My family's competitive nature comes out in less than conventional ways. Number of books read. Cranium winner. Best margarita recipe. Rarely, if ever, does it involve sports. Or money. Or success.
The latest competition my family has engaged in is walking. More specifically, a pedometer device called the FitBit. This is a device that works like a pedometer, but in a much more intuitive way. There are no buttons to push, and it automatically resets at midnight. The model I purchased counts steps, miles and calories burned in a day. Higher end models, like the ones my parents and sister have, monitor sleeping patterns. The most expensive model will check insulin levels and keep tabs on the stock market.
When my FitBit arrived in the mail, I was surprised to find it's about the size of a quarter. It fits nicely into a little silicone clip that can be worn in your pocket. But, due to my vast array of dresses and yoga pants, I've opted to wear my FitBit on my bra. Right smack in the middle of the cleve. For me, when worn here, it practically disappears.
The FitBit also has a digital face; two eyes and a mouth. And he smiles bigger and bigger the more active you are throughout the day. Inactivity will earn you squinty eyes and a wagging tongue. The FitBit syncs wirelessly to either your iPhone or computer. And you can add "friends" to engage them in a healthy competition. If Facebook is the social networking site that makes you feel that you aren't stacking up as a cook or a mother, Fitbit's network is the one that makes you feel like a lazy piece of shit. I have only three FitBit friends: my mother, my father and my sister.
The goal, as the Japanese brilliantly marketed back in the 90s in an attempt to sell pedometers, is to walk at least 10,000 steps a day. This is the equivalent of 5 miles. The average person with a desk job gets in somewhere between 2,000 and 4,000 steps a day. To get 10,000 one needs to add in some intentional exercise, like a brisk walk. Medical research has posited that continual, low impact activity throughout the day is greater than, say, a turbo charged Zumba class--which I've never taken, but I think it involves cage fighting in trash bags.
The first week I wore my FitBit my family was traveling to Hot Springs for our annual vacation at a sprawling lake house. At that time, my parents and my sister had been wearing their FitBits for several weeks. The first morning I awoke to find my mother, father and sister quietly eating breakfast. I joined them for waffles and then excused myself to take a shower. When I was finished showering and drying my hair, I came out of the bathroom to find a deserted house. I looked on the back deck, in all the bedrooms, in the living room and in every closet. My family had vanished. I panicked. I knew the only plausible explanation for their disappearance, but I just couldn't allow myself to believe it. Those competitive sons a bitches were out for a walk.
When we returned home from our trip, I received news that our child was finally given a full-time slot at day care, after waiting six months (her) and countless bottles of wine (me). For the first time in exactly 2 years, I wouldn't be home with my child. I would be able to work at work, instead of at home. Colors seemed brighter.
The two most overwhelming stresses in my life--staying at home with Lowery and graduate school--both came to a close within a month of each other. If the FitBit measured skips taken through fields of flowers, I'd win. So with those two problems having solutions presented simultaneously, I was able to think differently about my life. My daily routine. What my next steps were going to be.
My parents walk constantly as part of their professions. My father, a large animal veterinarian, is constantly on his feet as bulls do not often come and sit in his lap while he measures their scrotal circumference. My mother, an entrepreneurial caterer, moves about her commercial kitchen all day long to the hum of the Food Network. Both can reach 10,000 steps before noon. My brother is a competitive canoe racer, but the FitBit doesn't care about arm movement. So the competition is really between my sister and me.
And, as an engineer, her job couldn't be more sedentary. She sits in front of a computer or drafting table or train engine--I don't know specifically what she does at work, but I know it doesn't require much walking. But that doesn't matter because my sister always has to win. So, for the past two weeks she's been beating the veterinarian who walked hundreds of acres to pregnancy check 800 head of cattle and the caterer who served 700 people at a sit down dinner, because she finds ways to work in the steps. Not for her health. Not for her heart. But for the love of the game. Mostly the winning part of the game.
And then there's me. Dead last, but only by a couple hundred steps each day. I hit 10,000, sometimes eleven, every day. And there are two reasons why I can hit these numbers now: 1) I've graduated, and 2) my child is in full time day care. School and the dissertation kept me glued to a classroom seat or stuck in front of a computer for hours on end. And while it would make more sense that days with my child were more active than days without her, it's simply not the case. It surprised me to find that I walk more, a lot more, when I'm not at home with my child. Chasing after a toddler is exhausting, but it isn't always cardiovascular. Often it's sitting down for pretend tea, while she circles laps around me. Or scrubbing dried cottage cheese off the kitchen floor. Or standing by the door yelling for her to come get in the car while she runs like mad around the house gathering up dolls to take with us. Being home may be mentally exhausting but, apparently, not terribly physically demanding.
But in the one week she's been in full time day care, a lot about my life has changed. I'm calmer. Less stressed. More fulfilled at work. Pooping by myself more often. And, apparently, walking a lot.
Because I'm a people pleaser, and my FitBit has a face (and so therefore is a person), I find myself eager to please him. And because I'm a Myers and competition is in my genes--fighting off other perfectly good traits--I don't want to be too far behind the steps of my father, mother and sister. I strive to rack up a winning number so that I can impress my parents, silence my sister and get a smile out of a device that is wedged between my tits.
For the past few weeks I've been measuring the success of my day in steps taken. I often march in place during Lowery's bath time if I've not yet reached goal. Or pull my shirt down in the middle of the grocery store to look at my FitBit smiling up at me between my breasts, only to realize I've flashed a stock boy in the canned food aisle. It's thrilling to get credit for every step I take. Even if they are steps to the kitchen to get a cookie. I feel like I've accomplished something every day when I get a wide, manic smile from my FitBit. And its mere presence in my undergarment reminds me to move more. But it's impossible to forget that I'm moving more because I'm with Lowery less.
Don't get me wrong, I want her in daycare full time despite how much I miss her. Just like despite how much I miss the challenge of school, I don't want to be a student again. And while I sometimes wish my family could be pacifists, I'll bet I wouldn't have accomplished as much in my life if it weren't for the inherent taste for blood.
Everything's a trade off. Less Lowery equals more of everything else. And when I start to feel like that balance is tilting too far, and I want to jerk her out of day care, quit my job and stay home with her full time, I have a simple solution:
I walk it off.
We just got fitbits yesterday! Mine is perched perfectly in the middle of my Victoria's Secret. I'm going to have to do a couple hundred laps in nonfiction to get my 10k steps, but I'm game.
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