I began regularly exercising in the gym out of desperation back in the mid ‘90s when I was so tired after work, I would fall asleep in front of the TV until dinner, then go to bed. I began spending my weekends mostly lying around the house. I got scared that my life was ending at 45, so I went out and bought a really nice hybrid tour bike and started cycling like I did in my teens, 20’s and 30’s. Things picked up. I had more energy. I spent the daylight hours after work biking the city and weekends doing 100 mile tours with other bikers on bike trails around Florida.
Eventually, I wanted to do something for my upper body, so I bought a really nice ride-on-top kayak and alternated biking and kayaking weekends. This led to kayak or biking camping trips. I met a guy who talked me into going back into the gym after not being in one since high school. The first month was no fun at all. By the third month, I was addicted to my own endorphins. I found that I could bike faster and further using less energy as my body got more efficient—the same with kayaking. I was hooked.
One day I decided to take sailing lessons, something I did when I was in my twenties. I joined a couple of clubs in order to get crewing experience. This led to renewing my Scuba license and upgrading to instructor. One of the guys at the club sold me his old 22’ Catalina sailboat for $500. I taught my wife how to sail and we began taking weekend voyages together. I bought two carbon fiber tour bikes with aluminum, titanium and stainless steel parts (salt-resistant) to store on deck and put the kayak off the stern by a painter and off we’d go.
But I found I was getting too muscle bound to work the deck efficiently, so I got into yoga and that fixed it. Yoga led to tanscendental meditation, also something I’d played with in my youth, and today I feel ornery if I don’t spend at least 20 minutes per day quietly in formal meditation. It brings mind and body together and puts big and little things in their proper perspective.
I eventually got my crew certs and a USGS skipper’s license in order to legally take charters out, six people or less in order to help pay for maintenance costs. Today I captain a 42’ Hunter and have soloed throughout the Caribbean and crossed the Atlantic last year to Ascension Island and back. I’m thinking about trading a friend for his 53’ Pearson and doing the Pacific and possibly circumnavigating.
I’m sure if I would have continued with the lifestyle I had back in 1995, I would have died years ago, bored to death in a recliner with the TV remote in my hand.
I got my life back.