Walking on Sunshine

I’m going to tell you a secret. I didn’t actually have a 9am meeting this morning. I put it in my diary to suit my own purposes. As a matter of fact, I hardly have any meetings at all – because I hardly have any work.

There’s work in the company, some, but I’m not in the team for those projects. And people still seem to value my input and expertise for all sorts of various things - just not the sorts of things that lead to paid commissions. Perhaps I’ve run my course in this profession?

With time to kill, and the sun shining, and the right shoes, I decided to walk to my meeting at London Bridge. It was a long way, but I had nothing better to do with my time. I ambled at a slow stroll, taking in the buildings, and even at that pace it took less time than I thought.

Early this summer, not so long ago, I had fallen away from exercising almost entirely, preferring in the long, cold, miserable winter to curl up cosy with a book and a glass of red wine. When my friends signed up for the Edinburgh Moon Walk and the hospice ten-mile round Smallville, I made excuses, worrying I would slow them down, concerned that my dodgy knee would give up.

The last three months, though, I’ve turned that around. Short of time to devote to exercise as an activity in its own right, I have tried to fit more walking into each day when I can. I have started bodypump again (surely the most efficient hour of exercise humanly possible), and I have thought hard about the sorts of exercise that I can enjoy rather than endure. Apart from the bodypump (actually enjoyable in a sick masochistic sort of way) this leaves me with walking, dancing, swimming and listening to audio-books on the exercise bike at home.

These activities between them are enough to become fearsomely fit, if undertaken with sufficient frequency and for suitable lengths of time. I now meet friends for a walk or swim rather than a coffee, and I find that walking and swimming alone provide useful headroom for the writing. Dancing is the only aerobic activity I can sustain for several hours at a stretch, although whether I can do this sober remains to be seen (ask me after Friday night).

Over the summer, I have had: no chips, no ice creams, no desserts, no butter, no sugar. I have eaten mainly SlimFast shakes, Innocent Veg Pots, fish, salads, soups and smoothies. On holiday I have had a maximum of half a bottle of wine a day (I know some people will think that makes me a functional alcoholic but believe me that is extraordinarily abstemious), with no red wine, no liqueurs, no cocktails. When not on holiday I have had no more than 2 glasses of wine a week. I have had no lattes, no hot chocolate, no biscuits, no sweets.

So, all this exercise and fairly careful eating. Enormous swims, walks or work outs every day on holiday. Face treatments religiously twice a week. Manicures and pedicures, special restorative body scrubs and lotions. What difference has it made?

Negligible. Imperceptible. I am so pissed off. I have made a quite major lifestyle change and I have nothing positive to show for it. Unfortunately damn damn and blast I will have to take a more drastic approach. My last drastic approach (nothing except diet shakes for 100 days) was effective for sure, but I don’t think I have the guts to do that again. Figuratively and literally: my digestive system never quite got over it. But as I said my new resolutions are best starting in September, here goes:

• Always walk to the station
• At least half an hour of exercise every day
• No alcohol
• Only fruit, salad, veg, lean protein, a few wholegrains

Will that do it?

I think I look shit. I don’t want to wake up every day looking in the mirror and thinking “surely not”, but perhaps that’s my fate now?