.

I took note of the numbers on the postboxes we were passing. 1690. That means its only 1.6 kilometres to the next main road, I asserted brightly. Deep down, I’m sure I knew it meant 16 kilometres.

When I received a text from my man to say they were at the mountain, I started to stress a little. I didn’t want him stuck there waiting for me, with THREE TEENAGE BOYS. Not a nice thing to do to a man on his 55^th birthday.

So we rushed on, in who knew what direction.

I tried to ring my partner, but my phone decided it was out of credit. My partner told me later  my phone had kept redialing him, and he would answer but only hear me chatting and laughing with Lorraine, and the slosh of my water pack. That’s where all my credit went.

Eventually he rang me, and asked “where are you?’’

HOW THE HELL WOULD I KNOW! I’d been waiting for him to ring so I could yell that line at him.

No, we weren’t lost, I assured him. I could see the mountain. We were only a few hundred metres from the main road. I could hear the traffic…

Four bumpy kilometres later, we found the bitumen and I flew along the smooth surface to the bottom of the mount.

It had been three and a half hours since I set out. Damn, I wanted some lunch.

And I couldn’t back out of climbing Mt Jim Crow. We do it every year, around my birthday. To prove that I still can.

So up I went. In my wet shoes. All the way. Then I came back down a little and redid the last bit with one of my son’s friends, who had vomited on the way up, but still wanted to get to the top.

I was glad I had kept my cycling knix on, under a pair of denim shorts. They provided good padding on the way down when my quads were too tired to hold me up and I bum-hopped over the scree.

 

 

Top of the mountain. That's the road below in the top left corner of the photo. 

 

Exhausted, I turned to my Polar wrist gadget to see how much energy I had burnt. I was empty, spent, and sure I had just burned off a year’s worth of calories.

1200. What! I guess the road was too bumpy and flat to get my heart rate up. And because I was already so tired I climbed the mountain too slowly.

Lucky I burned another million calories laughing, and a score fuming over how far it was.

Surely Michelle would be proud of me.

 

 

 

You're so vain

You're so vain, I bet you think this song is about you, you're so vain
(come on, I know we all know the words to this one, sing along in your head)
 
You walked into the pump class, like you were walking down a catwalk,
your hair strategically tied behind your head,
your clothes they were Lorna Jane,
You had both eyes in the mirror as
you watched yourself dead lift
And all the girls dreamed that we'd have your six pack, we'd have your six pack...


Do you ever feel that this constant striving for bodily perfection is nothing but vanity? That if we have managed to claw our way from an "overweight" BMI to "normal", we should just sit back and relax?
I have tried to make 'be the best me I can be' my mantra, and so I am not going to rest at my mid-range normal BMI. Deep down I know I will never look the way I want, but damn it, I am going to get as close as I can.

The flipside of my personal "I want to be thin"  vanity coin is the "I don't care that I am fat'' movement which fights for  societal acceptance of obesity.
An example is the group of "fat femme'' women from Melbourne who got together and challenged society's lack of acceptance of their body size by forming a synchronized swim team,  reclaiming their local pool for bigger people.
They describe their stories in the documentary Aquaporko!. I haven't been lucky enough to see the film, but that doesn't mean we can't talk about the issues it raises.

The crux of Aquaporko is the need for self-acceptance and in their words, 'embracing body positivity''. And as my comments above hint at, that need doesn't necessarily disappear once you are no longer officially fat.

I think in order to have a healthy relationship with your body, you need to regularly push it to certain limits, so you know it will be there for you when you need it.
 How can you claim to be best buds with your butt if you have trouble heaving yourself out of bed? But if your butt is simply a motor to power you up a couple of flights of stairs without having a heart attack, maybe self-acceptance is deserved.
We all have to live with ourselves. Some may do this by embracing their obesity. I think both the thin and the fat have to uncouple how we look from how we feel about ourselves, and make how our body feels the defining factor. If it feels like it is strong and fit and can meet our daily demands plus a bit more, it doesn't matter what our size is or or how we look.
But don't take acceptance of your size as a get out-of-jail card for life-long health. If you are not nurturing your body with good food and sensible exercise, it will eventually come back to bite you.
These are just some thoughts I am tossing around and putting out there in the hope of starting a discussion. I shall explore it some more in a later post if we get a discussion going.