Walking, Not Enough Has Been Said

I know I already talked about walking (“Walking… enough said.” See scottthoughts 12/12/09), but I don’t think I said quite enough. I once taught a fifty minute class on only walking. Without further ado, here are some of my thoughts about walking. Walking is complex. Walking can be something you do without thinking at all. Walking can be the only thing you are able to think about when you do it sometimes. You might be walking around life thinking you mastered it (walking, not life), but you haven’t. Luckily you have me to tell you all about it. Walking covers a wide variety of topics, such as: speed, time, distance, effort level, group size, style, and impairments. Let’s first consider speed, you obviously have a top speed level when walking, it varies from person to person based on fitness levels and whatnot. Next, time and distance, to all the physically inclined (as in those with an inclination for physics), this may seem like speed, but it is not. For example let’s say your top walking speed is two miles per hour, and your distance is five miles and your time is two hours. Obviously you should not be walking. Let’s say the same scenario, but with two and a half hours. You might think that was perfect, but you aren’t going to be able to walk at your top walking speed for two and a half hours (or five miles). See, this is where effort level comes in. normally, you will only need to choose three of the four: speed, time, distance, and effort level, and the last will pretty much choose itself. Unfortunately, walking isn’t quite that simple. You probably want to first consider what size group you’ll be traveling in. This is easy (all it requires is knowing how many people you’ll be traveling with) but it has many implications. For starters, for larger the groups, there is a higher probability of slower travel. This can be caused by a range of things, like sometimes everybody is about one minute late (it’s like you’re running late? Great, me too! But really you get there and you still have to wait for them a little), or because it’s harder for more people to travel together in public places. Then you want to consider what style you want to walk with. You could be calm and cool, but that won’t help much if it makes you five minutes late to a business meeting. Or you could be bold and assertive, or sly and sneaky, or passive and pondering. There’s a lot to say about style, so you might want to think about yours before you just casually walk around (unless you want to just casually walk around). Last you want to make sure you take into account impairments. This is the grab bag, it could be anything from more weight because you have more clothes because it’s winter, to you can’t stand straight because you have to hold your girlfriend’s hand. A lot of the things are weather related (like you have to wear a movement restricting rain coat or it is slippery), but there are other things (like you’re carrying beer). Perhaps now, you will think a little before you walk.

So Scott Thought