The Practice Nobody Starts Until They Fall

Nov. 11/26

When we set out young trees, the first job felt backwards. We cut them back hard. A tree would arrive with a decent top on it and a root system that had just been dug up, moved, and pushed into new ground, and we'd prune the top down until it matched what the roots could carry. The tree looked smaller and sorrier than when it showed up. But a top the roots can't feed or anchor is a tree in trouble. Too much above and too little below, and the first hot spell or stiff wind finds the difference.

The other job was the white paint. Young bark hasn't toughened up, and the Valley sun will burn it, so we painted the trunks white to throw the heat back. Nobody thought of it as coddling. It was protection for a stretch, until the tree could take the sun on its own.

I've been thinking about both lately because of balance, which is about the least glamorous subject I could pick. Nobody gets a ring to close for it. You don't miss it until the day it's missing, and by then you aren't training anymore, you're recovering.

The research is plain enough on one point. Falls are among the leading causes of serious injury as people get older, and the reviews I've read on exercise for preventing them keep landing in the same neighborhood. Programs with a real balance component cut falls by something like a quarter. That's not a miracle, but it's a quarter fewer of the kind of event that can change the shape of the next ten years. What stuck with me was that the programs that worked were the ones that actually challenged balance. Walking alone didn't do it. The body had to be asked to catch itself.

That's where the pruning comes back to me. Balance is a matter of proportion, what you ask of a body against what's underneath holding it up. For years the work kept that in proportion without my having to think about it. Uneven ground was just the floor of the job, and the feet, the inner ear, and the eyes stayed in practice because they had to. Nobody planned it. Now the floors are level and the lighting is good, and the conditions that kept the skill alive are mostly gone. Unless I put something there on purpose, the top keeps getting asked to do what the roots have quietly stopped being asked to prepare for.

That's the strange part of training for something you hope never to need. There's no payoff you'll ever see. If it works, the proof is a day that didn't happen. You can't feel a fall you didn't take. A grower knows that kind of work. We cut those trees back for a wind that hadn't come yet, and the best possible result was a storm the tree stood through while nobody noticed. You'd never be sure the pruning was the reason. You just did it while the tree was young enough to take it.

I'm not young, but I'm not done either, and I'd rather do the small thing early than the large thing late. So this week I'm trying the smallest version I can think of. One balance exercise, once a day, tacked onto something I already do. Standing on one foot while the coffee brews is where I'm starting, with a hand near the counter in case the ground has opinions. It'll look like nothing, and I don't expect to feel any different by Sunday. The point was never to feel it. It's to keep the roots in proportion to the top, and to stay upright on the day nobody was watching.

This is a record of what I've read and observed, not medical advice. I'm not a doctor, and nothing here should replace a conversation with one. Any drug, dose, or treatment decision -- Mounjaro included -- is between you and your own physician. What works in my reading or in the field doesn't automatically apply to your situation.

From the Field:

Food Safety Recalls & Outbreaks -- https://www.foodsafety.gov/recalls-and-outbreaks

Mayo Clinic -- mayoclinic.org

fitandwell.com

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