2000 Days of 10,000 Steps or More

A few years ago, after I mentioned my morning workouts in conversation, a co-worker looked quizzically at me and said, “You work out?” Yes. I do. I may not be buff, slender, and sculpted, but I am fit. I work out every day. I have worked out daily for more than thirty years – and I hate it. 

When I began working out, I went to a gym on my way home from school. I was self-conscious and nervous, but I didn’t have any equipment at home and I didn’t know what I was doing. I needed the trainers to show me how to use the weights and machines. 

In addition to weights, I swam. I like swimming, partially because it doesn’t feel like I am sweating when I am all wet. It is clear that I am when I stop. I thought of swimming as my aerobic exercise. 

One day, I got to the gym and found that the pool was under construction. It would be under construction for a long time. Impulsively, I got on one of the stationary bikes and used that instead. I found that I liked the bike. I watched the news on the gym televisions or listened to music. It was clear to me that I was getting a better workout on the bike than I got in the water. Then it occurred to me: I could buy a stationary bike and work out at home! 

From that moment, I did at least a half hour on the bike every morning. I worked hard. It was my concession to physical fitness. It was like taking vitamins or eating vegetables. But watching my recorded TV shows made it tolerable and I didn’t have much time to watch TV.

A few years ago, I figured out that my iPhone was counting my steps. It didn’t count steps when I was on the bike, but it did keep track of my steps throughout my day. So I made a goal to get at least 10,000 steps daily. I realize that 10,000 is an arbitrary number, but I needed some kind of benchmark. 

After a year of doing this, I wanted to do better. I increased both the number of steps I took a day and the average steps per week and month. And I started using our home treadmill in addition to my stationary bike in the morning. 

I got a majority of my steps at school. I would have about 9000 steps by the end of sixth period. My last two periods of the day were usually my freshmen. They needed a lot of attention. When the day ended, I would usually have about 13,000 steps. Yes, flying around classrooms with students who needed attention was worth around 4000 steps! 

When I retired, my goal was to maintain my amount of movement. I had more time, so I increased the length and intensity of my treadmill walks. I walked longer and, as the walk continued, I increased the speed. 

During the pandemic, my children came home. My daughter brought her dog and I became a dog walker. In addition to my treadmill workout in the morning, I walked the dog at least two times a day. Even after my daughter and her dog went back east, I still take one or two additional outdoor walks each day in almost all weather. 

Since the end of January 2017, I have walked at least 10,000 steps a day. My monthly averages have gone up steadily and now are in between 16,000 and 18,000 steps a day depending on the season. It is sometimes too cold or wet for outdoor walks and I will take an easier treadmill walk in its place. My neighbors joke that I need a dog. No, thank you. 

I still don’t look great in a bathing suit. I am not a muscular hunk. I am a little flabby, but when the nurse took my EKG at my physical, she said, “You must be a runner!” I told her, no, I am a walker!

Reading for Treasure: February

Reading for Treasure is my list of articles that are worth your attention. Click here for an introduction! Here are some articles to read discussing how we can both mentally and physically protect our children and ourselves:

10 Reasons Teens Have So Much Anxiety Today: This quick article from Psychology Today lists specific reasons that teens today may be much more anxious than we were at their age. It is a good checklist for parents!

Teach Your Kids To Value Empathy Over Tenacity: Years ago, my congregational rabbi’s High Holiday sermon asked, “Would you rather your children be successful or good?” Kids know what we really value by our behavior, even if our actions don’t always match. This short Lifehacker article provides a good example of why empathy should be higher on most parents’ lists.

Encourage Teens to ‘Speak Before You Send’: This Lifehacker article is a great companion to the one above. I think we hear language very differently than we see it. When I just read my text or email in my head, it sounds fine. When I read it aloud, I hear it very differently. This is makes reading aloud a great editing tool – not only for writing skills but for empathy as well.

Bicyclists Should Be Shamed Into Wearing Helmets: This Chicago Tribune column takes a humorous angle on a very simple message: wear a helmet when riding a bike. I love the old man voice in this article. When my kids were growing up, we always said that you only needed to wear a helmet if you had something to protect…

10 quick thoughts on mobile phones in schools: This quick list from Dangerously Irrelevant really says that the problem is not phones. There are other issues and classroom phone struggles are really about teaching, the structure of schools, and the use of technology for learning. I agree!

I’m currently reading The Fated Sky by Mary Robinette Kowal

The Price of Parking

In 1999, a parent of a Barrington High School student purchased a home next to the school. This parent had no intention of living in the house. The family already lived in the district. The only reason for this huge expenditure was to purchase the driveway. The parent had bought a parking spot for their child, a very expensive parking spot.

Setting aside the cost of the car, what does this choice mean? For most schools, including my own, there is either free or inexpensive bussing service available to anyone who lives more than a mile from the school. No child should HAVE to drive to school. Even those who live close form carpools.

What does it mean to spend thousands of dollars for a car and parking spot for a sixteen-year-old?

First, it means you are living well. This is an issue for affluent families.

Second, it says that convenience is important. Some parents don’t want the child to take another means to school. The bus is not a good choice for them. Why? What is wrong with carpools? They seem like a great way to share the cost. But financial cost is clearly not the key factor in these decisions.

We haven’t even thought about environmental considerations.

And what about safety?

