Walk this way...

To fight the stir-crazy, everyone at my house is doing more walking.  Here are four ways to make walking more fun.

1.     Take pictures.  I like to take pictures of flowers, but other folks might want to snap cars or shapes or letters or sidewalk geography or dogs.  This helps us pay attention to what is around us.

2.     Go on a hunt.  Lots of places are doing teddy bear hunts.  We can use the bears as interval markers—go as fast as we can until the next bear, then recover until another bear is found.  Repeat until the end of the walk.  (Those of us who like to run can run between bears if desired.)  If bears do not appeal, we can use anything else that strikes our fancy:  little free libraries, or trees in bloom, or street signs with the letter E on them.

3.     Take a dog or a kid.  The pace may be different than we are used to, but dogs and kids bring a very different perspective to our usual haunts.  Who knew there were so many bugs?  But please do not pee on people’s lawns and bring bags to clean up when necessary.

4.     Vary the route.  Routine is often lovely and helpful, but we might find an unexpected pleasure around some other corner—a particularly gnarled tree, a tricycle, an amusing yard rabbit—who knows?