Shanthala commented a few months ago that I spent all my time in front of my laptop. I pooh-pooh’ed her observation with a defensive “I do a lot of things on my computer: write, work, read the news etc”. I didn’t fail to notice that my defense merely bore her observation out. So, I tried to reduce the time I spent in front of the computer. I tried to space the time I spent checking email; I’ll check mail only every hour, I declared to myself. I tried to limit the time I spent surfing the web. Having lived most of my life by Oscar Wilde’s credo that the best way to fight temptation is to yield to it, I failed in my efforts.
Another time, Shanthala suggested that we move the round table that passes for a work desk to another room, out of the family room where we spent most of our time. I disagreed with that suggestion, finding no point in it. I told her how I enjoyed listening to music while I worked, a habit from a time when I was still in school. The subject was closed.
This past weekend, we moved temporarily to a friend’s house. They own two adjoining houses, one of which they rent out. They were between renters and expressed an interest in our moving in for a little while. They have three children who dote on Maya, we have a wonderful time hanging out with these friends and so we decided to take them up on their offer.
Maya is lulled to sleep by music. It’s our nightly ritual. In our bedroom, we have a boombox that I use specifically for this purpose. When we travel, rather than carry the boombox and a large collection of CDs, I use the laptop that has most of my music. So, I setup the laptop in our bedroom.
Five days into our stay, I noticed that I don’t spend as much time in front of the computer. It’s not that I have more on my hands here than in our house. It’s not that there is a lull in the work. Puzzled, I thought about the reason. I realized that with the laptop in the bedroom, a place I only went to sleep, I was never in the same room as the laptop much. This automatically reduced the time I spent in front of the computer. Hey Oscar, a great way to fight temptation is to keep it out of sight. We’re moving that table that Shanthala wanted moved when we return. Sigh. It hurts to have her be right. Again.
The Company You Keep
I don’t do any other exercise besides running. I do a few weight lifting exercises for my upper body, but those are mostly very short. Running has been the mainstay of my physical regimen. Till I found running, especially long distance running, I found it very hard to stay physically fit. Running three or four days a week, running a half marathon every weekend was something I did quite consistently for three years. Then, something happened. I began to lose interest and had to work hard to get out of the house. Once I was out, it was not difficult to go the distance. But, oh! The reasons I gave for not getting out. The drop in motivation began just a short while before Kitty died. Grief over his passing was soon followed by the relentlessness of parenting and running began to look like another chore to be completed when I just wanted a little time to breathe.
Once I could push Maya in the jog stroller, I began to run a little more consistently, initially. Over the last few weeks, I began to find myself looking for excuses to not run. One problem is that there is only decent running track near our house, the Stevens Creek Trail. Other paths lead me along roads with car traffic and I’m nervous about running with Maya on such roads, even if they’re residential streets. I don’t care to run on the sidewalk (foot path for you non-Americans) because running long distances on concrete surfaces can damage the knee and hips over time. Ego played a little role too. I didn’t want to run if I couldn’t maintain my level of fitness, but each time I didn’t run, it became harder to maintain my fitness. Another reason is that running was self-motivated and lonely. I ran alone all the time.
Since we moved into our friend’s house, I’ve run four times this week and hope to run at least one more day. Each time has been about an hour with one of them being a hard workout on a day the temperature closed in on triple digits (it was 36 degree Celsius). While novelty is a possibility, I attritbute this sudden change primarily to the availability of partners who wanted to run. I ran with Jeff on Sunday, with David on Monday, Hilary on Tuesday and David again today. I’ll probably run solo tomorrow. Less than a week into our stay at the new place, I have made two small, but significant changes.
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