How long will this last?

Now is the time for Pierini Fitness to acknowledge that he's grateful for his upper-percentile and age-adjusted cardiovascular conditioning and strength endurance. These blessings aren’t automatic, though, because it takes dedicated fitness training but the fact that I’m able to slip into my workout clothes, lace up my training shoes and show up are also reasons to be grateful. 

 

Obviously, it won’t always be this way.  As my gracefully aging clock ticks toward the end of my life, at some point my eventual fitness erosion will start to show its ugly head.  There may also be later-in-life health issues I’ll experience that could very well be a game changer for me, bringing an end or a downsizing of the fitness training stuff I’ve been able to do thus far. 

 

Visting my 93-year-old Mom recently in the hospital was a stark reminder that I’m going to get my turn one day. The turn I'll get will likely be different than hers, but nonetheless it’s a turn for which I'm preparing.    

 

When will my day come when I’m no longer able to pull myself up and down on a pull-up bar, or dip myself down and up on my bar dips equipment?  What about the day when I’ll no longer be able to swing my kettlebells like I now do, or do one hundred burpees and have younger people marvel that I can?  Only God knows and He’s not telling me! While I don’t spend a lot of time pondering these questions, today I did, and this is the theme of today’s Pierini Fitness reflection.

  

I recently viewed a video of a fit 72-year-old man who shared that he doesn’t think about how old he is.  Do I?  Generally, I don't but my recent turning age 70 gave me cause for acknowledging I'm an old man rather than a middle-aged man, and has made me think about how old I am. I also recently started collecting my Social Security benefits and know that I need to live to my early 80’s to “break even” in collecting the amount I could have had I started collecting a lesser amount four years earlier at my full retirement age. 

 

Yes, all this makes me ask myself, “How long will this last?” 

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum 

Middle-age man morning report

When in the U.S. Army five decades ago, I remember how each morning there was a morning ritual leading to what was known as the Morning Report.   A fellow soldier friend of mine had as one of his many duties its daily preparation.  

The Morning Report was a document produced every morning for every basic unit of the Army.  It reported head counts of Army soldiers and changes in status from the previous day.  Once completed, it was reviewed and approved by the unit’s Commanding Officer and then punted up the Army chain of command. Basically, it was a daily measure of Army soldier resources, strength accountability and military readiness. 

Fast forward to my middle-age man present.   

Nowadays, I do a morning report of sorts with my middle-age man body to assess its resource availability and readiness for another day of fitness training.  In 2 Thessalonians 3 we read: “If any man will not work, neither let him eat.”   Pierini Fitness says, “If I don’t earn my calories from activities of daily living and exercise, let me not eat.”

My morning report assesses my body and mind’s readiness for planned daily living activities and fitness training.  Nowadays, it’s giving me much different information than a noon or early afternoon report.   

For example, yesterday, upon awakening and crawling out of bed, one of my first thoughts was how sore and stiff I was, and that perhaps my planned fitness activities for the day might not take place.   

My wrists, hands and ankles were sore, and the rest of my body “radiated” signals that perhaps a day of fitness training rest was a good idea.  My previous day’s workout included a short morning kettlebell workout and then later in the day, 150 burpees performed at a moderate pace. 

This has become a common morning experience for me that’s more pronounced than decades earlier.  I remember when in my late 40’s until my early 50’s hitting the gym at 6:00 am sharp, roaring, and ready to go, each Monday through Friday.  I don’t have the physical ganas to do this nowadays.  Did it, done it and gone! 

What I’m also finding is that as time passes, these morning report feelings begin to dissipate so that by noon or early afternoon, I’m ready to tackle my fitness training for the day.  Yesterday, for example, after my ganas woke up, I went for a great 6-mile early afternoon run.

So, my middle-age man morning report is often not a good measure of my middle-age man body's resource availability and readiness for another day of fitness training.

