Lifestyle Fitness Camp Part 2
Two
weeks down, one to go. While I don’t
have a waist yet, I can visibly see the difference. I put on a top and tight jeans, and I didn’t
look six months pregnant. That’s
progress.
I had
arranged to drive halfway through Utah, to Salina, to visit a friend from the
China days, Donna Lowery. In Changzhou she
was one of the ‘accompanying’ friends, who was not an ESL teacher. Her husband taught at a high school, the same
one where my dear friend Lori Runkle had taught AP English.
I was
truly alarmed at the thought of driving that far, over 3 hours, in a car that
uses up 8 ounces of antifreeze for every tank of gas. If it is a leaky hose, the hose could
blow. Yet I do not like the idea of putting more
money into a car I plan to sell when I get back to El Paso. Prudently, I took the car to a well-reviewed
mechanic in St. George. He wanted to put
in a new radiator, of course (ka-ching), but I settled on a new hose assembly. I had taken it to the Jiffy-Lube which is in
view of the gym, but they were helpless and clueless. So I searched further, and found this shop
just a two-mile walk away.
I went
on Friday, which is my day to do the 5-mile walk. Jen and Chad were gone for the weekend, at
the funeral of Chad’s grandmother. They
offered Chantelle to do the walk with me, but I chose to do it on my own. So, chalk up two of the five miles just
getting back home. The remainder would
be done on the walk back in the afternoon.
And just to keep me honest, I got lost on the way and had a thorough
workout that required rescue by a kindly stranger.
Across
the street from the gym there is a trail head.
Jenn had mentioned it once, vaguely, that it was a nice walk within the
city. In the morning when I walked home
from the garage along Riverside Road, I noticed an asphalted trail along
Riverside Road. I crossed the road and
followed it for maybe twenty meters, but then it was abruptly closed. I formed the conclusion that there was
construction work going on, to extend the trail or something. I speculated that this was a continuation of
that same trail that Jenn had mentioned, and it would lead me back home. I followed the detour sign and got back to
the Riverside Road sidewalk.
In the
afternoon, an hour and a half before closing time, I headed back to the
garage. From the house I walked out to
1450 S Street and crossed the road. I
accessed the trail and followed it under the River Road bridge. A sign said ‘1 mile to St. James Park’. After what seemed like a mile, the asphalt
path continued on its serpentine way. I
was listening to a book; I kept walking.
The occasional senior either walking or on a bicycle passed me, in
singles and doubles. I looked at my
watch and realized, it was already 40 minutes into the walk when I reached a
covered building that I assumed to be St. James Park. Must have been a mile as the crow flies. I was beginning to panic. This path was isolated. To the left was a cliff, and a housing
development on top. To the right was
tall desert scrub, with no paths leading through it to the east, where I could
see, through the occasional gap, Riverside Road perhaps an eighth of a mile
away. A sweaty jogger was coming towards
me. The path in front seemed to be going
in a westerly circle. I took my ear buds
out and fixed him in the eye, so he would also take his ear buds out and slow
down. I asked him which was the quickest
way to Riverside. He looked left, he
looked right. He said I could retrace my
steps and get back to River Road, where I started, or if I kept going, the
nearest bridge to cross the river, which separated the trail from Riverside
Road, was about a mile southwest, and then perhaps two miles east to Riverside
Road.
Either
way, I was not going to make it by the 5 p.m. closing time.
I am in
Mormon country. Here are some very fine
human beings. In fact, everything I had
seen and experienced so far in these two weeks had me wishing that I could
retire right here. The air is clean, the
sky is blue, the city sprawls without skyscrapers across the desert plain edged
on one side by comfortable neighborhoods of quarter-acre homes, and on the
other side by up-scale mini mansions cheek-to-jowl in gated communities. The desert river ran through it with plenty
of undeveloped land around it. This is
desert, after all, where flash floods are part of nature.
