Sunday, January 14, 2012
In August, I started routinely walks at work and home. By September, I was walking nearly every day. Since then, I walk on average 2.5 miles, 5-6 days per week. My longest walk was 6.1 miles in December.
I'm at the point where I can visualize the action of my feet, ankle, femur, and thigh bones as I walk. Today I was able to imagine the rotation in my hip sockets and the phalanges in action as well. I had a full motion picture in my head of each stride and foot fall. My breathing has stabilized as well, 8 steps to each breath cycle. I enjoy the scenery and the air while in a secondary consciousness I follow the rhythmic cycles of my strides and breathing.
At some point, I became aware that the mental movie in my head was mimicking the actual steps to the point that missteps on stones and loose pebbles were "captured" in my mental view of each step. My arms and legs were in sync, left arm and right leg forward, right arm and left leg forward, each step a coordinated movement of appendages, torso straight, hips and shoulders the pivots for each stride. Adjustments for rocks, ridges, grooves, debris, and pebbles in the dirt roadways and paths were shifts in my footfalls, sometimes a quick twist of ankle and knee to avoid injury and slowing the pace.
Keeping the pace was important, for awhile my sole goal. After 30 minutes, though, as I noted my breathing and the coordinated movements of arms, shoulders, hips, legs, ankles and feet, I started to relax and let the strides happen without tensing. I began to feel as though the phalanges in my forefeet were flexing more, certainly moving more freely. With each footfall I sensed a stronger "feel" in my toes for the road service, especially changes from soft, dusty clay to rocky, packed clay.
When I stepped off the dirt road and into the unmark trail that I imagined heading in an abstract line to the Shenadoah Peak, my forefeet sunked into the unpacked clay. I had to quickly adjust to a flatter footfall.