My Garmin Forerunner had stood me well when I was training for half-marathons and my one-and-done sprint triathlon. I chose it because it was waterproof and could count laps in the pool for the swim part of swim-bike-run. I'm quite proud of the 14 finishers medals (which somehow survived the flooding from Hurricane Ian) hanging from a small bulletin board in our home. They are still a point of pride in my perseverance beginning at the age of 60 when I decided to leave behind the life of a couch potato.
However, even though the Garmin has had considerably less work to do as age reduces my athletic endeavors, it can no longer summon the energy to allow its battery be recharged. Enter the Apple watch, my Christmas present to myself.
At this point in my life, I dread steep learning curves, especially if they’re coming wrapped in technology that is new to me. However, I talked myself into believing that this new device would reawaken my motivation to back away from my computer and start to push my heartrate (and my waistline) to healthier numbers.
For those few of you who don’t already have this little marvel, I can only say that, so far, in order to meet the goals it demanded I set, I find myself leaping to my feet at its command to stand every hour and move around the house for at least a minute to meet its requirements of hourly movement. If my morning walk with my dog falls short of my daily exercise goal, I hop on the treadmill and make sure I last long enough feel my watch vibrate and congratulate me on closing the exercise ring.
Ah, yes. Those brightly colored rings which gradually close as you reach the day’s goals, or which remain open to remind you of your failure. I’m hoping it’s not only the novelty that keeps me marching to this insistent drummer. What I really need is a way to shame myself into fulfilling my recurrent New Year’s resolution to write and submit at least one new short mystery story a month. Alas, right now, I’m more focused on my exercise rings than on submission deadlines.
But there’s always next year.
For now, I wish all of you a joyful, healthy, peaceful new year.
Sydnie and I are also experiencing the learning curve and other joys and trials of having relatively new Apple Watches. I am thinking of turning on sleep tracking, but haven't yet. I had one experience that might be worth telling. During one morning workout I apparently did something vigorous enough to trigger the SOS process. The watch told me it thought I had fallen and it was contacting emergency services for me. It was making all sorts of alarming sounds, so I stopped, put on my eyeglasses and read the messages. Among those was a button which stopped the whole process and cancelled whatever calls it was making on my behalf. Thankfully, I didn't get a visit from th…