Victories May 9, 2011
Who has two thumbs and just ran around Jamaica Pond for the first time ever?
This girl!!
Who fought her way through a migrainey, med-hangovery miasma and not an insignificant amount of depression, discouragement, sadness, and even despair to get outside and run today? That’s right, it’s the aforementioned two-thumbed girl.
And who has fought her way through all that crap to go to the gym 100+ times since September, and run 64 miles since February? That’s right, it’s the girl above taking her picture with her elbow!
I think I am very brave.
What a beautiful day! We’re not scared. May 6, 2011
Gorgeous day in Boston today! Yesterday was my birthday, and it was a good one. Some highlights:
Z, the four year old I babysit for drew me a picture of a “birthday tornado storm,” with lots of wind, smoke and lightning. Love it.
I went with Z and his 15mo old brother, N, to the Boston Nature Center, where we saw lots of birds, including wild turkeys, hawks, robins, I think an osprey, and my favorite, red-winged blackbirds. They are so beautiful, with the flash of red against the shiny black. I took them as a personal birthday present. And just seeing the kids running around and loving the outdoors was wonderful.
Pushed myself at the gym for a new personal record: 2 mile run at 5mph. I started running in February, and it took me weeks to even run a mile at all; weeks more to run one at 5mph. Yesterday I did two!
And one of my favorite writers/bloggers, Glennon, posted a wonderful quote by Amma that made my day:
“The essence of motherhood is not restricted to women who have given birth; it is inherent in both men and women. It is an attitude of the mind. It is love, and love is the very breath of life.” Amma (not mine, the hugging saint of India)
We Are All Mothers.
Oh, and the title of this post is from one of Z and my favorite books, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury.
We’re going on a bear hunt
We’re going to catch a big one.
What a beautiful day!
We’re not scared.
Whenever I say to Z, “What a beautiful day!” He replies, “We’re not scared!” What a wonderful affirmation, don’t you think? Let’s go!
Running April 25, 2011
I’ve kind of been cheating lately, posting other people’s poems and quotes without even my own thoughts about them. So here are a few thoughts, quick, before I forget what they are.
Community is hard, but I will grudgingly say worth it. Right now is one of the hard times, but it is a different kind of hard than when there is disagreement or conflict. Right now is when we are all suffering because two of us are suffering. As a community we can be there for them in a way that neighbors or even a church family cannot: We are right here, sharing a backyard and kitchens, steps away if they need to talk. I am happy for that. But when I heard their bad news, it hurt me in a way that a neighbor’s news would not, that the news of most church-family members would not. The worth it part of community is that we can be there for them, and that they and others have been here for me when I needed it. The bad part is the pain. And the disagreement and conflict, and personality conflicts, etc. There is a good part to that, too. But that is another story.
I have not updated you on the sunset times lately, but I am trusting my (mostly imaginary) readers to have noticed that it is getting later and later. Here in Boston the sun set tonight at 7:37 p.m. The muscles in my shoulders that were tensed all winter to cope with the long dark evenings have relaxed.
News about my literary career: I wrote a haiku last month. Let’s see if that little poem can snowball into a productive year for 2011. By which I mean it would be nice to write a story or two again.
But my big news is that I have started running and, more significantly, continued running. It has been 13 years since I have run more than a mile, but I now regularly run 1.5, 2, or 2.5 on the treadmill. I want to transition to outdoor running, but it’s harder for me: It’s so much easier to stop running when all you have to do is, well, stop, than when the treadmill is moving steadily under you and to stop you have to a) make the decision to stop, b) press the down arrow about ten times to get to a walking pace, and c) stop running. Just that little extra effort gives me the time to decide that I am, after all, going to keep running, whereas if I’m outside I will stop before I think about it. Does that make any sense?
Anyway, I have been running for over two months now, and according to MapMyRun I have logged 50 miles! Yay me! I am posting this under Wrestling the Tigers because this is a great victory against the migraines, both in that exercise is good long-term for them (against them) and that I often am running with some kind of migraine or other, or get one after running, but I persevere. Take that, tigers!
