34 Christmases
“Remember this conversation”, Bob said
In a restaurant on the streets of Lisbon, Portugal, he said “Remember this conversation 20 years from now. I’ll be 97 and still active, but for you - I want you to remember - Keep going. Don’t listen to anyone around you. Get up in the morning and just go.”
Bob Anderson, former founder of “Runners World”, at 77 years has begun a new project. KATA (Kenyan Athletics Training Academy) Running Camps are high-performance training hubs designed to identify and nurture distance running talent across Kenya. The camps are supported by KATA Potato Farm, a syndicate of farms that provide fresh food and work experience for athletes and help self-fund the running camps through sustainable agriculture. Athletes work up to 25 hours per week on the farm, gaining life skills while contributing to a self-sustaining training model.
Bob and his fierce wife Catherine own Anderson Manor near Castelo Branco and if you join GirlsTrek on our Portugal experience you will met this dynamo couple. With no regard for the number assigned to their biological year, these two do three things well.
See every day as an opportunity to do more and be more
Understand that body deserves the best - good nutrition and exercise
Ignore anyone who questions why “at your age” are you moving so fast?
Bob and Catherine are my kind of people.
My lovely Mum is 89. She too is a fierce woman. A bush horse racer as a youth, she could ride the buck out of a horse (most of the time) and after a time nursing worked side by side with my dad building a legacy with the strength of hands and heart found in many strong partnerships from the Silent generation. Not specifically an athlete, she would kick off her shoes at a School athletics day and run the mum’s dash and learnt to snow ski at 50. She loved to travel and played travel agent to our little tribe using Frommers on $25/day or negotiating a two month trip around South America using cattle industry contacts. Essentially, my mum was a goer and while I think women of today have more rope to engage in individual pursuits, in my language my mum did “get after it”.
Now her world is a Memory Unit and a small strip of lawn. At 89, the “getting after it” is gone for mum. Of course that makes me so sad, but it is also inspirational. At 55, the difference between me and mum is 34 Christmases. That’s 4 notches over a conventional school ruler. A number I feel I can wrap just one hand around and hold.
It’s pretty confronting.
It’s very motivating.
It evokes a burning, get out of my way emotion.
34 Christmases
What do I want to do with the time scape between now and my 34th Christmas? Maybe it will be less, maybe it will be more. The intention for me though is the waiting room no longer serves me. Now I am either doing it or not doing it. Or as Derek Sivers put to us back in 2020, if it’s “not a hell yes, then it’s a no.”
34 Christmases of hell yes.
We have all got the same finish line as my Dad would say to me. How you run your own race is what makes the difference.
My race sacrifices things over experience every day of the week. My race makes me get up in the morning, often before sunrise and just go. My race makes me believe that getting out there and giving it a good crack is the only choice.
That’s me, what’s you?
Frith x