multifarious mushrooms

I have now been going to the gym for 2 months every second day, except for the days I get migraines, which I’ve always had. It changes your psyche as well as your body.

I did a lot of sport as a child and an adolescent. I loved it. My father had a strong view that a healthy mind came with a healthy body. However, he didn’t factor in the gender question.

When I went to university, there was a distinct atmosphere that women who exercised were not cool at all. You had to look really miserable, wear sunglasses and smoke dope. That was back in the late 60s.

So I stopped doing any sport or exercise and started doing what everyone did in the 60s. I didn’t go for the drug bit much myself, but everyone around me did.

I went on to teaching and I was still very thin anyway so weight wasn’t a problem, until I had a baby at aged 35. I put on a stone then, but it didn’t matter because I quite liked the extra pounds in certain areas.

I was always a person interested in ideas, literature, philosophies, psychology so it was a cerebral life. My family too were very academic, but looking back that didn’t stop my brother from continuing with his sports and exercise.

He can ride a bike round the Melbourne Bay area with no trouble and he is older than me.

So the gym was completely new to me. I had never ever done weights. My program was to build those muscles up before I could even do aerobatics. I forgot to mention that from time to time I did play tennis, swim and go to aerobatic classes.

I looked at all the bodies in the gym and noticed that everyone was there for remedial purposes. I admired even the fattest person for giving it a go. I knew how hard it was to keep motivated myself, when it takes a long time to take off weight.

Today though, and I feel strange saying it, I saw a magnificent specimen of a man. He was clearly trained as an athlete and had a singlet on with a Melbourne Marathon insignia. I’ve seen other very fit men, but this man blew me away. He was such a joy to watch. His running style on the treadmill was perfect. His form and rhythm were excellent. He kicked up his legs at the back which no-one else seems to do. I wished I had a camera, but that’s not etiquette at the gym. Nor is me perving either.

I wanted to say something to him about his beautiful body, but of course I didn’t have the guts. I’m 60 and he was half my age so it wasn’t that I was wanting to get into bed with him or anything. He just provided some joy for the hour.

It made me realise though, that all my life until now, I have never taken much notice of male bodies. Mostly there are men in the gym building up their muscles. I don’t find that attractive. I take notice of men’s faces and what those faces tell me and then what they say and how they act.

So I wish I had started gym in my youth. I wish I hadn’t had a mental block about bodies, including my own. And I’m certainly wondering whether I should post this message.

By the way, the MP 3 player did help today to rid myself from boredom. Suddenly music is a part of my life again. I really have to get some more songs. My oldies are somewhat jaded now. They are all about disappointment in love or girlfriends committing suicide. Not good anymore.

Wow! Technology is marvellous. I’m listening to FM as I write which is broadcasting from my new MP 3 player. I don’t have to listen to anyone ever again. Still have to download my favourite music (for which I got a $5 dollar credit). It’s not an ipod and it didn’t cost $800. I already have a 3G phone so why do I need a combination of a mobile and an MP3 player. I am not a mobile worker. Whoops, the chat is a bit adolescent.

This new acquisition is for the gym. It does get boring doing 25 minutes on the bike and I’ve now read all the magazines available. I tried a Running magazine last time. I’m not about to run a marathon at my age, so that was no use.

Anyway, have to now fill it up with music and podcasts. The other use is to have it on when my partner plays opera loudly.

I read in the Green Guide, The Age, July 3, 2008, that research done recently on social networkers and bloggers altered the view of some that bloggers are lonely and desperate people.

Blogging began in 1998 and I couldn’t tell you how many blogs there are out there now. I played around a bit on blogger.com, but didn’t really get into blogging seriously until I got bored with my site. Things were changing so rapidly in the web design world with XHTML and css becoming a necessity as well as PHP, that my site was becoming outdated and I couldn’t keep up with it, because every time something new came up, I’d have to change every page. There is still some useful stuff there by the way, but I now prefer blogging.

I tried another CMS program first for my tennis site, but then decided to up me fees with my host and go for a self-hosted word press blog. Now that required a steep learning curve just in itself.

As you would know if you follow my blog, I turned 60 this year and started up at the gym. But still, I needed intellectual stimulation. Yes I do the sudoku every day, code words, crosswords, killer sudoku and keep up with current events, but I needed more. Well, it seems blogging does just that for bloggers.

Some studies say that blogging fosters critical thinking and feelings of connection and that bloggers feel better about their situation.

US researchers say blogging makes us better thinkers and that blogging can be a powerful promotor of creative, intuitive and associational thinking.

Swinburne University in Melbourne did a study of bloggers and one of their cases said it made her saner. Another said that writing helped her through mental dilemmas as well as discussing them online. My post on Bill Henson’s photography has certainly done that.

Swinburne gives us examples of some of the bloggers’ blogs they interviewed. They are mostly Melbourne bloggers which is my city.

Link

The Brain of a Blogger

• Bloggers
• Blogger on a Cast Iron Balcony
• Loobylu
• Personal political
• Life in Chippendale
• Fitzroyalty
• The Adventures of ShinyShiny and Halfeman

Enjoy!

I’ve just watched a very interesting program on 4 Corners.
It was about sleep deprivation. Many drivers have micro naps apparently without knowing it. The statistics in America show that someone dies in a car accident due to sleep deprivation about once an hour.

The saddest story was about a doctor who had to do 13 days and nights in a row, not all at once, but over that time period. He also suffered epilepsy which he knew to be triggered by lack of sleep. On the 13th day, he said to his wife how tired he was. She said “one day to go” and he went to work. He slept at the hospital after his shift in a place designated for doctors. He had an epileptic fit in his sleep and died.

As the lawyer who acted for his widow said, “If we can’t get it right in hospitals then where can we”.

Quite. My father was, and my cousin and nephew are, all doctors and they have told me of the culture in hospitals while doing one’s internship. You are considered weak if you can’t hack it.

One of my friends is also a sleep disorder psychologist and academic. This is a very important part of our lives. She tells me that daylight and exercise are essential for good sleep and this program vindicated that saying that a glance at blue sky is twice as good as looking at green grass for a proper sleeping regime.

In my final months of teaching, I was staying up until at least 1am because I was so interested in computers. I would drag myself to work, barely awake, in the mornings.

Now that I’m retired and my son has left home, I don’t have a particular reason to get up early. I always hated getting up in the cold especially. So it gets to be that after a while I am sleeping during the day and awake at night, but that’s not good either even though I’m getting sleep. Our biorhythms are effected by doing that. I change it usually by staying awake for as long as I can and gradually fixing my hours and back it goes again. But staying awake by just 24 hours effects our concentration as much as .08 of drinking does.

Well, I must try to do it this time. For over a week now I have been awake before noon, very early at first and now later. I must do it because I’m always tired. I always feel jet lagged. I feel my concentration is practically nil….

Off to bed soon.