A Life Lived in Motion

My Nanny (grandmother) never worked out, but she outlived most fitness trends.

Yesterday, she would have turned 104 years old, and it made me think about the life she lived and the body that carried her through it.

She didn’t count steps, track calories, or carve out time to “exercise.” But she worked, every single day, and she did it well into her nineties. Looking back, I realize she taught me more about honoring my body than any fitness plan ever could.

Even after hip surgery, she simply found a way to keep moving.

Her mornings began before the sun came up. While most of the world was still asleep, bread would already be rising on the counter. Fresh bread wasn’t a special occasion, it was simply part of life. She made three meals a day, and there was always enough for whoever happened to walk through the door.

We’re from Nova Scotia, and in her home the door was never really closed. Family, friends, neighbors, and often strangers passing through were always welcome. The kettle was always ready for tea.

Movement was simply part of how she lived. She did barn work, tended her garden, walked in the woods, carried, lifted, bent, climbed, and cared for the land and the people around her. She was constantly doing things that made people shake their heads in disbelief, especially as she got older.

She never seemed particularly impressed by their surprise, it usually made her come up with something even more unbelievable!

She lived to be 97 years old and raised 13 children. Her family eventually grew to include 24 grandchildren and 42 great-grandchildren.

Strength, it turns out, multiplies.

Looking back now, what kept her strong wasn’t exercise. It was the constant movement woven through the fabric of her life.

Today we even have a name for this kind of movement: NEAT — Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis.

It’s the energy we burn through everyday activity that isn’t formal exercise. Things like cooking, cleaning, gardening, carrying groceries, climbing stairs, standing instead of sitting, walking through the woods, or tending to the work of the day.

Nanny's life was full of NEAT long before anyone gave it an acronym.

She didn’t move to stay fit. She stayed fit because she moved.

Her strength wasn’t built in a gym. It was built in kitchens, barns, gardens, and forests. It was built through work that mattered, through caring for people, and through simply using the body she had.

Today, many of us live very differently. We sit to work. We sit to drive. We sit to relax. We sit to connect. Movement has become something we schedule instead of something we live.

We try to undo hours of stillness with a short workout and then return right back to the chair.

Slowly, quietly, our bodies adapt to not being used.

One of my favorite stories about my grandmother actually made the news once. A surprise crop of vegetables had started growing on top of a manure pile. When she climbed up to harvest them, a reporter asked her what she would do if she fell.

Her answer was simple.

“I’d get back up.”

No hesitation. No fear. Just certainty.

That response says everything about how she lived in her body. She trusted it. She used it. She didn’t treat it like something fragile that needed to be protected from life.

She simply lived in it.

The beauty of everyday movement is that it belongs to everyone. Honoring our bodies doesn’t require a perfect workout plan or hours in the gym. Sometimes it simply means sitting a little less, walking a little more, carrying what we’re able, tending a garden, taking the long way around, or choosing motion when stillness would be easier.

Not everyone can do everything.

But everyone can do something.

Maybe honoring Nanny’s legacy doesn’t mean exercising more. Maybe it means remembering that our bodies were built to move through life, not watch it pass by.

Our bodies aren’t meant to be preserved. They’re meant to be lived in.

Thank you for leading the long line of strong women in my life. Your footsteps made the path easier for the rest of us to follow.