Just Do It

Ready to go.....

My life is peppered with what I call Nike moments. You know the slogan. Just Do It. I often end up giving myself that advice to combat the kind of latent paralysis that I experience in the face of something I don’t want to do. Laundry. Changing light bulbs. Giving the animals their monthly flea and tick treatments. Exercise.

Ah exercise! It’s my daily Just Do It moment. I have the phrase written out and taped to my computer monitor and I know what it is there for. I wish I were one of those people that consider exercise a gift that they give themselves. Intellectually I get it and yes I really do feel that sense of accomplishment when I have ticked it off the list for the day. But for me it’s something that I mostly do because of the very negative effects of not doing it. An obligation. Another chore. At some point in the aging process you change from going to the gym because you feel like it to going to the gym Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at 6 whether you feel like it or not because the gal in the mirror is telling you to get there and to get there fast!

I’ve tried the gym membership since I became a Mom – but it hasn’t stuck. Work demands means that it never sits well to be off exercising during business hours and taking the time away from being with my son isn’t appealing either. I feel I get little enough time with him as it is. So for me exercise required a more creative response that allowed me to exercise and be with Liam at the same time. That's a level of multi-tasking that takes some thought. 
The quality of the exercise may not be as great but the quality of the moment is vastly enhanced.

The form that the exercise has taken has evolved as he’s grown. Back when he was a baby it was long walks on the beach near where we live with him happily strapped in to one of those baby jogging strollers. You can get them with attachments that allow you to put a baby car capsule up on top so you can use them even well before the child has the neck strength to hold their head up. Mine never got used much for jogging (I just couldn’t get used to not having my arms free – it felt weird) but boy did it put in some miles on the sand. Liam’s always been an early riser and in fact was such a lousy sleeper when he was a baby that I’d take him off at sparrow’s fart so that he would get some sleep in the stroller.

Next up was cycling with Liam strapped in to one of the baby seats on the back of my bike. We started this while he was still perfectly happy to be in the stroller and it took over as our main form of joint exercise when he got a bit older and boredom meant that the stroller was losing its appeal. This worked for a long time but as he grew it became less and less comfortable for both of us. By the time his knees were pushing up against my back for most of the ride and his greatest entertainment was to pull up my cycling shirt to tickle me, I knew we needed to move on.

But what to move on to? His own ability to ride a bike wasn’t strong enough for him to just ride along beside me. (Heaven forbid! With the drivers in this town and how close they drive to cyclists I would fear for his life.) Even one of those tandem set ups that allowed me to tow him on a bike along behind me seemed to be a bit of a stretch of his capabilities and endurance and I’d learned back in the latter stage of the stroller phase that having a kid whine and complain the whole time you are out for your workout is no fun at all. There was the option of those bike trailers that the kids sit in and you tow – but he was already pushing the height limits of them.

Just when I thought that joint biking trips were going to have to be put on hold for a few years I discovered the Wee Hoo. I saw a woman riding one with her daughter happily strapped in and had one of those Aha! moments. Not knowing what they were called it was rather challenging to find it on the internet but ultimately Dr Google didn’t disappoint and I found a local dealer, went for a brief test ride and brought one home that same day.

It’s awesome. Liam gets to participate (it really does make a difference when he pedals too) but he can relax and chill if he’s not up to it at that point in the ride. He has access to panniers so he can get his drink or snack, take a few toys along for the ride, listen to his iPod – in short he will sit quietly and comfortably on the Wee Hoo for long enough for me to get in a good ride. Yes – it is heavy to tow if he is not pedaling but that just makes for an extra challenging work out for my legs! Really the only downside I’ve discovered so far is that it’s huge and takes up a lot of space in my already full garage. And I do have to get an extra stand to help keep it upright.  We knocked it over yesterday – on the car (!!)

But all in all we’re big fans – and it gave me the delight of Liam’s first made up knock-knock joke (well the first one that made any sense!) It goes like this.

Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Wee.
Wee who? 

LOL!