Dearest Rachel –
They say that travel is broadening, and, given my effort at weight loss over the past couple of years, that’s exactly the sort of thing I didn’t need. But it was something I was keenly aware of as I launched out on my trip this year. Cruise ships are famous (infamous? I guess it depends on perspective) for their seemingly endless amounts of rich and lavish food and drink – and as a quick aside, I should mention that it’s a good thing I don’t drink much; I’ve learned that the calories involved in most alcoholic beverages are staggeringly high. Given that beer – which we’ve heard referred to jokingly as “liquid bread” before, so it stands to reason that it has a lot of carbs embedded in it – is known for causing obesity in habitual users (the dreaded “beer belly,” don’tcha know), it shouldn’t be all that shocking, but since we consumers aren’t told this (alcoholic beverages don’t include nutritional information on them, unlike literally every other food product sold in America), we’ve no idea as to just how much we’re taking in with every drink.
I digress a bit here, but the point stands; I was well aware that I was likely to put on more than a few pounds over the course of this trip if I wasn’t careful. So I committed myself to taking measures to mitigate the effects of this literal movable feast. I made a point to skip lunches as a general rule, avoid bread as much as possible (especially at dinner, where I used to habitually grab a roll or two while deliberating on an order and waiting for it to arrive), and do what I could to get in ten thousand steps every day. This sounds like a daunting task, but it proved to be easier than I’d expected. True, when we were in port, I would often get something as a midday meal (or at least a snack), if for no other reason than when else would I ever be able to try any of the things on offer in such an exotic place? Likewise, I would relax my “no bread” rule when the other dishes included sauces that were literally good to the last drop, as the old coffee slogan goes; some of these had to be sopped up to the point where the galley staff wouldn’t know whether the plate needed to be run through the dishwasher.
But the real surprise was with regard to getting ten thousand steps every day. After all, that comes to at least four or five miles, depending on the length of the step, and we were confined to a ship (albeit a large one, to be sure) in the middle of the ocean. Where would you go in such a relatively small space?
Well, to be fair, I did “cheat” by spending some thirty or forty minutes walking on the gym treadmill on the days that we happened to be at sea; I wasn’t going anywhere, but I was getting the exercise I needed. It helped immensely to know that certain people were keeping track of me back at home and keeping me accountable to this; otherwise, I probably would have been a lot less motivated to keep this up. But you might notice that walking for that length of time wouldn’t amount to the full four or five miles I might otherwise need in order to maintain this pace. So how did I do it?
Well, it so happens that, for all its relatively small size amidst the vastness of the ocean, the Serenade of the Seas is still fairly large. From stem to stern, it measures 962 feet, and while I never needed to walk all the way from the very end to the opposite end, there were enough times I needed to get from the forward area (where my cabin was located) to the aft sections, particularly if I was on my way to or from breakfast or dinner, as both of the dining facilities were back there. Not only that, but they were also several decks below or above where my cabin was located (none of the common areas were on a deck with balcony cabins), so not only would I get in over a thousand steps with each round trip for one meal or another, I’d also be doing a fair amount of stair climbing as well. Two meals a day – combined with the meandering path I would take through the Windjammer’s various stations – would easily bring me a quarter of the way to ten thousand steps on any given day, even on a day when I was otherwise too ill to do any more exercise. Combine these meal walks with my efforts at exercise (or the time spent wandering about various port cities) and the odd walk to one place on the ship or another for one reason or another (coffee runs, pool visits, and the like), and you might see how easy it is to keep up with one’s steps while cruising, especially if you pay sufficient attention to it.
It was so easy, in fact, that once I returned home, I assumed it would likewise be just as effortless to maintain such a pace. And it’s at this point that I came to a shocking conclusion; it’s not nearly as easy to keep this up in a place where everything is either right at hand, or so distant as to require one to drive to get there.
As a case in point, let me tell you about my Memorial Day. In some ways, while a little different that in the past (after all, Daniel and I weren’t down in Tennessee visiting Kevin anymore), we were doing most of what we would do if we were down there; which is to say, hanging around together, watching television (well, YouTube, but it was on the television in the bedroom, so I think it still counts). I’d put together the new leather rocker, and Daniel was enjoying the old one on the other side of the bed, so we were both comfortable to the point of not needing to go anywhere or do anything. That’s kind of what holidays are for, right?
I did decide to get pizza for the three of us; I’d gotten an email from one chain which with I get loyalty points, telling me that they would expire that day, and I figured I might as well use them. What I didn’t know at the time – but probably should have, given previous experience elsewhere – is that they apparently expired at the beginning of the day rather than the end of it, so they were already of no use. Still, the two of us already had our hearts set on the place, having made a decision, so I went ahead with it. At least Logan found a gift card that the boys had partially used in my absence, so we didn’t pay full price. So upon ordering (and being notified that the order would be ready in a mere thirteen minutes, so I’d have to get on the stick and go across town to fetch everything post haste), I got in the car, drove to the place, got the pizzas (and the wings, and the sandwiches – look, it was a small pizza, and there were other menu items that were both cheap and appealing), went back to the car and drove home, whereupon we enjoyed and devoured everything in reasonably short order, at which point we resumed our watch schedule.
The next morning, as I prepared to head off to the fitness center to get in my steps for the day, I weighed myself. And while I was dismayed, I wasn’t exactly surprised to see that I’d put on three pounds since the morning previous. After all, while we had the pizza relatively early in the evening, it was quite a lot of food in its own right, and it’s not as if I’d done much to work any of it off. Sure, you burn calories as a matter of existence, but not that many.
What shocked me was when I checked my steps, and got a quick glance at how many I’d taken the day previous before the app reset itself to begin counting for the current day. I’d ask you to guess, but I’ve already told you.
For all that I might be susceptible to putting on weight on the ship, due to the way they ply their guests with food and drink like they were fattening us up for slaughter, it would have been all but impossible for me to limit myself to less than a hundred steps in a given day. Even if I ordered my meals via room service (and given that I may have passed a cold on to one of my table mates at some point, it might have been a good idea now and again), I’d have to leave the room at some point to let Marlon do his job, and that would have likely required more steps than that just to get to the centrum and back (to say nothing of going up and down stairs). Here at home, even the trip out of the house to the pizza place didn’t amount to enough walking to exceed a hundred steps. You can get pretty indolent here in the suburbs. Maybe that’s why people take such an issue with the place.
Anyway, I’ve gotten in my workout today, but I’m still a couple thousand steps short of ten thousand. Not sure when I’ll be able to do anything about that, or what I can expect to do, but while I try to work that out, honey, keep an eye on me, and wish me luck. I’m going to need it.
Letters to Rachel 