After a way too warm weekend, rain decided to show up last night, and today it was one of those lovely summer days, with loads of white clouds scattered across the blue sky, and temperatures low enough to allow for a hike during the day. And hiking I went. That in and of itself is not all that unusual: I think I went hiking at least 15 times already in August. The unusual part is that I wasn’t alone today.
“Well, actually Manu…” Alright, alright, I hear you: technically, I’m rarely alone because 95% of the time the insane dog is with me. What I meant to say is that this time another human was hiking with me, and that is because I took my mother out for a hike.
She wanted to hike a specific mountain that’s very close to her at a personal level, and since I am a wonderful—and modest—son, I was happy to accompany her on this journey. It’s a short drive from where I live, roughly 40 minutes, and the hike itself is a very modest one: just a bit more than 5km and some 330 meters of elevation gain. It’s the same mountain I hiked the other day at 3 in the morning, but we took another route this time around.
Usually, I hike either alone or with the dog. That means I’m either dictating the pace or the dog is literally dragging me upwards with him. I’m not saying I’m used to speed-running these hikes, but I’m no slouch either. I’m also 36 years old, and even though I’m not in the best shape of my life (because I am 36 and not 22), I’m still 190cm tall (that’s about 6'3" for the Americans out there) and that means I can cover quite a lot of ground when my legs start going.
But my mother is 65 years old with bad knees, and so we decided that she was going to dictate the pace. It didn’t matter how slow she needed to go; I was happy to stay behind and keep an eye on her. And I have to confess that this was such an enjoyable experience. Not only because it was incredibly relaxing since the pace was clearly slower than what I’m used to, but also because I knew I was there doing something for her, rather than for myself.
Sometimes it feels good to slow down, to take it easy. We’re rushing through so many things in life that sometimes it feels like we’re rushing through life itself. And to go where? Nobody knows.
While I was walking behind her, making sure everything was ok, I was thinking about the concept of walking meditation, the idea of walking as slow as possible, paying as much attention as possible to the act of walking itself. It took us an hour and a half to hike up the mountain, and I thought that one day I should do this hike again with the goal of completing it in twice the time. Not half the time, but twice the time; forcing myself to slow down, as much as possible.
It was a great day outdoors. My mother was happy to be up there again: the last time she hiked that mountain was pre-COVID, which feels like half a century ago, and I was happy to see her happy. Life doesn’t have to be complicated to be enjoyable.
— M