We’ve been making an effort to drive less lately. As it is, I go through less than a tank of gas every other week–I simply don’t go anywhere outside of a 10- or 15- block radius of our home more than once a week or so, and even then we’re usually talking a 10-15 minute drive, max. So the sky-high gas prices aren’t pinching us too much yet.

But since you never know what could happen ($10/gallon gas? Sudden complete breakdown of the family minivan with no room in the budget for a new one? Both entirely possible) driving less seems like a good thing to get used to. And that means tweaking my own personal definition of “within walking distance”. When we moved here, I mentally wrote off the train, grocery store and many restaurants (besides the strip on Devon Ave, which is fantastic if you’re in the mood for Indian, Pakistani, or other South Asian food, but doesn’t really seem like the place to find a club sandwich or croissant) as “too far to walk”. Many of those things were ten or twenty blocks away, which just seemed really…far.

But then I took a few minutes to Google-map the distances, and learned that Target and Jewel are exactly one mile away, while the Metra is 1.3 miles. Should I need to get somewhere not on the Metra line, the EL station is just .5 miles further, or 1.8 miles total. Not a hop, skip, and a jump, but about a 35-40 minute walk…not torture. Especially considering that it doubles as exercise.

So lately I’ve been walking a lot more. To the Metra when I need to get up to Evanston (it’s a 5-minute ride); to Target, to the grocery store. Jon and I went out to dinner last week, and we walked 1.4 miles each way to this fantastic Mexican restaurant on Clark street–with a cheap bottle of BYOB wine and $7 entrees, it was a cheap night–and as we chatted while we walked on a beautiful early-summer evening, it didn’t seem like a long walk at all.

I’m finding myself stretching my idea of walkable distances further and further as I think of places outside of the radius I’ve become comfortable with, and realize that driving is often more of a hassle than a convenience. After all, it would probably take me about 7-10 minutes to drive to the same places I can walk in 20-25, but I have to find a place to park, watch out for pedestrians, and feel the da-DUMP of a hundred speed bumps. Where else can I get on foot? To the beach? Exactly 2.0 miles–easy. To the yoga studio? “Only” 3 miles. What about the indie bookstore? Just 3.7!

The biggest obstacle right now is that my kids are all relatively young. I love a weekly or so outing sans kids, but on the whole, it’s not really practical or desirable for me to spend hours away from them running errands. And two of them still have to be carted around at least some of the time on longer trips after their little legs give out, and pushing two kids in a stroller can make a nice stroll downright exhausting. The bus ceases to be a cheap option when you take four kids on it with you, and it’s not exactly quick, either.

Maybe when all the kids are big enough that taking two hours away from them just to get to and from where I’m going isn’t a huge issue, I’ll walk, train, or bus it everywhere I go. For now, I’m just doing what I can and doing my best to toughen up. For instance, today I walked the two-mile round trip to Target and Jewel for groceries and a few odds and ends. My double stroller is fabulous, but when I’ve got both the little guys loaded in there, the thing easily weighs 75 lbs. And before I left, I forgot to factor in that adding:

a gallon of milk
a 16-oz container of yogurt
a 10-oz container of sour cream
two bags of dense granola
Applesauce
And various bags ‘o carbs

would mean I’d be pushing 100 pounds for a mile. As we left the store in the 2:30 sun and I struggled to steer the stroller, stopping every few minutes to refill Owen’s pretzel ‘tup’ and take a swig of water, I cursed my silly notion, but after a few blocks we steered onto a shady street, a breeze picked up, and I got into a groove. Twenty-five minutes later I was home: sweaty, but triumphant, and I think I may even have beefed up my triceps a bit. Sure, what might have been a quick run to the store took about an hour more time and a lot more effort. But hey, my pants have been fitting a little tight lately, and I’d rather walk to the store than hit the gym.

Going by this calorie burn calculator, I probably walked off 250 or so calories today, and I figure that earns me an extra glass of wine with dinner tonight. And if that’s not an incentive to hoof it, I don’t know what is.