The
surrounding hills are carved by a history of winds and receding seas. The cliffs are painted with layers,
striations that make you wish you had studied geology. My mind flips between wanting to understand
the origins of such majesty, and simply standing in awe.
[See photos below.]
The
jogger had dark ringlets pasted to his forehead; his reddened face glistened
with a sheet of exertion. In his late
thirties and still a bit breathless from his run, evidence had it that he had
let himself get out of shape. I thanked
him for the information, and resumed my walk.
I cut
across the lawn to shorten the circle; he was coming around the turn and our
paths would intersect again. He slowed
down.
“You
know, if you would like I can drive you there.
You are not going to make it by closing time by walking.”
I
protested. “I don’t want to interrupt
your exercise.”
“Yeah,
well, I was just thinking that maybe I had done enough for the day. I live just up the hill.” He pointed towards
the houses above the cliff.
I
followed him up the steep sidewalk at a good clip. When I arrived two weeks ago this walk would
not have been possible without slowing down and gasping for breath. Now I easily strode beside him.
He
pulled his car out of the garage and I hopped in.
He
shared with me that he was working from home these days, where snacks were all
too easily at hand. He had decided to
start running again, and getting back in shape.
Today was the first day, and as it turned out, my timing was great. He finished the last of his goal of two miles
during our long walk up the Cliffside and into the development.
He
delivered me to the garage; I checked with the mechanic, and then signaled him
that the car was indeed ready. He drove
off.
My car
was set for the long drive tomorrow, to meet Donna.
Speaking
of the great people of St. George reminds me of one of the classes I took at
the gym. The age mix at the gym is wide,
from teenagers to silver-haired octogenarians.
One class I tried was called Silver Fit.
It met on the basketball court. There
were about 15 elderly people, one who arrived leaning on a walker and who did
the entire routine sitting, even when the rest of us stood for some portions.
Another
class I took was Aqua Fit. The indoor
pool has 3-foot depth at one end and at the other; the five-foot depth was in
the center. Two groups assembled, one on
each end, mostly seniors. The group
self-segregated, with women all-but-one on one side and mostly men on the
other. It was a fun class; I appreciated
the workout, recognizing the power of water resistance to achieve muscle burn.
We were
a large group; the ladies’ locker room has only four showers. I stripped, wrapped myself in a towel and
headed for the shower, only to encounter a queue. There are two showers on one side and two on
the other; in between there is a faded wooden door. Although the pool itself had been heated, I
had become quite chilled since leaving it. Above that door was a sign,
‘Sauna’. Hmm. I had not realized. So I went inside, and inhaled the wonderful
dry hot air. The shower room was, after
all, quite chilly. The lady sitting
there was in a swim suit; she averted her eyes.
A younger lady came in, and they started chatting. Then I realized that
the first lady and I had had a lively conversation in the pool during the
class. She had traveled to China with a
choir group; the younger lady had been part of the choir, and could answer some
of the questions the older lady had not been able to. The older lady had told me, with an air of
apology, that her memory was not what it used to be. This slender silver-haired fox admitted to
being 85.
I am an
admirer of pulchritude; so many of the people I saw in this city glowed with
vitality. I felt an imbalance towards
blondes and blue eyes; I flashed on the stereo type of the California Girl,
minus the Valley Speak and surf music.
It is
now Sunday. I have texted my Dutch
friend, Joze, that I hope to have dinner with her in Albuquerque Saturday
night. This is my last week, my last
chance to achieve a waist line.
This
evening another woman is scheduled to arrive; she is in her sixties. She was here before, but her stay was
interrupted by a health issue. Now she was
coming back to complete her reserved stay.
I am eager to hear from someone who left the program. How much of her gains was she able to
maintain?
My time
in this fitness program pushes my body to its limits. If there is a weak spot hiding in your limbs,
it will be revealed. For Maddie it was
her back. For me it is the right
shoulder; it could be arthritis. I will
have it looked at when I return to Mexico.
