Last week I snagged a couple 20-pound sacks of Sable Marco ice salt at the Sinclair gas station up in Brewster. I bought one to keep by the front door now that proper winter weather has arrived. I can sprinkle a handful or two of the fiery fairy dust whenever ice and snow accumulate on the rock steps leading down to our house from the street. Our landlord’s mom put the slabs in decades ago between her two front perennial beds. The rocks add a rustic accent to the yard, but even without any frosting of ice or snow the footing can be treacherous.
The other sack of salt I brought inside to stuff into my son’s old book bag. Lots of noise lately in the media (e.g., here and here) on the terrific fitness value from doing speedy hiking while saddled with a weighted rucksack. Now my dogs and I no longer go walking. We go rucking.
Or I go rucking and they carry on doing their usual doggy nonsense of pulling me in every direction while they sniff and scrounge and dilly-dally. This daily dance is all the more challenging when the extra weight makes me a bit clumsy on my feet.
Rucking, I have learned, is legit cross-training. All week, I’ve been feeling it in my shoulders and upper back. But today I am also feeling very sore on my posterior. Because yesterday just when I was working my way across a patch of black ice my youngest doodle decided to lunge after a windblown leaf skittering across the street. With twenty extra pounds helping gravity do its thing, I didn’t stand a chance.
Even as I hit the ground I had to laugh at the irony of that sack of salt being strapped to my back rather than scattered on the ground instead of me, working its ice-melting magic for passing walkers, runners, and even would-be dog-ruckers.
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