I knew I needed to do it, so I did.

As my 60th birthday approaches next month, I find myself being reflective. I suppose that’s only natural. I think there are only a few big milestone birthdays in this life, although one could argue every birthday is a big one since you’re still here on this plane of existence. Eighteen, 30, 50, and 60 all seem to be markers of life’s transitions where one trades youth for wisdom. If I think about it, every decade mark after 50 is significant. One becomes more aware of one’s health and perhaps more willing to make changes to prolong the current state, assuming the best. This is, of course, also natural, but silly if you think about it. Nobody can stop themselves from aging and the effects that come with this are also inevitable. That never stopped us from trying to slow it all down now, has it?

Aging is the primary reason I retired early and moved to France, plain and simple. My mortgage was a long way from being paid off and without health care provided by a job prior to age 65, it was for me at least, untenable to stay in the USA if I wanted to pull the rip cord early. And I did. I’ve written about it many times, but I’ll say here that I am doing my best to maximize my time left by doing those things that bring me joy and positive experiences. Once removed from the transactional part of my existence, which so dominated the majority of the time in my life—especially in the USA—I could dive into those things that I always wished I had the extended time to do. For me, that list was quite long: reading many more books, cooking dishes that take half the day to prepare, finishing my WSET Diploma in wine, creating art, visiting Paris, visiting museums, traveling, watching old movies, learning another language, covering a wall with all of the corks I’ve saved in my life. The common thread among these things is time. You’ll notice that each of them is a slow thing to do, so when I was working and focused on making money, they would always have to be truncated or ignored.

You’ll also notice that I don’t write about getting more fit or focusing on being healthy like a lot of people do when they list what they’ll do with more free time. But I’ll be damned, it’s happening anyhow. Since leaving my job, selling most of my possessions, traveling for six months, and then settling in Nice, France, I have lost 35 pounds. I am wearing clothes I couldn’t a year ago, and I notice my legs are a lot thinner and more muscular.

I saw my doctor this week after I had a blood test and the results were surprising. All my numbers were in range, even my A1c, my blood pressure was perfect, and my doctor mentioned taking me off some of the medications I have been on for five years if I continue trending this way. It’s important to emphasis trending because, look, I am still a fat f*** and I have been for my entire life. It’s just the cards I was dealt. But it is amazing to me what can happen when you make some lifestyle changes, regardless of why you made them.

I don’t profess to be sharing any revelatory information here, nor do I wish to make comparisons between where I used to live and where I live now that come off as rubbing it in. However, I think it is worth noting a few causes and effects that might stick with anyone reading this and help them make different decisions with the precious time they have left.

First, I eliminated my sources of stress and along with it, any accompanying guilt. To me, these are two closely related peas in a pod. Stress comes from the feeling that one doesn’t have the time or energy to do what is required of them the way they would prefer to be doing it. More importantly, is the feeling that we should be able to do what is required of us, and when we can’t, we feel bad about ourselves because often we are letting somebody we care about down (partners, children, bosses, coworkers, communities, or ourselves). In my one year of experience of traveling and living in France, I will say that this way of thinking appears to me to be a very American state of mind. At least it isn’t French because they prioritize their happiness and their time with family and friends over everything else. Needless to say, and quite obviously, stress and guilt are poisonous, and they cause all kinds of both physical and mental health issues.

Second, is quality of food, and here there is absolutely no mistaking it: Much of the food in the USA is also poisonous. I am the millionth person to make this claim, aren’t I? In France, and I would venture to say all of Europe, food is real food and not primarily some form of sugar, salt, or trans-fat like it is back home. Here are just a few things I have noticed since regularly eating food in France: First, I eat less, and I am full faster. Second, I don’t experience sugar cravings like I did back home. Third, when I buy a product and look at the ingredients, there are less of them listed and those that are listed are whole and natural. There isn’t some long list of scientific jargon obfuscating what is really in the foods we eat like there is in the USA. Fourth, the food tastes so much better here. Everyone here eats seasonally because that’s all there is for sale. The peaches, nectarines, plums, tomatoes, apples, fennel, onion, garlic, shallots, parsley, basil, all of it, is deeply flavorful. I ate a fig yesterday that I got at the outdoor market and it was almost spiritual it tasted so good. I often find myself proclaiming, “This is the best ______ I have ever tasted!” Lastly, and I am unsure of how this is accomplished, but the bread here is magic. You can eat it every day and you don’t gain weight. The same goes for pasta. There really isn’t much attention paid to gluten in France, because it isn’t an issue.

