Stand up or die: the new office gospel

I strolled into UNC Health Blue Ridge CEO Gary Paxson’s expansive office for an interview earlier last week expecting to find the head honcho sitting behind a huge, authoritative desk.

Nope.

He was standing.

At his desk.

While he worked.

Before I started firing fastballs about Medicare, Medicaid, and the oncoming collapse of Western Medicine, I had to lob a softball.

What’s with the desk?

“Healthy,” he replied. “Standing is better than sitting. A lot of discussion in the medical community about how sitting is the new smoking.”

Hmmm …

I knew that 70 is the new 50 … that Trump is the new Mussolini … and that Lake Rhodhiss is the new Catawba River, but I had to admit that sitting is the new smoking is a new one on me.

Wanting to know more, after arriving back at the newsroom I decided to do some hard research.

I immediately pulled up the internet site of WebMD, a pristine source of medical information which every business day convinces thousands of perfectly healthy people that they’ll be dead in a week.

I typed in the website’s search engine, “sitting is the new smoking.”

For some reason, the first article to pop up was “What is Smoking Fetish?”

The brief description of the article read, “Smoking fetish means a sexual interest in smoking. Learn more about smoking fetish and how it affects your sex life.”

Geeze Louise, I’m 70 years old. Books could be written (and in fact, they have been) about all the factors affecting an old man’s sex life, but in this instance, smoking is not one of them.

My probing research continued.

I found a slide show titled, “Why sitting too much is bad for your health.” OK. Now we’re making some solid progress.

Reason One: Not good for the heart. People who stand all day, like prison guards and barbers, have healthier hearts than people who slouch in front of a computer, like old editors and teenage computer game addicts.

Reason Two: It can shorten your life. Well duh … so can eating double cheeseburgers with bacon and chili or complaining to your bride about your declining sex life.

Reason Three: Dementia is more likely. If you sit too much, your brain could look just like that of someone with dementia. And, the columns you write could read just like those of someone with dementia.

Reason Four: If you don’t move it, you could lose it. Older adults (that would be me) who aren’t active may be more likely to get osteoporosis (weakened bones) and could slowly become unable to perform basic tasks of everyday life, like taking a bath (who takes baths?), using the toilet, or having sex with his bride. (Everyday?!?)

Reason Five: You’ll undo all that exercise. “The effects of too much sitting are hard to counter with exercise,” the website reports. “Even if you work out seven hours a week — far more than the recommended two to three hours — you can’t reverse the effects of sitting seven hours at a time.” Wowzer … so the two to three hours I work out each quarter are being undone by the 14 daily hours I waste sitting around.

The website slideshow goes on to list a number of other chilling physical effects that sitting on your duff for too long can bring, among them a rising risk of cancer, varicose veins, back pain, increasing anxiety, bad breath, and fleas.

But enough of this negativity. What can I do to save myself?

The website is succinct in its advice:

Work more movement into my day. Sneak over to my neighbor’s desk and steal her cookies. Walk down to Uncle Eees for a cheeseburger. Walk up to Icecream Sammies for a double sammich. Stand up, stretch, and touch my toes several times a day. (Touch my toes. Really?) And finally, my favorite:

Ask your boss for a desk with a built-in treadmill.

So, this is it, Mr. Publisher!

Come down off that ivory tower and provide me with a treadmill desk, an expensive one, in fact, or I walk!

Or I sit.

Or I do something.

Who knows what I’ll do?

Maybe I’ll just take up smoking.

That way the old can be new again.

I think.