My Back Hurts...

I was racing to finish reading Atlas Shrugged before the movie came out.  Rand won.  I have a paperback version, so small words - I do alot of squinting.  Around midnight, I adopted a reading position I'd given up a long time ago due to lower back pain. It's as close to yoga as I get - and my back is paying the price this morning. 

I anticipate the movie will be a let down, expectations being high.  I read a little about the production, and it seemed that due to circumstances they did not get to do everything they wanted.  However, its not a Hollywood production per se, so maybe it has a chance.

Back to my back...

I woke up, took a glance at FoxNews.com, then the workout of the day at Crossfit.com (its a Hero WOD, dedicated to a fallen soldier).  I don't know what made me do it, but then I went to Google and entered "Mach 3 video game."  I used to play it at an arcade in Scottsdale called 10 Cent Games.  I spent literally several dollars playing that game.  Just thinking about it, I can smell the arcade and hear the sounds. 

Oh yah, my back...

Then I came across this guy, and my back doesn't feel so bad: (I edited the article, the full version is here)



At 75, many of my friends began to pass away. People were getting older around me, but I was only just ready to retire. I carried on rowing and publishing a dentistry newsletter until I was 82.


Then at 85 I had a crisis. I looked at myself in the mirror one day, and saw an old man. I was overweight, my posture was terrible and there was skin hanging off me where muscle used to be. I looked like a wreck. I started to consider the fact that I was probably going to die soon. I knew I was supposed to slow down, but I'm vain. I missed my old body and wanted to be able to strut across the beach, turning heads.

I was already rowing six times a week, and there didn't seem any harm in pushing myself a bit harder to rebuild my muscles. So in my late-80s I joined a bodybuilding club.

There's no research into bodybuilding for the over-80s, so it's been an experiment. With weight-lifting and protein shakes, my body began to change. It became broader, more v-shaped, and my shoulders and biceps became more defined. People began to comment on how much younger I looked, and my new muscular frame drew a lot of admiring glances from women.

Everything I learned was tailored to help my body cope with old age. I took up judo to teach me how to fall properly. My circulation and posture improved, and I was told that there was a chance more muscle mass could protect my brain from Alzheimer's. I stopped thinking about dying. As I approached 90, my focus was on getting my body back.

In 2008, I signed up for my first championship. I was nervous, but although I was the oldest contestant by around 20 years, everyone was very welcoming. I got higher scores than all the women taking part, and a lot of the men. Then, at last year's event in Germany, I triumphed, scoring higher than any contestant in any age category for my 57 dips, 61 chin-ups, 50 push-ups and 48 abdominal crunches, each in 45 seconds. As I'm over 70, they did make allowances – I could do the push-ups on my knees, for example – but I proved I wasn't past it.

I'm not chasing youthfulness. I'm chasing health. People have been brainwashed to think that after you're 65, you're finished. We're told that old age is a continuous state of decline, and that we should stop working, slow down and prepare to die. I disagree. To me, a 65-year-old is young. I turn 92 this year. It is a frightening prospect – the law of averages is against me, and, yes, one day something will happen and that will be it. But until that day comes, I'm going to carry on working on my abs.