In all my workouts, I have to be careful with that arm, and not push
it. As soon as I can feel it, I
stop. I modified many of the upper body
workouts.
I have
purchased a set of tube bands. This is
my plan for maintaining fitness back in Canatlan, Mexico. There is no swimming pool there; the gym I
saw was painted black outside, with no windows.
I imagine what I will find inside; a pool of testosterone. Not an appealing image. I need a sensible plan in place before I
return, beyond walking and biking for calorie burning.
I found
a lot of workouts on YouTube. In
Canatlan I do not have wifi, so I cannot rely on YouTube to guide my daily
workouts. I need to master a routine
before I leave Utah.
I plan
to try to coax Jenn to coaching me through routines using these bands. I have had the bands all week when I was the
only participant. I repeatedly reminded
Jenn of this. She pretty much ignored
me. Now this coming week there would be
two of us in the program; I could not expect Jenn to provide me with a private
class. What to do? I am hoping that she will be willing to
negotiate something. She has told me to
take the TRX classes at the gym. I plan
to do that Monday for the first time.
TRX is
a system that one can buy for ones home use, consisting of resistance training
using only bands anchored to a door or, if possible, a metal rod firmly affixed
to a ceiling or wall. I managed to
download a few instruction videos from YouTube for the tube bands that I can
use at home in Mexico, where I do not have internet access at home.
I found
the Catholic church again Sunday. Last
week the priest was from Mexico. This
week he is from India. Last week’s
homily was given by the Deacon, and its topic was the Eucharist. He shared his nomadic family experience,
growing up with random religious education, and eventually finding the Catholic
church. He spoke of discovering the transformative power, the spiritual
strength that fed him through the Eucharist.
This week, the priest instructed us on how to respond to Protestants (we
are in Mormon country) who say the Bible does not support the Pope, and that
all truth comes exclusively from the Bible.
He quoted a verse from 1 Peter 1.
Unfortunately, the church is so large, and I tend to sit in the back,
that the echo swallows a lot of sound. I have since searched for it without success. According to him, in 1 Peter there is support that it is not by scripture alone, but through divine leadership that we grow in Christ.*
The church has an unusual altar. I wonder if it is inspired by the
Mormans. There are two tiers of alcoves
on the back wall, topped by a great gold dove surrounded by rays. Each alcove has a different saint or angel;
Gabriel and Michael are there. It is
soothing when the church raises its voice for the Gloria, because the melody
used is a familiar one, from my long-ago church back home in North Carolina. Perhaps you can see the altar picture at this Google Maps link.
Monday,
this is the third week. Weigh-in and
measuring day. In two weeks I have lost
five pounds. I do not have a waist line
yet, but I have indeed lost inches.
These shouldn’t be as important as what I have gained in strength and
endurance. Still, I am consuming less than 800 calories a day. I doubt I can maintain the same level of
daily calorie burn once I get back home.
So how will I continue to lose weight to reach my goal, a waistline?
Evenings
are boring. There is nothing to do. The TV must be on a basic plan. Most channels are blocked; even Rachel
Ray! There are no movies, beyond some
westerns from the 60s and 70s. I tend to
fall asleep early; this leads to an early morning. This morning I got up and went to the gym for
a 5:30 TRX class. Afterwards I hung out,
using some familiar machines and walking around the track, until Chad showed up
at 7 a.m. The TRX class was scary. When the instructor could, she helped me
through some of the moves; but there were about twenty people there, so I did
not get much attention. There is a thing
called Jacob ’s ladder, which I refuse to go on. It is on an angle. You hook a line to your waist, then lean
forward and start climbing a ladder. It
has a variable speed, depending on yourself.
For some reason, it just felt scary.
I tried it once; that was enough.
