CULT OF JAMES

Second walk of the day. Ten PM, same August 22nd. The heat backed off just enough to make it bearable, which in Pensacola means it dropped from “oven” to “sauna.” Shorter than the afternoon walk. Six-tenths of a mile in fifteen minutes. But the heart rate tells a different story — averaged 125, spiked to 143. Either the first walk…

Second walk of August 22nd. Ten PM. Shorter this time — 0.63 miles, fifteen minutes, the kind of walk where the sun is gone and the air is finally something you can breathe instead of wear. Heart rate higher than the afternoon walk, though. Avg 125, maxed at 143. Moving a little faster, or maybe just carrying whatever the day…

Late afternoon walk. Not quite a mile, twenty-five minutes, the kind of pace that says “I’m outside and moving and that’s enough.” August 22nd. Still brutally hot. Heart rate crept up to 131 at one point, which for this pace means the heat was doing most of the work. Your body doesn’t care that you’re just walking — ninety-five degrees…

Two walks in one day. This is the first one — late afternoon, 0.86 miles, the longest I’d gone on foot in a while. Twenty-nine-minute pace, which is slow, but it’s almost a full mile and that matters more than the speed. August 22nd. The kind of day where you go out once and then go out again later because…

Half a mile. Seventeen minutes. August in Pensacola, which means the air is soup and the sidewalk radiates heat back at you like a personal grudge. This was a slow one. Deliberately slow, or maybe just honestly slow — hard to tell the difference sometimes. Heart rate stayed low, feet stayed on the ground, and the whole thing was over…

Half a mile. Seventeen minutes. August in Pensacola, late afternoon, when the heat isn’t breaking so much as settling in for the evening shift. This is not a workout. This is getting up, going outside, walking to the end of something and back. Thirty-five-minute mile pace, which is the speed of someone who is moving because stillness felt worse. Heart…