I’ve posted in several threads about my COPD and walking for exercise. I can’t reverse the lung damage itself, but I’ve been amazed at how my lung capacity or lung function has improved. I’ve been able to get my blood oxygen to stay at 98 with “full” — not “labored” — breathing, and 96 is pretty standard. Blood pressure is often down to 122/78 +/- (as low as 117 !!)
I had found this public park with a level path around its circumference of exactly 1/3 mile. So three circuits is 1 mile and six is 2 miles. Since beginning of March I’ve pretty much walked 2 to 2.5 miles daily.
So I decided to venture forth. My town — now a city of 323,000 — still preserves an historic avenue with a center boulevard. Back in the 1970s, looking in store windows in the nation’s capital around M Street and Wisconsin Ave, they featured an orange-crate filled with ceramic ducks, the crate enameled with its original label showing a Model T Ford ambling down Victoria Avenue. The city had originally been settled by British immigrants, who started our legendary citrus farming industry. The well-preserved avenue has rose and other bushes in the center, and a mix of mature palm trees and eucalyptus trees. The eucalyptus trees are very old and large. There is an asphalt bike or walking trail that follows the paved street, with the line of trees between the path and avenue.
I wear a fanny-pack at all times, as a habit I acquired 20 years prior in consideration of a fear I might “forget something” when I went out in public. It holds my cell-phone, large wallet, toothbrush and paste, flossing tools, ball-point pen, vaping pen, comb and other useful items. Long since casting aside my concern for appearance and style, I wear it to hang over my belt buckle and the fly of my blue-jeans. Someone could joke — “Does that guy have elephantiasis or something? Maybe he just has big cojones!”
The park I mentioned has a restroom facility in its center space. If I were doing my circuits, I could easily step off the trail and use it, then continue with my walking. But I’ve been walking the one-plus mile stretch from the park’s street corner at Victoria to another intersection, to turn around and walk back. There are orange trees well-maintained between the walking path and the houses of the adjacent neighborhood, which also have brick walls. This time of year, walking that length of “The Queen’s Boulevard” offers an extra pleasure with the trees in blossom. It smells like heaven. There had once been a time when several fruit-producing groves surrounded the city, sandwiched between new housing developments. You could ride a bike or motorcycle in the night air, and you would never ever afterward forget that smell.
Now, between the huge eucalyptus trees, various clumps of bushes and the orange trees, the view from the street or even the walking path is totally obscured.
Depending on what I ate for breakfast or my level of blood glucose, the growing urge to relieve my bladder can really ruin the pleasure of my walk. There is serious risk of soiling my clothes. And I had discovered that I could conceal myself from the street by standing against a eucalyptus tree, opening the fly behind my fanny-pack, taking care as I stood there and aiming to avoid soaking my inseams, while I keep vigilant watch down either direction of the trail to assure there’s nobody visible a quarter mile each way. Nobody can see Willie from any angle around a 360-degree view. As far as anyone is concerned, I’m just “standing there” taking a break from my walk.
But I’ve been informed or advised by some friends and relatives that I could be arrested and charged as a SEX OFFENDER! FURCHRISSAKE! — The only way Dead Willie could offend anyone would be through just making a brief appearance (that’s a pun, isn’t it?) And at my age, that little thing is hardly capable of “appearing” much in any way.
Doesn’t the fanny pack suffice to shield me from this risk? What if I were a cross-dresser in a polka-dot summer dress without underwear beneath? How could relieving my bladder in those circumstances be construed as “exposing myself”? I fail to see the difference.
Anyone may comment. In the meanwhile, I’m on Amazon making choices of “Depend” briefs and “Incontinence Inserts”.