Going the Distance
That's a dad joke made by a mom. A pretty fit mom.
On April 22, I celebrated a big anniversary — four years with Peloton. I commemorated it by taking my 900th ride, a 10-minute Elton John warm-up with Bradley Rose. April 22nd was a Monday and I do strength-training via Zoom M-W-F, ride my Peloton Sundays and Thursdays, but I couldn’t resist hitting a milestone on our special day.1
I assume some people are doing the math2: If I started using the bike on April 22, 2020, I must be one of the pandemic Peloton’ers, the ones who helped the company’s stock soar — and then plummet, when many of the riders-come-lately went back to gyms or embraced doing nothing, or maybe found another fitness path. The fact is, I had gone into 2020 with the goal of buying a Peloton — there’s an email to my then-husband in summer 2019, noting that I plan to buy one to celebrate my latest book contract, asking if he would have any interest in using it. He did not reply; it’s possible that he had a clearer view of where we were headed in 2020 than I did. Anyway, I guess I got a little distracted in early 2020, but I ordered my bike in March, just before demand soared.
I do not lead an especially exemplary life, but I have been taking regular exercise, to use a quaint expression, for four decades. I think the last time I went more than three days without some kind of fairly rigorous activity was in 1986 and that was because I was on crutches after almost severing my toe. I like to move and I am extremely grateful that I still can. A year ago this month, I published an essay for Scribd about my first serious fall and also the challenges that some family members have faced after their own misadventures with gravity. Happy to report that two of us are fully recovered. The third — well, the third one just keeps falling. It’s sad and it sucks and it’s something that regular exercise cannot solve.
More math: To get to 900 rides on a twice-weekly riding schedule, one has to “stack” rides. I usually start with a 30-minute ride rated at 7.5 to 8.0 difficulty, then follow it up with a 10-15 minute “Lanebreak,” a kind of gamified ride, and end with a 5-minute cooldown. I generally ignore the leaderboard, although I sometimes check to see if I’m at least in the top 25 percent of riders and then I try to make it to the top 20. Sometimes, I even land in the top 10 percent. However, my favorite competitor is myself.
For all this, I have mixed feelings about exercise. I love it and feel bad for those who find it a chore. But I’m also aware that we live in a culture where the female body is subject to so many expectations. The term that most of us use for exercise, workout, suggests that our bodies are another job, but who’s the boss? Lord knows, I’ve gotten a lot of evaluations from people who don’t even know me. I owe it to myself and my daughter to try to be healthy, but no one else has a stake in my body.
What is a body for? What is my body for? I think a lot — well, not a lot, but sometimes — about a film called Surrogates, in which humans can have robotic alters that do all the business of life for them while they stay at home. (God, this sounds so dreamy to me.) People who choose to go about in their ordinary human bodies are referred to as “meat sacks.” That’s how I tend to think about my body: It’s a meat sack, holding all my organs in.
This sounds kind of existential, doesn’t it? Maybe that’s a by-product of turning 65, going on Medicare, and receiving a modest pension while still working full-time and parenting a teenager. The other day — OK, it was yesterday — I had to give myself a stern talking-to by imagining a conversation with a younger version of myself. I literally wrote it down, like a little play. My younger self was stunned by the details of my career, which has exceeded both our dreams3. It was an interesting exercise, perhaps more valuable than any Peloton ride. I encourage you to try it.
I do love Bradley Rose. Also, Jenn Sherman, Sam Yo, Leanne Hainsby and Robin Arzon. But, really, what I love is riding to ‘80s music and show tunes.
Read/Reading: The House of Grief, Helen Garner; The Stolen Child, Ann Hood; Foster, Claire Keegan; So Late in the Day, Claire Keegan; An Inconvenient Wife, Karen Olson; The Colossal Columbo Quiz Book, Alan L. Galpert. Selling the Dream, Jane Marie (audio).
Re-reading: The Best of Everything, Rona Jaffe.
Me, Me, Me: I’m headed to Bristol for CrimeFest, where Prom Mom is shortlisted for the eDunnit and I am doing lots of fun panels and an on-stage interview. I’ve also finally made good on my promise to write for Oldster.
No, I’m not the least bit obsessive, how dare you.
Actually, I know no one is doing the math, except maybe some incel troll who needs to explain to me that I don’t work out enough/correctly.
I’ll tell her about our personal life another time.
I admire your commitment to this. I am making a long-needed return to trying to have a level of fitness that will help me through my next "phases", but it's been a tough 10 years of cancer (twice), weight gain (a lot), and finishing a PhD. Now I have new knees, have lost about 80 lbs, and want to go another 100. Not for looks, I am plenty cute, but because it got really hard to walk and move, and I have had no energy for so long I think I might not recognize it when I get it back. Thanks for the Oldster tip - I'm 59 and grateful for so many really awesome women who are writing and creating over 50.
I want your biceps but I don’t expect I am willing to do the work for them. In any case, I salute your exercise ethic. Go you!