A taste of home: Homemade Texas chili and brown butter cornbread

The third contributor to the rise in my health is purposely opting out of a car lifestyle. I haven’t owned a car in a year now, and other than renting one when traveling for a few days here and there, I have walked everywhere. Trains and trams are now far more important to me. And I joke a lot about them in my posts, but stairs have become my friend. Whereas I used to dread them, I now seek them out. When my thighs are burning, I know I am doing myself some good.

Now, a typical week here in Nice plays out like so. Every four or five days, I walk with my wheeled cart to Libération Market, one of the two big daily outdoor markets here in Nice set in a large, central open plaza that stretches for a couple of blocks in all directions. Libération has at least a hundred vendors selling seasonal fruit and vegetables, herbs, lettuces, eggs, and fresh fish and seafood. There is also a big grocery store in the plaza called the Intermarché Super where I can get almost everything else. It’s about 1.5 kilometers (about a mile) from my apartment, slightly uphill. Along the way, I pass one of the Italian markets I like and a wine shop that also sells specialty épicerie items like olives, mustards, and vermouth. I sometimes stop in one or both of these, but I always stop at a bakery I love called Zambetti for baguettes and other deliciousness like quiche and coca fritas, which are Niçoise bell pepper and onion tarts. There is also a cheese shop in my neighborhood and a couple of excellent butchers. It’s a bit too far for me to go every day to Libération like a lot of people do, so I generally buy four meals at a time, plus pantry and sundry items because that is about all I can carry in my cart. So, I have a minimum walk of six kilometers a week while pulling some weight behind me built into my life.

I also love exploring Nice, and I love finding unique stores where they sell Asian foods, Italian foods, North African or Indian spices, or even Mexican things. It depends on what I am making each week, but for those items I often get on the tram and go a few stops to other parts of the city and then do some more walking with my cart or backpack on the hunt for specialty items. I needed a couple of platters this week. Walk. I bought a houseplant. More walking.

We live 12 minutes by foot to the waterfront, and we go at least once a week to walk along the Promenade, that beautiful wide walking path that runs seven kilometers along the Mediterranean Sea, to see the beautiful blue water and sky, which let me tell you, is worth the price of admission alone. Matisse, Picasso, Chagall, and Renoir all moved here just to paint these blues. The people watching is also incredible. This time of year, there are thousands of beautiful browning bodies lining the stone beaches and I love the joyous screams and laughter of the children running and playing. There are dozens of dogs (lots of Frenchies and Poms) to see walking on the Prom. One of the things I most cherish is overhearing bits of conversation from the passing tourists in their native tongues: Italians, Russians, Koreans, the Swedes, the Brits, the hard H’s in the backs of throats from those speaking Arabic, and of course, plenty of French from other parts of the country. Plus, a whole bunch of languages that I have no idea what they are. There are beach clubs with tables and chairs for dining and lounge chairs for sunning lining the Mediterranean and one can smell charbroiling fish and lobster for miles. It’s fabulous. Anyhow, my point is that we do even more walking than just errand-running each week as we take it all in. So, we now average about 40–50 miles a month just living our daily lives here in Nice. I am unsure if I even walked 40 miles in my last five years of life in the USA.

All told, the combination of no stress, better food, and walking has culminated in feeling a lot better, which I know, surprises nobody. My doctor seems to be, though, but she’s French and is preternaturally negative. She even managed to send me a note telling me to keep up the good work, which must have really hurt her. But the thing is I am not working at it, or even trying, it’s just happening. This is my life now.

Will I be down another 35 pounds a year from now? I have no idea. I suppose if I keep living this way it could happen. Or it could plateau at some point where I would then need to consider more active measures to keep the trend going. The thing I actively did, however, was to finally break the vicious cycle of sedentary stress and make significant changes to my existence. That I am proud of. I consciously chose to change my environment and therefore my future, which I felt was heading for an early grave. I knew I needed to do it, and so I did. I was willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make it happen, and honestly, I continue to make them. So far, it has been worth it because the quality of my life is vastly better than it was. Not because I am less fat, but because I am less stressed and guilty. My world perspective is seen from my two feet at 2.5 mph and not from the driver’s seat at 70 mph, and the food I cook and eat is playing the all-important role I want it to in my life, as the origin of health and harbinger of joy.