I drooled as I stared at the advertisement: A walk machine! All I had to do was place my still lazy feet on the machine without getting off the bed and the apparatus simulated walking movement while I went back to sleep! This was what I had been dreaming about for years; to exercise without effort. No more fighting sleep, as daylight forced its way into another day. No more searching for walking shoes in the dark. No stretching! No warming up!
No ankle ache after the first round! No thigh pain after the second! Ah! This was ze life! Why had it taken so long for such machine, I thought dreamily. And then my thoughts wandered to this morning. The walking down the stairs, talking to the strays who waited outside with demonstrative greeting, “How was the night you little fellow?” “It was good Bob, there was this fly that bothered me, but then I shifted away from the garbage bin, and things were fine!” “There you go!” I said and patted him and his other two friends as they scampered away.
I looked up and noticed the clouds; from around them the sun made silver the edges, “Ah God!” I whispered, “it’s a beautiful day!” “Enjoy it Bob!” the Lord whispered, “I made it for you to se it!” I walked to the park with a smile, “First round slow!” I told myself sternly, and looked with surprise at tiny new blue flowers that had come up overnight, a koel cried out from a tree, sparrows chirped pretending they were all early birds, “Stop that noise!” I told them sternly, “you’re disturbing the worms!” They chirped louder: Who said birds didn’t have a sense of humour?
I felt a wave building up behind, it was the arrival of a dear friend; he came like an express and I knew my passenger train walk was over; he just took me along with him. I quickened my pace, my muscles cried out, my legs murmured in mutiny but I pushed and two rounds later, I felt a calm in those same weary legs as they kept pace with those of my speeding companion. We talked as we did everyday. We argued, debated and were soon joined by the good doctor, a dermatologist; conversation shifted to skin.
I walked back home later flushed not just with the toil of walk, but with the joys of friendship, and fellowship with nature and God! I look at the machine and turn away: No contraption can bless me with what I receive with my morning walk, even if I have to look for shoelace in the dark, or fight leg pain and a sweaty beard, it is well worth it all! God given friendships, spectacular views and talks with nature: What machine could give all that to me?