Susan Palmer's Exquisite Now

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recent posts

  • Get up

    Who invented chairs? Wikipedia, of course, delves into that question, which intrigues me. What did people do before chairs? Sit on the ground. Sit on pillows, walk around a lot, stand. Be active. Then chairs became a thing.

    So how much time do I spend sitting? Short answer: Lots.

    Harvard researchers recently came up with some data on how much time people spend sitting daily, as part of a study on how movement (or the lack of it) may impact heart health.

    Here’s what they found:

    Based on a week’s worth of data, the average participant’s day consisted of 7.7 hours sleeping, 10.4 hours sitting, 3.1 hours standing, 1.5 hours doing light physical activity, and 1.3 hours doing moderate-to-vigorous physical activity. Note that the participants probably didn’t do 1.3 hours of structured moderate- or vigorous-intensity exercise per day. Rather, the trackers recorded and added up all their short bouts of activity, such as walking up a flight of stairs or running to catch a bus.

    They used computer modeling to conclude that swapping out even brief amounts of time — 5 minutes, for example — of sitting with some form of exercise could improve heart health.

    This has me curious about how much time I spend sitting. This morning, for example, I’ve been at my computer for an hour and 15 minutes and it’s not even 8:30 yet.

    I think I’ll keep tabs on my sitting for a week, get a base line, and then consider modifying my behavior. As a writer, sitting is built into my life, but I do have a height-adjustable desk, so standing-writing isn’t out of the question.

    I like how a daily Nia practice is sufficiently embedded in me that 5 minutes (which I did on Monday) or 20 minutes (which I did yesterday), gets me off my chair.

  • Seasons change

    The rains have begun in Oregon, and soon the last of the flowers will wrap up their show and bed down until spring.

    I didn’t want to say goodbye for that long and so have been cutting and pressing a few blooms, mementos of all this year’s sunny garden pleasures.

    It’s surprising and fun to see what survives the loss of moisture. Queen Ann’s lace, lavendar, and the tiny blossoms from the rosemary plant all came together nicely, and glued fairly easily onto card stock.

    But wait, there’s more. I had good luck with my finicky gardenia this summer and wondered if I could start a second one using the softwood cutting method.

    I use plastic takeout containers with lids for starting new plants this way. Just put a little damp soil in the container, insert the cutting, punch a few small holes in the lid for air, close it up and put it somewhere it gets indirect light. This gardenia start has been in the container for about a month and in another few weeks should have sufficiently developed roots that I can put it in a small pot. I’ll keep it inside for the winter and in the spring, with luck, it’ll find a home outdoors. Few things smell more wonderfully exotic than a blooming gardenia.

    Having something young and growing through the winter will be a fine thing.

  • Mindful contagion

    Ann Christianson dancing “Ignite”

    A lively camping weekend will mean no dancing, so I grabbed a 20-minute routine this morning — “Ignite” — that focused on the upper body and was just right.

    I’m still thinking about Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer’s book “Mindful Body.” Some of her experiments focused on whether mindful people just being mindful can positively influence others. These experiments are small and, I have to say, a little weird so I wouldn’t call them conclusive.

    But my experience dancing with Nia instructors is that their mindfulness and reminders to be aware of what’s happening with my body while dancing has had a great positive influence on me.

    Lately I feel less triggered by other people’s anger and outrage, and there is plenty of it all around in these final days before the election.