Lifestyle changes are what’s going around the office here at the Tribune this season.   It’s time for me to jump on board too.   
About five years ago, I lost a good amount of weight and was looking and feeling better and younger than I ever had, but a around 2010, my life changed.
 At first, I thought for the better.  My part-time reporter job became a full-time reporter job.  I was excited to have the new responsibility and the higher pay check.  But the trade off was more time sitting and less time exercising--which had been my salvation.  When I had time to ride my bike and walk extensively every day, my mood was great, my metabolism high, my appetite in check and my waistband straight.  But that began to change, and the new size 12 went back to 14, and then further back to my between pregnancy sizes of 16 and (Yikes!) 18 on my bad days. 
Fast forward to today.  While I’ve moved to a new town and traded in my daily hour of driving to work and back for a three block walk, I still have yet to get into a good routine of exercise again. I admit, most days I start up my truck just to drive it three blocks to the office.  Many days, it sits there until it’s time for me to go home.  I have friends back in Denver, where I grew up, that commute into work every day and have to park further away from their office than if I simply left the truck in my driveway at home.  Clearly, I’ve been allowing “sedentary” to creep into my life in more ways than one. 
I dislike exercise for the sake of exercise.  But exercise for a purpose is something I can really get my mind around.  What better purpose than getting around to do the things I normally would do every day?  Like going to work, going to the store, going to the bank, meeting a friend for coffee? 
Now, if you are thinking to yourself my timing is way off for taking on a project like this, you aren’t the only one.  It’s about to get really cold, as we enter December.  Between low temperatures, winds, snow and ice, staying comfortable is going to be a challenge.  So, I’m going to set some parameters now.
I won’t walk in blizzard conditions.  I won’t walk if the wind chill is below zero.  And, I won’t walk if I have a cold.  I also won’t walk to work if I have meetings to be at locations more than six blocks from the office, which interestingly enough, is considered by the people at WalkScore to be a “walkable distance” for determining walkability scores for locations all over the nation.  Any further than that, I’ll pick up my car and drive there. 
For extra inspiration, I watched the online documentary, The Walking Revolution (you can watch it too at http://www.everybodywalk.org/documentary).  One of the easiest and best prescriptions, it turns out, for nearly anything that ails you is walking.  I’m ready to increase my dosage.

Veronica Coons