Take a Hike

I love the one about the doctor telling the grandmother to start walking 3 miles a day to improve her health...  She started doing that 2 years ago and now her family has no idea where she is.

Oh, what would I give to be able to walk as well as I did even 10 years ago?  Truthfully?  My left arm.  It doesn't do much anyway... except help me smoke cigarettes and drink tea at the computer.  And it's got what is lovingly called a bingo wing.   The skin on it looks like a satellite image of Texas.  It bends and is comfortable to lean on in most any armchair.  And when I drive, it leans on the window frame very nicely.  Of course, that has given the elbow a rather dark and crusty look.   I have always meant to put sunblock on it... but we are forgetful.

I could quit smoking, and would in a North Dakota minute if I could trade that arm for the ability to walk as well as I did 10 years ago.

My grandmother, my mom's mother, broke her hip when she was 54.  I remember seeing her fall.  I saw the little black dog running toward her and she could see only me, tiny 3- or 4-year-old me, skipping down the street to meet her as she came from the bus stop.  I saw the dog.  I stopped skipping.  I wanted her to stop walking.  She didn't, and tripped over the little black dog.  The dog yipped, my grammy cried out in pain.  I tried to help her up, but she said, "Run get your mother, Honey."

My next memory of her is seeing her in the hospital bed with a cast on her hip and leg.  She had broken her hip.  When I totally relax I can see two men putting her in an ambulance, but it is not as clear a picture as that little dog running, my grandmother walking, looking at me with love and joy on her face, in her eyes.   If only she would glance to the right and see the dog.   Surely, she wondered why I stopped still, frozen in mid-skip.  But accidents happen in the blink of an eye.   I learned that just then.   Grammy probably already knew it as a fact of life, but (as I know now) adults tend to forget everything they know when they are too focused on a single moment. 

And so, for Gram Doxtater,  who had loved to walk, walking became a chore and she walked less and less. 

My father's mother, Gram Behr, had a limp for as long as I can remember, though it became more pronounced as she got older.   I asked her once why she limped.  Gram Behr didn't talk much.  She simply answered "arthritis."   Gram Behr was more distant with us, didn't see us as often as my mother's mom.   Even when she lived with her daughter, Aunt Thelma, and brother Gregory and I would spend a couple of weeks in the summer, Gram Behr was not a presence.  She was a git'er done German of few words.    She would feed us, as well as our two cousins, Tom and Nancy, and clean up and go to her room.  

At one time, to be more independent probably, she took a job as a live-in housekeeper for a widower with two children, Wanda and Kippy, who lived not far from Aunt Thelma.  I stayed with her there a couple of times, sharing her bed.  Once she told me to keep my mouth closed when I sleep so I wouldn't snore.   I'm sure I tried.

Lest I go on about my grandmothers further, I remind myself I am writing about walking.  A broken hip, arthritis, bad feet.... that's my family history on the subject.  The bad feet belonged to my mother.   She had an overly pronounced instep, which she blamed on high heels.  As a middle-aged woman, she had ample time and opportunity to have foot surgery.  But with 8 children and her determination to do as much as she could for friends and family, she never took the time to take care of her feet.   Even in her late sixties she was having trouble and oh, so much pain, walking.   So she stopped except for when she had no choice.  Then when she became diabetic, her feet became worse.  Much worse.

My dad never had problems with his feet or legs.  He did, however, have disk repair surgery. . . and he wore for years after that a therapeutic cummerbund, a girdle, to support his back.

Bad backs, arthritis ... I should have seen it coming.  Funny how I could be more on the watch against accidents that happen in the blink of an eye, than against the genetic factors that would someday keep me from walking as I would love.

Spinal stenosis, osteoarthritis, 4 herniated disks.   Because of the stenosis and the arthritis and the spondylolisthesis, surgeons don't want to repair the disks unless they put a rod in my back.  At least that's the story so far.  And I don't want a rod because I've known people who are worse off with it than before.  So I put up with the pain and my walking is very limited.  You may have seen me in a grocery store, hunched over the cart.  Or in one of those electric shopping carts.  Or with my Rollator walker, sitting every few feet to ease the pain. 

When I was in my 20s and 30s I swore to myself that I would do whatever it took so as not to end up like my mother and grandmothers, unable to walk for the sheer pleasure of it.  I walked.  I went 20 years without a car because it made me walk more. 

But now, at 64, overweight and arthritic, I am often near tears for not being able to walk.  I believe I can do more than I have been doing, and will try harder, push a little bit further.  I will even check with my new doctor about getting disk repairs.   And I must must must lose weight.  Those two things are my hope.  At 64 I still have hope.  Seems reasonable to me that I must lose weight before I have surgery on the disks.   How else can I ask for help if I don't help myself? 

My left arm, yes,  I would give in order to be able to walk for the sake of walking.  People take walking so for granted.   I see them.  Totally oblivious of the blessing they have.   The opportunity they have for better health as they age.   I tell my children,"Save yourselves,"  but I really believe it is not too late for me to take a hike.  Someday.