I’m sure all three of my regular readers have noticed that other than my New Year post, I haven’t written a blog for MONTHS!! Shortly after that last blog (WAY back in Feb 2023) my world got hectic, my work got bonkers, and I became very busy. Then summer rolled in and I was riding my bicycle a lot, and then I started in a new position with my work.
In the fall (2023) I completed my Conqueror Challenge and the urgency behind my cycling decreased significantly, but it took its toll.
For those that may not have heard of them, Conqueror Challenges are virtual fitness challenges. The folks that run the website have created a bunch of virtual courses varying in distance from a few dozen, to a few thousand kilometers in length; most (but not all) of which are based on real world locations. You can do a marathon following the original route in Greece, the Great Wall of China, Hadrian’s Wall, Route 66, or any of dozens of different distances, and then choose how long you want to take to complete the distance. This summer I cycled the entire length of Great Barrier Reef, a total distance of 2119km with a goal of completing it in 175 days.
Back in April 2023, after signing up for the Great Barrier Reef challenge I ran into some obstacles. (Not literally.) It set me FAR behind and at one point 23% of my goal time limit had passed, but I had only completed 5% of the distance. I had my work cut out for me, but I rose to the challenge and managed to complete the distance with 12 days remaining on my goal time. A glorious “come from behind” win that I’m quite pleased with.
But I was SORE!! My poor, aching, 51yr old body was feeling run down. Which is understandable because I was pushing hard, and the result of pushing that hard was not unexpected. My plan for the following few months was to ease up, recuperate, and focus more on mobility, and flexibility in preparation for next riding season.
Right now though, I still feel all 51 of my years, and a handful more. Which kinda sucks, but is also kinda awesome……from a certain perspective.
People have a strange aversion to aging. For some reason our society has decided that getting older is bad. That we need to stay young, or at least LOOK young for as long as possible. We, as a culture, have forgotten that getting old is a privilege.
I definitely don’t look my age. Shortly after starting at my new job one of my new coworkers learned my age, stopped what she was doing, and literally came to my desk to say “You’re 51 years old?!?” in a shocked, and almost accusatory way! There are definitely a few things I have going for me that help keep the years from showing, but I also work hard to keep in shape. My 50 year plan (mentioned a lot in previous blog posts) was almost exclusively designed to establish habits to keep me mobile and healthy for years to come. Staying healthy (and looking young) is a lot of work. Work that our culture has also decided we’re not allowed to talk about. Somehow we have to look as young as possible, for as long as possible, and make it seem like its natural and effortless.
Now, I fully admit I’m one of the blessed people that has won the genetic lottery of (currently) looking far younger than I am, so maybe I’m not the person to be promoting the line of “getting old is a privilege” but I do truly believe that it is.
The majority of what ages us is stress and challenges in life. Many circumstances are terrible, but many of them are not. My go to comment/joke when people comment on my apparent youth is that my wife and I don’t have kids, which causes many people to get a far away look on their face, and nod, but raising kids is not a bad thing!
Aging is often a result of pushing physical and mental limits, regardless of whether those limits are beneficial (raising children) or detrimental (unhealthy lifestyle), but aging is also just the result of being on the planet for a significant number of years. With any luck, we will all eventually have to deal with looking our age.
Our anti-age culture is driven by media. By celebrities and “influencers” who often have the resources to remove most of the stressors that age a person, and can devote enormous amounts of time and money toward looking youthful. Your average person cannot hope to keep up with that lifestyle, and attempting to do so will likely cause the sort of stress that will produce the opposite effect.
I’d like to think that I would be ok if I looked my age, but since I (currently) don’t, maybe this entire post is bullshit.
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