It was fitting, or so I thought, that as the previous year came strolling to the finish line, one of my social media friends posted a screenshot of the step-tracking app they had been using throughout 2023 to motivate themselves to walk more. It was fitting because it was one of those “walk along with the characters” apps, the kind that aligns your daily pedometer tally to that of a fictional character and through story encourages the user to keep pace.

The character, of course, was Frodo Baggins. The journey, of course, was the journey to the mountain where the Dark Lord’s ring (spoiler alert!) would be tossed into the fire from which it had been forged to unseat the evil that had been creeping over the land. This, according to the app, was a distance of a little less than three thousand kilometres, and one helluva fitness goal for the year.

On the eve of the new year, I would have been silly not to download it and attempt such a goal myself in 2024, right?

Just like a certain fictional hobbit, I do a lot of traveling on foot.

I run for fitness, yes, and I log many miles that as these posts continue in the coming months and years readers will almost certainly hear more about.

But I also walk a lot, too. Arguably I walk more than I run. More than arguably. Measurably. Quantitatively in both time and distance, in fact, I walk more than I run. I walk the dog. I walk to the library or cafe to write. I walk with a sketchbook and pen in my pocket. I walk the trails with my voice memo app open and ready to make notes about what I am going to write in the next scene when I’m back in front of my keyboard. Walking is not just keeping my body shipshape, but apparently good for the mind and soul, too.

And this year I am tracking it via a goal tied to the Lord of the Rings.

Kinda.

For reasons of copyright, the app does a lot of handwaving to avoid using (and thus selling) any direct references to the beautiful works of Tolkien. But this year, in 2024 I’ll certainly be chasing “Mr. Underhill” to the mountain of fire via a single-purpose piece of technology that tangles up my pulse-making efforts with that fictional world. And so yes, this all this seems very fitting—and right and fun, too—as I spend the year walking and thinking and working to build and create my own fictional trails.