There’s a mountain close to my home that I sometimes climb for cardio. I go on an established route known as the Grouse Grind with 800 meters (2,620 feet) of stairs. It’s a beast of a climb.
Now there are elite cardio freaks who fly up this trail. The current record is 23 minutes and 48 seconds, set by a professional cyclist, which is nuts.
But professional endurance athletes made of lungs and legs jetting up an endless stairmaster ISN’T what I want to talk about today.
Instead, my enduring Grouse Grind memory is that of an arthritic, hunched-over grandmother shuffling up the mountain with walking sticks. I remember thinking that she would be in the pain cave at least six times longer than the record holder.
It’s one thing to push yourself when your joints all work, and it doesn’t hurt to stand up. It’s quite another thing for someone racked by the indignities of ageing to climb a mountain instead of surrendering to the couch.
Similarly, I respect the little old Chinese ladies gathering in the local park at 6 am to do Tai Chi while Chinese violin music wafts from a Bluetooth speaker. They’re out there doing their thing in every kind of weather, which is more than I can say of most 20-year-olds.
And I salute the grapplers trying to hang with young punks who are stronger and more athletic than them… or moving conservatively because they’re working around an injury… or training once a week because they have to juggle multiple jobs, kids, and other responsibilities.
There’s just something about refusing to give up on movement, even though you might not move as well as you used to. If conditions have to be perfect for you to do something, then how committed are you? Something is better than nothing, and at least you’re not giving up.
Just. Don’t. Stop.
Stephan
“Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
Dylan Thomas