I think it all started with a phone call from Vanessa. She introduced herself as a newcomer to town, an exercise therapist, who was interested in starting a fitness class for people with chronic diseases, and would I be interested? I’m not sure how she knew about me, but her timing was perfect. Having lived with Parkinson’s disease for over 10 years, I was becoming more and more determined to keep my muscles from getting stiff, and I was trying to do a bit of walking up and down the halls of the senior residence where I live. At 79 years of age I knew that I didn’t have a great deal of time to play around with, so I decided to sign up for her class and see what would happen. I had already started tallying up my laps on my own, , and marking them on a chart to represent a virtual walk along the #1 Highway, and any chance to add to the distance was welcome. When the February Fitness Challenge came along last year, I continued my walking, and at the end of the month decided to continue on to see how far I could get by December 31. (I almost reached Austin, Manitoba.) [Editor’s note: that was 210km, FYI].

In September 2016 I went to Vanessa’s first class, along with four others. After 15 minutes of warm-up and stretching exercises, Vanessa said, “Okay. Now it’s walk time. You have 30 minutes.” I was stunned. I was expecting a whole hour of exercises that would perform a miracle on me and my muscles. But as I walked, leaning heavily on my walker, I noticed that Vanessa took turns accompanying us and talking to us individually about our needs, hopes and desires. I think I did about 10 laps that day. When the walk time was over, we had 15 minutes of squats and cooldown exercises, and that was it. I had a little rest when I got home, and decided I’d go back again, just to see if it would be any different the next time. Besides, I really enjoyed the camaraderie of the group.