Streets - 52 Ways to Walk: The Surprising Science of Walking for Wellness and Joy, One Week at a Time

By the same author

The Age-Well Project (with Susan Saunders)

(writing as Annabel Abbs)

Nonfiction

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First published in Great Britain 2022

Copyright Annabel Streets, 2022

Illustrations created by Alexis Seabrook, illustrations copyright Annabel Streets 2022

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For Hugo

Contents

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When I was twenty-three and had a little money in my pocket, I learned to drive and bought a small, rattling car. I loved my car, often driving round town for the sheer thrill of it. You see, I grew up carless. My father never owned a car; he never even learned to drive. My mother finally took lessons in her forties, proudly failing her driving test seven times. We lived in obscure, remote places where public transport was at best unpredictable, and at worst non-existent. If we needed anything, we walked, often for miles and miles. Perhaps this explains why my little Fiat brought me such pleasure.

My driving life coincided with a desk job. Both eventually coincided with curious changes to my body (rounder, softer, achier, stiffer, stooped) and to my mind (anxious, unsettled, discontented). Around the same time, I came across a fact that flabbergasted me. I read in Bill Brysons A Walk in the Woods that the average American walked 1.4 miles a week.

In that instant I saw how dramatically my life had changed. Because I was no better hopping into my car at every opportunity, slouched over a desk all day, slumped on the sofa all evening. Suddenly I had a deep yearning for the life Id lost, with its simple walking joys, its endless adventures on foot, its wild blustering air. I decided to upmove my life, to re-oxygenate it.

I made a rule for myself: not to use my car unless it was absolutely necessary. Instead, I would walk. During the months that followed, I noticed that many of the journeys Id taken by car were ridiculously close to home. Why had I driven to a supermarket that was only a twenty-minute walk? To a dentist that was a mere fifteen-minute saunter? More ludicrous still, why on earth had I driven to a gym so that I could walk on a treadmill or sit on an exercise bike?

I noticed something else too: at the first sign of rain, wind, darkness, heat, hunger, boredom, lack of a companion to name a paltry few of my many excuses my little car became irresistibly alluring. And so I bought a dog and proper wet-weather clothing no longer would the cold, wet or dark excuse me from walking. I grew to love my night walks, my rain-sodden strolls and mud-bound marches, my after-dinner ambles, my windy weekend hill hikes, and my ley-line saunters. Walking had never seemed more beguiling or more thrilling.

Later and suffering from debilitating, desk-induced back pain I made a second rule-for-self: to convert as many of my sedentary activities as possible into walking activities. Work would be walked, holidays would be on foot, the weekly shop would be militarily tabbed, coffee with a friend would become a strolling coffee Only to hear the same excuses Id once given myself. Colleagues turned down my invitations to bipedal meetings: too windy/hot/cold/early/late. Friends (some) and family (especially) were no different: too far/steep/muddy/heavy/boring especially boring.

A question began gnawing at me: what if all these excuses were, paradoxically, good reasons to walk? By this point, I was regularly researching, and writing about, the subjects of walking and health. Studies on the astonishing power of movement and nature sunlight, soil, snow, silence, scent were tumbling into my inbox, confirming some of my recent suspicions. I began my own series of walking experiments: hiking at altitude, in forests, barefoot and backwards; walking by moonlight; following rivers, pilgrim routes, fractals, or my own nose; dancing and singing as I strode; litter picking, forage walking, mindful walking, power walking, silent walking Walking had become, once again, the great adventure of my life. But this time science could explain how and why.

Meanwhile, reports of its impact on health seemed incontrovertible: regular walking was helping millions of people to reverse diabetes, fend off heart disease, hold back cancer, lower blood pressure, reduce weight, counter depression and anxiety and so much more. Indeed, one study concluded that exercise was preventing almost 4 million premature deaths every year, a figure deemed conservative by some epidemiologists, who believe walking could avoid up to 8 million deaths a year. Another study calculated that thirty-five chronic diseases could be prevented by exercise.

Because heres the thing: when we move, hundreds of intricate changes take place inside our bodies. A twelve-minute walk alters 522 metabolites in our blood molecules that affect the beating of our heart, the breath in our lungs, the neurons in our brain. When we walk, oxygen rushes through us, affecting our vital organs, our memory, creativity, mood, our capacity to think. Walking causes hundreds of muscles, joints, bones and tendons to move in an elaborate, effortless sequence, propelling us forward but also triggering a multitude of molecular pathways, expanding our heart, strengthening our muscles, smoothing the lining of our arteries, shunting sugar from our blood, and switching our genes on and off in a miraculous process known as epigenetic modification. Walking does more than enrich our own health. It also enriches the health of future generations. We know that exercising in our reproductive years produces children who are more resistant to disease; we know that active pregnant women produce a compound in their breast milk that reduces their babies lifelong risk of diabetes, heart disease and obesity.