I walk because I am alive

 We lived in Appleton, Wisconsin from 1984 to 2023, almost 40 years of my life.  It is my hometown.  It is a small town compared to any cities in the East Coast or the West Coast.  My brother (from New York City) told me that Appleton has only one major street, the College Avenue. My sister-in-law (from Los Angeles) calls Appleton, the place where even a bird would not lay her eggs.

Yet at this place, I raise my two kids, I have 2 satisfactory careers. I have a difficult diagnosis.  I have stories that can make me laugh, or make me cry. 

Precisely, it is a small town where I can walk to any part of the town by foot or by bicycle.  Because my jobs required me to commute and to sit at the office during the week, I tried to walk as much as I can on the weekends . The church we went to regularly on Sunday was  2.5 miles away from home; the library is 2 miles away.  Even I am what people say not the “church goer”, I went to church anyway because in doing so, I would walk 5 miles on Sunday; 2.5 miles one way. 

When we were at Appleton, most churches were involved in the Crop Walk. Crop Walk is an ecumenical church activity to walk for hunger. Basically, the participants ( the walker) asked for pledges from friends and relatives; those money then was used to help the hunger. 

In 1984, our next door neighbor, Ms. Dorthy Johnson was the mayor of the city of Appleton. She organized the walk.  We therefore went to walk to support the event.  I signed up for a 10 mile walk; my wife brought 2 boys, Victor (7 years old) and Leo (5 years old) to the City Park to cheer me up.  

As soon as we arrived at the City Park, Victor saw the excitement of the crowd. He told his mom that he wanted to walk with me.  My wife then hurriedly found some pledges for Victor at the last minute; actually, one of the pledges was from Mayor Johnson who pledged $3 per miles thinking that a seven year old boy could only walk as far as 3 miles.  Actually that was my wife’s thought.  She told Victor that anytime she wanted to quit, he could called home and mom would pick him up.  

Amazingly, that day, Victor, the 7 year old boy, walked side-by-side with me completing the 10 miles walk.   Eight years later, when the pastor of my church said that he could no longer run the 10 miles for the walk, Victor said that he would run for his pastor.  He ran the 10 miles Crop Walk.  Victor stays physically active.  He leads the bird walk and run frequently at Ann Arbor now.

Participating in the annual Crop Walk was  a family event. Both Leo and my wife walked in 1985 and the following years.  My wife walked the shorter routes.  Both Leo and Victor walked or ran at a much faster pace.

While Victor ran, Leo took on the swimming and tennis. In swimming, we still had a photo of Leo’s butterfly swim photo that was published in Appleton local newspaper. One year, when my wife took Leo to Whitewater tennis camp, he played so hard that he broke his collarbone. The coach called my wife to take Leo home.  Leo cried so hard not because collarbone hurt so much, but because he had to miss the tennis camp which he loved so much.

I have walked the Crop Walk every year since 1984 and always walked 10 miles from 1984 to 1990 when the Crop Walk committee changed the maximum length from 10 miles to 6 miles.  It changed again  to an even shorter length of 3 miles in 2020.  There was a year in which we had pouring rain in Appleton on the Crop Walk day. Still, I wore a raincoat and walked the full length of the course.  There was a year that we did not walk; that was the year we had the pandemic. All churches were closed at the time. In 2023, the organizers including my wife ran out of steam and still could not find people to continue to organize the event.  The Crop Walk was closed in 2023.

In the Crop Walk, I had a walking partner. His name is Tom Neal. We both belonged to the same church and even sang in the same choir. When we walked the 10 mile event, we always stopped by an ice cream shop at the 8 mile mark and enjoyed the ice cream.  That was the best part of the walk.  

My wife and I even walked 13 miles in 2002 in the half-marathon. 2002 was the year I retired from my first career of Kimberly-Clark and took on my teaching at University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.  Being a walker of 10 miles very often, I did feel it until I passed the 10 mile mark.  The next 3 miles was a drag; I was glad that both my wife and I completed the race.

The most strenuous walk I have had was the 20 miles backpacking from Algoma to Sturging Bay, Wisconsin along the Ahnapee State  trail in the year I was still working at Kimberly-Clark, probably in the year of 2000.  This is a 48 miles winding along the Algoma and Kiwanis rivers.  I camped at Algoma the night before. The plan was to backpack and walk 20 miles from Algoma to Sturgeon Bay then stayed at a hotel in Sturgeon Bay and walked back another 20 miles on the next day. It was a very hot summer day and the mosquito was totally intolerable. Because of the mosquito, I was unable to take the outfit off and wore just a T-shirt to walk. There were even snakes on the trail and I had to dodge them to proceed. Backpacking meant I had to carry not only food but enough water to complete the walk. By the time I arrived at Sturgeon Bay, I was completely exhausted.  Instead of walking back another 20 miles back to Algoma, I took a taxi and back to my campsite site where I could drive my car home. 

When we moved to Ann Arbor in 2023, I organized a Saturday morning walk for the Taiwanese retiree community.  We walked in many different city and county parks of Ann Arbor. We even walk both at the State Parks such as Maybury State Park and several Metro parks such as Hudson Mill Parks.

Recently I came across a report from Dr. Ronda Patrick. She is a biochemist who runs the Foundmyfitness podcast.  In this report, she talks about metabolic health. She says that a perfect recipe for developing diabetics is being sedentary, eating meals at a wrong time, and neglecting sleep. The definition of sedentary is more than 2 hours of sitting at a time.  My dad walked everyday to his 90.  When he was 90 years old, he rode his bicycle and fell and was sent to ER.  My sibling in Taiwan followed the doctor’s advice and restricted dad’s movement.  My dad’s health declined rapidly.  He died at age of 94.  My brother, Dr. Ting-Kai Chen, physically active all through his life.  He ran when he was in the 60-70’s.  He even ran New York Marathon in 1979.  Today, at age 89, he is still very vibrant and physically strong.  He is my role model. 

I am glad that my hometown Appleton gave me opportunities for being physically active.  I walk because I am alive.  I walk because I want to be alive.