You may recall from what I’ve previously shared that my fitness training approach is an intuitive one.  I’m never quite sure what I’ll do even though I have some ideas and preferred exercises to select from in my fitness training cafeteria with workout duration and intensity depending on what’s being reported in my morning, noon, and early-afternoon reports. 

Works for me. 

Even though it doesn’t always give me the good report I’d like, I’ll continue each day preparing upon awakening and crawling out of bed, my middle-age man morning report. 

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum

An aging elitist

How to live forever is a popular topic of interest as evidenced by the sheer volume of articles and research devoted to it.  On any given day, there’s no shortage of reading material to cherry-pick and read about this subject.

A recent article in the New York Times reported that American life expectancy increased for the first time in four years in 2018.  It finally rebounded after three successive years of decline as a result of an opioid abuse epidemic. 

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics, lower mortality from cancer, accidents and unintentional injuries explained the average life expectancy uptick for 2018, now at 78.7 years at birth.  While considered good news, American life expectancy is still less than most European countries.  

Meanwhile, to the delight of those wanting to live longer than ever before imaginable, aging-longevity influencers are adding new reading and viewing content to their blogs and websites at a blistering pace.  

Dr. Peter Attia, M.D. is one influencer whose content focuses on the science of longevity.  Among his many works is The 5 tactics in the longevity toolkit.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick, Ph.D. is another influencer who’s always adding new aging-longevity content to her FoundMyFitness website.  From autophagy, caloric restriction, epigenetic aging clocks, fasting and more, she offers a “ton of content” for the Ponce de Leon wannabe’s chasing their eternal fountains of youth.  The link between Metformin use and longevity seems to be one of her current topics of interest.

There are countless others who are devoting significant energy to the aging-longevity agenda, in the research they conduct, articles they publish and speeches they deliver to a captive “preaching to the choir” audience of Centrum Silver folks, and younger people too.

Pierini Fitness once wrote “ain’t no man wants to live to be 100 except the 99 year old man.” 

Hollywood actor and entertainer George Burns was able to reach the centenarian mark without the benefit of these modern-day aging-longevity influencers.  He did it thanks to daily exercise of swimming, walking, sit-ups and push-ups.  He also enjoyed smoking cigars and buying a new Cadillac every year.  Of course, his genetics obviously helped.

Kirk Douglas, another Hollywood actor, who recently passed away at age 103 years, also reached and surpassed the centenarian entry age.  He was interviewed at age 100 years and attributed his longevity to a wonderful, six decades long at the time, marriage.  Although his parents didn't live as long as he did, his genetics obviously helped.

A couple psychology professors conducted eight decades of research known as The Longevity Project that’s also the title of a book they wrote.  Their study of over 1,500 Americans for over 80 years pinpointed why some people live longer than others.  Being physically active, working hard and accomplishing desired results, challenging yourself and surpassing the limits you’ve set.  Being socially active with family and friends, having a good marriage and staying friendly with healthy people were also identified.

Meanwhile, another recent article appearing in the Financial Post had a catchy title “Treating aging like a disease is the next big thing for science”.  The article quotes another longevity influencer, Peter Diamandis, who has said “The average human health span will increase by 10+ years this decade.”  He points to a dozen game-changing biotech and pharmaceutical solutions, including stem cell supply restoration and others that are beyond my middle-aged man meathead pay grade to comprehend.

This aging-longevity fascination is unbelievable!

Pierini Fitness is not yet ready to join the crowd that considers aging a disease.  He believes it’s a blessing, the gracefully aging version, because there are positive benefits from experiencing it.  By embracing it, we’ll be less likely to experience death bed resentment of why all the things we did to appreciably prolong our lives didn’t work.

Some might suggest there’s no downside to the elixir of hope, even if it’s false hope and this point is well taken.  It’s hard for them not to be mesmerized and tantalized by hope, of any kind, that their eventual meeting with the Grim Reaper will be much further away from their now than previously contemplated.  

