Tuesday January 26th, 2010

When Steve and I started dating, twenty something years ago, he was in the Royal Navy. In fact he was in the submarine service in HMS Oberon. No jokes please about fairies.
This submarine was what they called a “diesel dog”. It was small, cramped and had a limited supply of water. Neither clothes nor anything else could be washed. In all it was a pretty a disgusting environment and no self respecting woman would ever serve on such a boat.

One thing that amused me greatly was the fact that the submariners couldn’t exercise whilst on board. Although they had the capability of replenishing the air for normal use, that capability didn’t extend to extra oxygen that would be consumed if everyone was breathing rapidly as a result of exercise.
So the submariners had an expression along the lines that “if you want to exercise, go and lie down until the urge to exercise goes way”.

I have followed this mantra fairly rigidly over the years and find that it works very well for me. Walking the dog is about all I do these days. I have tried endless exercise classes but I am always the one three steps behind everyone else, crashing into the person next to me going left as I am going right.

Over the years, walking the dog I have come across some strange sights but none as strange as this morning. In the woods in France there was a man who would hide in the trees and practice tai-chi. I am not sure who gave whom the biggest fright, me, Tessie or this elderly man.
Similarly, in Princeton there was an Asian family that would do something similar but hidden in the bushes of a housing development. They were clearly trying to maintain their privacy whilst doing their exercises

Well, this morning we walked in a small-ish park fairly close to where we are going to be living. In the middle of the park were three middle aged women. Hard to tell precisely how old they were, because they looked as though they had been lifted and separated on numerous occasions. With them were three rather hunky young men, leaning over them whilst they lay on the ground twisting and contorting their bodies into all sorts of shapes. I felt in agony just watching them. There was absolutely no pretence about privacy. There were plenty of less public areas in the park had they chosen to find them. No, they wanted the world to see what they were up to and believe me it looked very painful.

I thought back to the mantra that has sustained me all these years. Time to go and lie down.