The Burrow

Catalina State Park's trails were beginning to feel familiar to me.  I could gauge how far I was from the parking lot, how much higher I could climb, where we could stop for lunch.  After bullets separated me from my hiking poles, I lost interest in the trails.  We were at Gabe Zimmerman's trailhead  earlier this year; I picnicked but didn't put a foot on the path. If I couldn't do it well, I wasn't going to do it at all. Miss Vicki took me out  a few times.  She was solicitous and thoughtful and we had fun but I wouldn't call it hiking.  Margo and I walked on flat surfaces  and had enough time to take dozens of photographs.  There was not a lot of sustained forward movement in either of those instances.  I'd walk a few hundred yards and then pause to catch my breath or massage my hip or loosen my neck or cover my need to stop by taking a picture.  I covered the ground, lumbering, groaning, but doing it.  It was all I cou...

My friend wrote a book . (Actually, I have several friends with new books to their name.   This is the first of several shout-outs to those who have done what I've only fancied myself able to d o.) http://www.pwr4life.org/product/pwr-moves-book/ This book changes lives.  Not in the way Catcher in the Rye  might have done when you were fifteen, but in the change-the-shape-and-abilities-of-your-brain way. Yes, denizens, a book can actually do that. Becky has the research to prove it. I found Becky Farley, PT, MS, PhD, through a friend of a friend of a friend in the physiatric community.  Physiatrists are   nerve, muscle, and bone experts who treat injuries or illnesses that affect how you move . I've written about her before , and if you're interested in pictures of the gym and a glimpse into where I was 18 months ago, click through... but come right back... because there's more to this than you can imagine.  She uses a research based e...