Young drivers make mistakes. Young drivers are more likely to make mistakes when they are in a hurry. One hopes these errors are benign and easily repaired. Sometimes, young drivers are using devices or otherwise distracted. “Good” and “responsible” kids are still inexperienced drivers. Young drivers and teenagers in general need supervised practice. We must help them develop good habits.

If you were going to visit a high school and would be staying beyond the end of the class day, would you choose to park in the student lot or the faculty lot? Why? What about on a snowy day?

Having a group of inexperienced drivers in one place can be dangerous. The student lot at the high school is only one example. I live in a neighborhood that abuts our high school. Some of my neighbors allow students to park in their driveways. Many of these kids pay for that privilege. Of course, they are not charging Barrington prices, but again, between the cost of the car (and gas and upkeep) and the price of parking, this option is only available to families with means.

The high school allows most senior students to park for a fee in the student lot. Therefore, the parkers at my neighbors’ homes are most often younger, less experienced drivers. There are 152 homes in my subdivision. I don’t know how many kids are parking, but judging from the kids walking down my street after school, it must be more than twenty-five.

So, around 3:30, we have many young experienced drivers moving through our neighborhood. At just about the same time, the bus from the middle school drops off. Kids who are walking or biking are leaving the high school at that time, too. We are close enough to the elementary school that we do not qualify for free busing, so on nice days, we might also have younger students going home, as well.

A few years ago, a student of mine was riding his bicycle home. As he rode away from the school and down one of the streets in my neighborhood, a student driver who was “renting” a neighbor’s driveway pulled out a little faster than was safe. She cut off the cyclist and he hit her car. He was thrown over the car and landed on the street. When the EMTs arrived and treated him, they told him that, had he not been wearing a helmet, he might have had severe injuries  - or worse.

Most of the kids I see riding bikes to school are not wearing helmets.

I have been told by my lawyer friends that a homeowner would not be liable for actions of the student driver using their driveway. That doesn’t matter to me. If a child who was parking on my driveway hurt someone  - or worse – I would be very upset. I might not be legally liable, but I might see myself as at least partially responsible.

Kids make poor choices. Good and smart kids make mistakes. New drivers do dangerous things, not because they are foolhardy (although some are) but because they don’t know better.

There is no ignominy in taking the bus. Time with your child in the car (and their friends) is time to talk and get the news. It may be less convenient, but it is safer and healthier.

To my neighbors: please take these ideas into consideration if you are thinking about letting students park at your home. Please don’t sell out our safety. To parents: the way your child gets to school is more than a matter of convenience and affects more than just your child.

Street Smart or Street Stupid?

When we say, “street smarts,” we are usually talking about practical knowledge. People who are street smart, as opposed to book smart, have practical knowledge and can handle themselves in rough and tumble situations.

I want to talk about street smarts in a more literal way. I am concerned that people are not smart in the street. In other words, that their behavior as the drive and bicycle makes me wonder if we need a new term: street stupid. My daughter is a brand new driver and is often shocked at how poorly many people drive. I told her, “Not all people are poor drivers, but most of them are.” I think too many of us are street stupid and it could be deadly.

Yesterday, I saw a dad riding bicycles with his two children. Both children were wearing helmets but Dad was not. I can see the situation: Dad hits one of the many potholes in our streets and is incapacitated. Now what do the kids do? Perhaps dad is either so hardheaded or stupid that a helmet won’t make a difference. If we want our children to take proper safety precautions, what message do we send them when we fail to take those precautions ourselves? Unless there is nothing in your head worth protecting, why not wear a helmet? We need to model street smarts for our kids!

As I continue to teach my daughter to drive, I instructed her to always assume a bicycle will ignore the traffic rules. It is such a wonderful and rare exception when a bike stops at a stop sign. It is my experience that many bikes don’t even stop at traffic lights. Forget about riding in a single file line, many bikes are all over the road. Too many times, I come around a curve or turn a corner to find a bicycle heading directly toward me. Usually that rider has no helmet. Duh!

Street stupidity by bikers is liable to get them hurt or killed. When car drivers are street stupid, they are more likely to kill innocent people. How hard is it to turn on the headlights of your car? The car creates electric power, so there is no cost. The bulbs last for a long time. In my state, the law requires motorists to use their headlights if they have their windshield wipers on. Wait a minute. Isn’t that common sense? Next time it is raining or there is fog, count the number of cars without headlights on. Stupidity is rampant.

However, the place where street stupidity is an epidemic is the use of cell phones while driving. There has been a great deal of coverage of this issue in the popular press - using a cell phone, even if it is with some kind of hands-free device, is a driving distraction akin to drunk driving. How many times have you passed a driver going too slowly, driving dangerously, or not paying attention only to see that driver talking on a phone? But of course, we are better than that. We can talk on our phones and drive safely. Can we? Really? Always?

Driving while texting boggles my mind. It is in another universe from any of the other forms of street stupidity. According to the New York Times, people sending text messages will look away from the road for as much as five seconds. Think about how far a car going only thirty miles an hour can travel in five seconds. Think about the damage it can do. According to a Pew Research Center report, 27 percent of all adults and 26 percent of teens report sending text messages while driving! That means that one or more of the drivers near you on the road is probably looking at the phone and not the road.

So here is the gambit: is the cell phone call or text message worth an accident? Is it worth someone’s life? That is a loaded question. I thought about starting this posting with a quiz on each of these issues. But everyone knows the right answers. No sane, reasonable person would say that a text message or phone call was worth the pain an accident, even a minor one, would cause. Then why are so many people street stupid?

We can only hope that they don’t hurt people close to us.