Ponce de Leon never figured it out over 500 years ago and I don’t think most of us will either.  The elixir from the Fountain of Youth will continue escaping both of us in that we’ll likely not live as long as we’d like. Obesity, brought on by an opulent and gluttonous lifestyle many Americans live, brings on many of the maladies shortening life expectancy. 

Perhaps the solution is something simple like using duct tape covering the food eaten point of entry immediately after a necessary and sensible amount of food has been eaten.

None of this considers a proven American reality that those occupying higher socioeconomic groups have a statistically greater chance of reaching age 100 years than other groups.  Simply stated:  For life expectancy, money matters.

This, according to an article titled the same appearing in the Harvard Gazette on April 11, 2016, deserves our attention:

“A Harvard analysis of 1.4 billion Internal Revenue Service records on income and life expectancy that showed staggering differences in life expectancy between the richest and poorest also found evidence that low-income residents in wealthy areas, such as New York City and San Francisco, have life expectancies significantly longer than those in poorer regions.”

The article also notes that access to health care is less of a contributing factor.  

So, we need to spend time improving our financial prosperity and the quality of the social circles we frequent.  

We need to spend time pursuing and “training” to be an aging elitist.

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum

OK boomer

It’s normal for us middle-aged men to have ambivalent feelings from time to time about our gracefully aging journeys.  On one hand, we’re blessed with perspectives and wisdom coming from a life well-lived, having racked up many lessons of life along the way.

On the other hand, at any given moment, more so upon awakening or late at night before calling it another day of life, we may be toiling with aches, atrophy, rust and wrinkles, physically and emotionally,  that shout out as “friendly reminders” that our journeys toward the end of our lives are getting closer to the end.  This assumes, of course, we’re not afflicted with stage 4 denial.  

Which of the two is the better?

Neither, because they come as a package that, most of the time, results in a middle-aged man blur with one not being distinguishable from the other. 

Would we rather turn back the clocks of our lifetimes to our more youthful yesteryears, or to be content and grateful with what we’ve got and how we are at our now moments?

Perhaps this pearl of wisdom from an aging older woman, actress Helen Mirren, says it best:  “With every age comes advantages and disadvantages. And you tend to find you don’t want to go back.  You want to be exactly where you are with everything you’ve experienced.”

What a great and healthy perspective this is, yet we might still ponder it along with a realization of thinking getting old would take longer.  And a realization that someone once shared with me when I asked how he was doing and he replied, “I’m getting old and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Nevertheless, we must gallantly continue marching forward in our gracefully aging journeys, flaunting our baby boomer perspectives and wisdom to the youthful generations, the cast of characters who stand below us in the wisdom department, known by others as Generation X, Millennial and Generation Z.

These youthful characters may not always appreciate our perspectives and wisdom, thinking they’re laden with old-fashioned, unsolicited and not of value attributes in today’s modern and fast-paced “real world” in which they live.

“Thanks, but no thanks”, they may say if they’re trying their best to be semi-courteous.  Or, if they’re curt, maybe we’ll “luck out” and get an “OK boomer.”

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum

Little by little becomes a lot

Summer 2019 fitness has come and gone for Pierini Fitness as he begins the first week of his Fall 2019 fitness training.  How time flies when we’re having fun.

You may recall that earlier this year, I shared my Summer 2019 fitness goals so now it’s time for an executive briefing giving an accountability report to my Pierini Fitness sports fans.  Today, I’m having a body fat measurement test because that was one of my goals.  Then, I’ll give that executive briefing, hopefully on Friday in a couple days.

I’m also finalizing my Fall 2019 fitness goals and will also share them at the same time.

None of these goals are spectacular in the worldwide fitness community but they are little, meaningful and challenging to me, and that’s the way it should be.  SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timetable) fitness goals that help guide me in my perpetual middle-aged man fitness, health and wellness journey.

Because, with consistent fitness training while trying to live a good and wholesome life, little by little becomes a lot.

  

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum