First Person: My Father, the Fitness Fanatic – Rhode Island Monthly

My father was a fitness nut before skim milk, probiotics and planks were hip. Although he had both of his children in his forties, I never once thought of him as an older dad. He exuded youth: petite yet muscular, agile and — as he used to brag to my mom — “solid as a rock.” 

Photography courtesy of Karen Carlo Ruhren.

Though I can never fill his sneakers, I credit Dad for instilling a love of fitness in me. We were similar in stature and I was always inspired by Dad’s love of movement. I took up ballet in my forties and, with Dad’s never-say-never attitude, became a certified fitness instructor at fifty-five. 

“You like teaching those ladies exercise,” he mused. “That’s good for you!”

Dad’s energetic lifestyle was rooted in his Depression-era childhood. He learned from necessity how to scrape together nutritious snacks for his two-mile walk to school each day: bananas, dark chocolate, orange juice and peanuts sustained him. 

After school, he walked miles to sell The Saturday Evening Post before returning to his father’s shoeshine/magazine stand. There, he met celebrities and athletes who made appearances in nearby New York City. Olympic swimming superstar Johnny Weissmuller encouraged my father to strength train and learn to swim at the YMCA. Dad learned that a strong body could compensate for a small stature, and he was soon winning medals of his own at the neighborhood’s track and field exhibition.

By the time he was drafted into the Army in 1943, Dad knew which foods fueled him. He cleverly bartered with his buddies, trading GI-issue cigarettes for canned peaches, which kept him hydrated on twenty-mile hikes during basic training in Alabama. “I grew two inches and gained twenty pounds of muscle,” he recalled. 

Photography courtesy of Karen Carlo Ruhren.

After D-Day and five major campaigns in Europe, Dad thanked God for keeping him alive and the U.S. government for building up his body. He took neither one for granted. He started to box (featherweight) and got a job grooming courts at the Tremont Tennis Club in Orange, New Jersey, where he taught himself to play the sport.

Dad’s fast footwork and quick reflexes were natural assets. He eventually got good enough to warm up the ranked players that came to Tremont on their way to larger tournaments. Dad rallied with the sport’s first Grand Slam champion, Don Budge, as well as Althea Gibson, one of the country’s first Black professional tennis players. I’m fairly sure they were charmed by Dad’s unorthodox style and passion for a game he had mastered by sheer observation and practice. 

After his second round of military service as a combat medic in Korea, Dad returned to the U.S. even more grateful. He finished his tour of duty aboard military transport ships. While shipmates lounged, he was below deck punching a speed bag and jumping rope. When others overindulged in heavy foods, Dad found his new favorite breakfast: oatmeal and wheat germ. 

Photography courtesy of Karen Carlo Ruhren.

By the time he married my mom in 1954, Dad realized that one simple word — movement — was at the core of everyone’s health journey. However, Mom — a pragmatist with a fabulous sense of humor — said her idea of exercise was climbing the stairs 100 times a day to do the laundry. This did not dissuade Dad from trying to learn all he could about newfound terms like “cholesterol” and “fat-free,” which quickly became a sore spot in the household. “If you try one more time to take the yolk out of that egg, I’m going to break it over your head!” Mom threatened.

By the time I came along, it was evident that Dad’s devotion to a healthy lifestyle kept him young. One afternoon, while I was walking with him in town, a neighborhood girl thought he was my older brother. He got mileage out of that anecdote for the next fifty years.

From a physical-fitness perspective, there was nothing Dad couldn’t accomplish. Deep knee bends, 100 sit-ups and isometrics were morning rituals. “Dynamic tension!” he’d explain. Trees that needed trimming were scaled in record time — with a saw in one hand. Backyard badminton was played at a supersonic pace. Shopping trips often ended with a few quick laps around the parking lot to “limber up” before driving home. And at summer barbecues, Dad would swim the length of my cousin’s in-ground pool underwater — no breathing! 

Photography courtesy of Karen Carlo Ruhren.

In 1976, maybe after the hype of Wimbledon champion Chris Evert, or the practicality of the newly installed courts in our neighborhood, Dad taught me how to play tennis. He chose a beastly hot day yet was undaunted by the summer sun. “An excuse to wear his white tennis shorts and short-sleeve shirts that show off his biceps,” Mom said with a wink. 

For hours, we toiled on the asphalt. Armed with my Billie Jean King wooden racquet, I was aced, run ragged and loved every minute. I joined the high school team, and Dad even organized some team practices. I was far from a champion. But like my father, I made personal victories. 

We played tennis until he was ninety-five, and in turn, I taught my younger daughter the game. My family has beautiful memories of tennis with Granddaddy.

When Dad retired, he took up oil painting — a creative outlet, but never a substitute for movement. After Mom died, the park became his home away from home. Those little legs that trekked miles to school and many more miles in the infantry still served him well, walking laps at an impressive pace. He’d play tennis with anyone who would hit with him and when he couldn’t find a partner, he’d serve alone … only to walk to the other side of the net, gather his tennis balls and start all over again.

Photography courtesy of Karen Carlo Ruhren.

This faithful fitness continued into Dad’s nineties. As balance issues became problematic and COVID-19 shut down our world, Dad was forced to stay home. That didn’t stop him from exercising. He walked around the backyard. He raked leaves. He washed his car even when it was clean. He practiced tai chi. “If it works for Dick Van Dyke, it’ll work for me,” he teased. When colon cancer set him back for only one week as he recovered from surgery, I watched him dance slowly in his living room to the music of Enya. He was almost ninety-six. 

In his last year of life — at ninety-eight, with legs swollen from heart failure — he would not surrender to a sedentary lifestyle. He stood strongly, held the back of a chair and walked in place. “One-hundred steps,” he counted. Ever faithful to fitness, this man was invincible … and never stopped moving. 

_____________________________

Karen Carlo Ruhren, of South Kingstown, is a journalism, public relations and business writing instructor at the University of Rhode Island. She dedicates this essay to her father, Emanuel Carlo, who would have been 100 years old on Dec. 14, 2024.