I Thought “Not Unhealthy” Was Enough

My dad had a heart attack last week.

He’s okay.

That feels important to say first, because every time I tell someone, I can see the rest of the conversation rearranging itself in their face. He’s home now. Tired, annoyed at everyone fussing over him, and already complaining that the coffee tastes different because my mother has apparently decided this is also the moment to reform his entire diet.

The strange part is that he was never the person I worried about. He’s always been pretty healthy. Not health-blog healthy, obviously. He likes ribs. He likes a beer. If there is garlic bread on the table he considers it a personal challenge. But he’s not seriously overweight, he never smoked, he walks a lot, and there was no dramatic warning period where everyone could later say, yes, of course, we should have seen it coming.

There was just a normal day, and then suddenly there wasn’t. I think that is the bit that has stayed with me.

I’ve spent most of my adult life assuming that “not unhealthy” was probably good enough. I walk around a lot at work. I’m not carrying sixty extra pounds. I don’t live on takeout. I can climb stairs without needing an ambulance at the top. That counted as fitness in my head. Now I’m not so sure.

I haven’t properly exercised in years. Not consistently, anyway. I’ve had phases, obviously. A month of yoga. Three weeks where I was inexplicably convinced I was going to become a runner. A gym membership that mostly provided me with a tiny monthly reminder of my own optimism. Nothing stuck.

And now I keep thinking about my dad. Not in a dramatic I’m going to die at thirty way. More in the uncomfortable way where something happens close enough to you that a bunch of things you had filed under “later” suddenly move folders.

So maybe I should start exercising. There. Horrible sentence.

I don’t even know what that means yet. A couple of workouts a week? More walking? Something involving weights and machines that I will definitely use incorrectly while pretending I know exactly what I’m doing? Probably not running. I feel strongly that humanity already invented bicycles for a reason.

But something. I think I’ve reached the point where “I really should” needs to become slightly more useful than a sentence I say every six months.