Maddie
arrived Monday night. She had been here
before. She is of retirement age. She hurt her back and had to return
home. Now she has recovered and is back
to complete her program. She is intense;
her wide-open blue eyes remind me of that one-time fad ‘sampuku’. The whites of her eyes showed above the
iris. She keeps to herself, not wanting
to share even a coffee pot. She drove
here, and so carries with her her own coffee press and certain foods. She eventually warms up, but unlike Julia, we
do not wait for each other before walking to the gym for the workouts unless I
catch up with her as she races off.
I made
breakfast after 8 a.m., after Jenn finished the weigh-in. French-pressed hazelnut coffee, two fried
eggs and a bran muffin.
Two-hundred-twenty calories. I
use the 5 cm muffin tins, not the giant ones like at Starbuck’s. Each muffin is only 80 calories, so if I want
two I am still within my target of 300 calories per meal. They are moist; the raisins add to that
moisture.
Here is the recipe. I
probably got it originally from AllRecipes.com
No-Fat Bran Muffin
Makes
1 dozen 190 C/375 F 15~20 minutes
Bran 1 ½ cups
Milk 1 cups
Applesauce ½ cups (unsweetened)
Egg 1
Brown sugar ½ cups
Vanilla ½ tsp
All-purpose
flour ½ cups
Wheat flour ½ cups
Baking soda 1 tsp
Baking
powder 1 tsp
Salt ½ tsp
Raisins ½ cups
SOAK: milk and bran for 10 minutes
Mix together
applesauce, egg, sugar, vanilla. Beat in
the bran mixture. Ladle into greased
muffin tins.
Spray muffin
tin with Pam. Don’t use paper
liners. Beat the egg a little before
adding it.
Jenn met me at 2:00 for the
afternoon ‘boot camp’ workout. She added
a couple of exercises using tube bands.
For the week that I was in the program alone the morning workouts with
Chad were quite short, sometimes just 30 minutes. Now that Maddie has arrived, we are getting
the full hour-long workout.
I booked a hotel in Albuquerque
for Saturday night. The Howard Johnson
had a great special through Agoda, and according to the web site there is a
pool and gym/workout room. I sent a
message to Joze about meeting for supper, but so far I have not heard back from
her. I have a few more days before I am
actually charged for the room.
Another person arrived on Tuesday. Maddie knew he was coming, but it was a
complete surprise to me. He had been
here before, leaving a couple weeks before I came. He went home to Idaho and packed his
things. Now he is back, and is looking
for a place to rent. He loves St. George,
and wants to move here. My sentiments
exactly, but he has the wealth to make it happen.
Buck is a gifted guitarist. He had a career in Los Angeles as a studio
musician. He is tall. His BodPod test verified that he has a fast
(above average) metabolism. His capacity
for caloric intake is something else. I
can only look on wistfully as he follows a huge salad with mitts-full of smoked
almonds, as I nibble on my little turkey sandwich.
To break up the monotony, I
rented a movie. While at Walmart to buy
more vitamins I stopped at the RedBox and browsed. I was delighted to find Wonder Woman, which I
had not yet seen. After dinner, Maddie
had disappeared upstairs to her room, Buck and I settled in to watch. He is emotive, and thanked me several times
during the viewing for renting this.
We got to talking. We found kindred spirits. Two nomads, with the kind of consciousness
that is global. He has lived in many
different cultures, both in the U.S. and abroad, and is at home in them
all. He is a member of the SAG (screen
actors guild). His work brought him into
the milieu of that Hollywood world. He
is grateful for the money he made through his music, and grateful to be out of
it. I wonder what kind of lifestyle he
will make for himself here in St. George.
He must have a great relationship with his parents, because they are
coming down from his Idaho home to live with him here too.
Maddie eventually warms up and
shares more of herself with us. As it
turns out, she is an avid loomer. A room
in her house in Arizona is filled with looms of all different sizes. She is active in a loomers’ guild at home,
helping to organize guest experts to come to Tucson to lead workshops for her
group.
