Raindrops are lightly falling this last Sunday of February at Mosquito Gardens. This last week of above normal temperatures has indeed brought forth the varmint that brought us to jokingly name our home here Mosquito Gardens. I killed my first one of the season, a fine one of good size, yesterday!
When I saw the blob of green hovering just west of us on radar in the predawn hour I awoke, I had a choice to make. The easy one would have been to pull the robe a little tighter around me, settle into the chair, open the blinds, and watch the rain begin. I gave serious thought to doing just that, but my better self won out. At six-fifty I was out the door, headed down the long sidewalk to the driveway, umbrella over my head.
The rain was light, but steady, beating a good cadence for walking as the sidewalk in front of me gradually turned from dots to wet grey. I saw the dogwoods, still green as they begin opening. The showest sight, though, were the Formosan azaleas, resplendent in their brilliant color which falls somewhere in between deep purple and intense pink. Their blooms, fully four inches across, are the true queen of my yard and others in this part of the south. The little miniatures azaleas are pretty and neat, but these huge bushes celebrate the changing of the season like no other in their over the top exuberance of color!
My mind wandered (as minds are likely to do; mine, anyway!) as I walked. I have been walking for exercise and pleasure since the late sixties and I thought back to the last time I actually walked in the rain. It would have to have been while we lived at Green Park, a monstrously large apartment building in Musachino City, a suburb of Tokyo, Japan. We lived there, along with several thousand other Air Force people between May of 1969 to May of 1972 when we moved to Tachikawa where we enjoyed living in an actual house with an actual house.
But, I digress! I started walking at Green Park for exercise and pleasure. After I sent Klep off each morning to his job on the IG team at Headquarters Fifth Air Force, Fuchu, Japan, I would circle the building three times for my morning exercise. Later a friend (usually Carol Griffin that first year) and I would go out the gates and walk through the wonders that surrounded us. Some days we stayed close to home, walking down to the alley where a variety of shops awaited us. Other days might find us a mile or so away at a Shinto shrine or at some pottery shop or coffee shop we had never discovered. It was on these jaunts that we really got to see what our neighborhood was really liked. We learned to let the attention of people snickering geijing under their breath roll off us. Carol could fit in much easier than I, since she was short. Tall American women were always noticed.
My walking started as an effort to take off the excess pounds I had added to my body after I got married. I have battled weight all my life. Face it! I started off in trouble when I was born weighing twelve pounds! The first year of our marriage, we both gained over twenty pounds. The walking helped. So did writing down every bite I put in my mouth for three months. By Christmas, I was within four pounds of my goal. The following Christmas, I was still within four pounds of my goal.
I find myself in that situation again, four pounds shy of where I want to be. Therefore, I walk. Actually, I think that I would walk anyway. To me, it is such a pleasure to be able to move. After my accident in 2005, I gradually tacked on over thirty pounds which did nothing to improve the mobility of the knee with the torn meniscus!
While I walked this morning, I considered the fact that my will power seems to have "got up and left." I also pondered the reasons for this, and wonder if, I somehow have decided to sabotage myself. I don't know since psychology is not one of my strong suits. It may just be that I have an overwhelming desire for chocolate!
I guess I'll just keep pondering, pull out the umbrella when it rains, and go walking! Someday, somehow, I will shed those four pounds!
