Possibly few of my readers have given the matter serious thought, and they will be astounded at the changed conditions of work which have come into our modern life. It will be interesting to note here some of these changes.
Men used to live within walking distance of their work. Now the electric street railway and the speedy automobile have eliminated the necessity for much walking.
Men used to climb stairs. The elevator has now so accustomed us to the conveniences that stairs are taboo.
Machines have replaced muscles. The old printer walked from case to case and got exercise. To-day he sits in an easy backed chair and uses a linotype.
Telephoning is quicker than traveling. No one "runs for a doctor."
Our houses have electric washers, electric irons and many other labor-saving devices.
Even the farmer has his telephone, his auto, his riding plow, his milking machine and his cream separator.
In the stores, the cash boy has disappeared. The cash carrier takes the money to a girl who sits in the office, a machine makes the change, and another machine does her mathematics.
[Sidenote: Perils of Inactivity.]
The modern idea of efficiency puts a premium on the sedentary feature of occupations, and employees are frequently automatons that sit. The business man sits at his desk, sits in a comfortable automobile as he goes home, sits at the dinner table and sits all evening at the theater, or at the card table. It is sit, sit, sit until he gets a big abdomen, a puffy skin and a bad liver.
He tries to counteract this with forced exercise in a gymnasium or a couple of hours golfing a week. Very likely, his golfing is more interesting because of the side bets than because of the exercise.
We are losing out on the natural, pleasurable, and practical exercises, mixed in the right proportions to promote physical poise and health.
Things are too easy, luxury and comfort too teasing, for the ordinary mortal to resist, and the great mob sits or rides hundreds of times when they should stand or walk.
When my objective point is five or six blocks, I walk, and I think on the way. I probably get in from two to four miles of walking every day, which my friends would save by riding in the street cars or autos.
I walk to my office every morning--a distance of nearly four miles.
I walk alone, so that I may relax and not expend conscious effort as is the case when I walk with another.
That morning walk prevents me from reading slush and worthless news, and relieves me of the necessity of talking and using up nerve energy.
I get the worth-while news from my paper by the headlines and by trained ability to separate the wheat from the chaff.
[Sidenote: Four Great Body-Builders.]
I just feel fine all the time, and it"s because I get to bed early, sleep plenty, exercise naturally, think properly and get the four great body-builders in plenty: air, water, sunshine, food; and the other four great health-builders, which are: good thought, good exercise, good rest, and good cheer.
The great crowd aims at ease, and so the business man sits and loses out on the exercise his body and mind must have. And therefore the great crowd pays tribute to doctors, sanitariums, rest cures, fake tonics, worthless medicines, freakish diet fads, and crazy cults, isms, and discoveries that claim to bring health by the easy, lazy, comfortable sitting route.
Believe me, dear reader, it is not in the cards to play the game of health that way. "There ain"t no sich animal" said the ruben as he saw the giraffe in the circus, and likewise, there "aint no sich thing" as health and happiness for the man who persistently antagonizes Nature, and hunts ease where exercise is demanded.
The law of compensation is inexorable in its demand that you have to pay for what you get and that you can"t get worth-while things by worthless plans.
You must exercise enough to balance things, to clear the system, to preserve your strength; it doesn"t take much time.
33.
This afternoon I am sitting on a glacial rock in the forest at the foot of Mount Shasta. A beautiful spot in which to rest and a glorious page from the book of nature to read.
[Sidenote: Back to Nature.]
A canopy of deepest blue sky above, with sunshine unstopped by clouds.
The rays of old Sol pulsate themselves into an endless variety of flowers, plants and vegetable life which Mother Earth has given birth to. Glorious trees of magnificent size reach up into the blue and give us shade. Ozone sweeps gently through the forest, impregnated with the perfume of fir, balsam, cedar, pine and flowers.
In this spot, nature has thrown up mountains of volcanic rock, which hold the winter"s snow in everlasting supply to quench the thirst of plant, of animal, and of the millions of humans in the lower country.
The whole hillside around me is a community of springs of crystal water laden with iron and precious salts. It is the breast of Mother Earth which nurses her offspring.
Here are no noises of the street; the newsboy"s cry of "extra" is not heard. The raucous voice of the peddler, the din of trucks, the honk of automobiles, the clatter of the city--all these are absent.
There is no noise here--just the sweet music of falling water, and the aeolian lullaby made by the breeze playing on the pine needles.
My eyes take in a panorama of beautiful nature in colors and contrasts that would give stage fright to any artist who tried to paint the scenes on canvas.
[Sidenote: Gaining Pep.]
I am getting pep. This is my treatment for tired nerves; "tis the "medcin" of the hills;" "tis nature"s cure, and how it brings the pill box and the bottle of tonic into contempt! I"m letting down the high tension voltage and getting the calm, natural pulsation that nature intended the human machine to have.
So quiet, so peaceful, so natural is the view that I drink in inspiration of a worth-while kind. No war news to read, no records of tragedy, no degrading chronicles of man"s pa.s.sions, of man"s meanness and man"s selfishness.
A little chipmunk sits upright on a rock before me wondering at the movements of my yellow pencil and the black mark it makes on the paper.
A delicate lace-winged insect lights on my tablet, and a saucy "camp robber," or mutton bird, wonders at the unusual sight of me, the big man animal brother. A big beetle is getting his provisions for the winter. I recognize his occupation, for I"ve read about him in Fabre"s wonderful books on insect life.
[Sidenote: Nature"s Lodge.]
Here, in the sanctum sanctorum of the forest, I am made a member of Nature"s lodge, and the ants and bugs and beetles and flowers and plants and trees are initiating me and telling me the secrets of the order. I can only tell you, who are in the great busy world outside, the lessons and morals. The real secrets I must not tell; you will receive them when you, too, come to the hills and forests, and sit down on a rock alone and go through the initiation.
You are invited to come in; your application is approved, and you are eligible to membership.
Come to Nature"s lodge-meeting and clear away the cobwebs from your weary brain; get inspiration and be a man again.
Come--soothe and rest and build up those shredded, weakened, tired, weary nerves. Let the sun put its coat of health on you, and let the ozone put the red blood of strength in your veins.
[Sidenote: Rest and Recreate.]
Come and get perfect brain and body-resting sleep. Come to this wonderful, happy, helpful lodge and get a store of energy, and an abundance of vital ammunition with which to make the fight, when you go back to your factory or office. The doctor can lance the carbuncle, but Nature"s outdoor medicine will prevent your having a carbuncle.
The doctor can stop a pain with a poison drug, but Nature"s outdoor medicine will prevent your having the disorder which makes the pain.
No, brother, you can"t get health out of a bottle or a pill box. But you _can_ get it from Mother Nature"s laboratory, where she compounds air, water, sunshine, beauty, music, thought; where she gives you exercise and rest, health, happiness, all summed up into cashable a.s.sets for the human in the shape of poise, efficiency and peace.