Julia, Maddie, Buck, these are
the extraordinary people I met at this Lifestyle camp. Through it all, Jenn and Chad were a constant
presence of encouragement. It is hard
for anyone to come and stay with this couple and not fall in love with them.
I left at 7 a.m. Saturday, to
Albuquerque. As it turns out, Joze and
Arthur are in Boulder, helping their son with a house remodeling. They won’t be back for another month. The drive to the Howard Johnson is 8
hours. To El Paso is another 4
hours. I decide to take advantage of
this great deal, and have another day to swim and use a gym. It was well worth it. I lolled about Sunday morning, getting th car
packed with minutes to spare to check-out time.
Without a phone, it was
complicated getting in touch with my El Paso hostess. I gave her Nelson’s phone. She gave him the address and front door
access code.
Now I am back in El Paso with
Nelson. Can I maintain? I found a great place to stay for five days,
through AirBnB. I am in one room in a large
house, rented out to mostly students from Africa. I also met an American guy who works for an
NGO. Anyone who has worked for an NGO
knows low-income housing is a necessity.
The first floor of the house twists and turns. I walked through a small living room, through
a laundry room, past the kitchen through a dining room and then my room. I have a private bathroom also off the dining
room. There is a fridge here, and another
in the kitchen. Having the kitchen
allows me to make the fresh salads that are such an important mainstay to my
diet. It is so much more affordable than
a Motel 6.
I searched El Paso on the
internet to find a place for daily hikes.
I found Franklin Mountain State Park.
Each morning I get up at dawn and drive twenty minutes by freeways to
get there. It is very cold in the
morning, but I soon warm up; in the end, I unzip my hoody. I walk for at least 80 minutes on the
undulating hillside, getting lost in my head listening to audiobooks. I watch the sun come up, the shadows receding
from the surrounding canyon walls.
Nelson is such a whimsy, it is
hard to find him. Finally he realizes
that if he wants to spend time with me, he has to get a little specific; we
make a date to meet at 5 p.m. each night, at his home. One night I rent a movie on Amazon, The
Circle. Not great, but we eat bowls of
unbuttered popcorn, I bring a can of Bud Light.
I finally get to see his ‘escuelita’, the little impoverished school
where he volunteers his English teaching program, and whatever other help he
can give. Through seeking sponsors he
managed to secure enough computers to fill a classroom. He is still scraping the last few coins to
add the cables and mouses. Soon he will
be leading these children into computer literacy.
I get my passport from the
Juarez U.S. Consulate; I book my flight to Durango. I had ordered a music CD from Amazon, through
Buck’s encouragement. I had looked for
it before, but I guess I was in Mexico at the time and could not receive it
economically by mail. I had it sent to
Nelson’s address. It was due on Feb 7 at
the earliest; my flight is for Feb. 9th, coincidentally my
birthday.
The car hasn’t been sold. The principal at Nelson’s school expressed
interest, but wasn’t willing to pay the full price. I am asking for an amount under the Blue Book
value, but never mind. This is
Mexico. Everything is negotiable, and on
the cheap side. Nelson will post it on
Craigslist again, and also drive it back and forth to the school. He will eventually sell it, keep a little for
himself and send me the rest. I have
signed all the paperwork.
The CD has not arrived. Fortunately, Nelson can mail it cheaply on
the Juarez side of the border; I leave him some money for that. I will be so happy to have this music back
again. I had it for years, it has seen
me through a lot of hard times, put me to sleep on troubled nights. It is Christopher Parkening playing Bach.
Finally, I am home, back in
Canatlan. On the walk from the Canatlan
bus station I pass a yarn shop, and realize that the work displayed in the
window is crocheted. At last I will find
someone to help me decipher the pattern for my vest project. The apartment is how I left it; bare, and
cluttered with boxes. I miss Dog. I get a good night’s sleep. In the morning I weigh myself. My goal had been 15 pounds in four
weeks. In the end, I managed 11. I cannot complain, because it means that a
week after leaving the program I am still losing. Yes!
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