This past week, I had several layers of joyful goodness. I had a full week off from work. I like my job, but still... a full week off. I got to spend much of it in Moab, which just happens to be one of my favorite places on earth thus far. In addition, my parents joined us in Moab, which was just fantastic. I was a silent, confused, confusing teenager and twenty-something, but boy oh boy has it been a joy to grow up into a fantastic adult relationship with my parents. Now, I get to experience the bliss of spending time with people I respect and admire, knowing all the while they respect me for me and think well of how I live my life. That is a great gift indeed. Add more layers of a couple of lovely and favorite Moab area hikes with my friend fellow, two zesty cold runs around downtown Moab (running on Thanksgiving day in the chilly sunshine... priceless), and excellent food (the apple pie was so-so, but the first effort at gluten free gravy was a rock star), and an opportunity to visit the site of my future home and meet my future neighbors (whew! they're cool). Thanksgiving, indeed.
Sweet moment - ordering stuffed baked potatoes for lunch with my mom; a tasty gluten free choice on the menu. A nice comment on health, and feeling better at last!, for us both.
Yesterday, I did spend about 8 full hours cleaning my house. This was not such a joyful goodness. But, that said, the house looks darn good now, so the efforts were fruitful. Even my garage floor is clean.
Now, after a chilly lunchtime run and a futile attempt to warm up with a cup of tea, it's time to look forward to hunkering down on the couch with a cozy blanket, good companionship, two adored cats, and Mrs. Brown (thanks, netflix).
Monday, November 29, 2010
Monday, November 22, 2010
Running in the snow and baking power bars
Today, it was snowing. Not enough to be terribly inconvenient, causing multiple accidents on the main roads and forcing me to shovel and curse as I hurl snow off the driveway. Actually, just enough to be a bit pretty out and to cause the neighbor dog to frolic like a nut. Snow frolicking dogs equals a smile on my face.
I did go for my first run post-couch to 5k today. Wiped snow from my eyelashes on occasion, and kept reminding myself to trust my feet (eek! ice!). Overall, it was actually pretty fun if I let myself feel that. Today's "keep running" mantras included, "what's my border collie's name?" See, as part of the next phase of life we will be adding a dog to our family. It will be a Border Collie from a rescue - I'm somewhat a Jack Russel person but my life really isn't. Border Collies are high on my list. So, knowing that my BC will be running with me sometime in the future is keeping my feet moving forward some days.
And of course, since we have decided that we really want a red and white male border collie (pardon the switcheroo capitalization throughout, I like the familiarity of small letters), my old coworker sent me an email today of a lovely black and white female they have up for adoption. Wrong gender, wrong time, we're going to put our house on the market and we have two cats in residence already, etc., etc. But is she cute as pie? Of course she is.
Thank goodness for animals. Small statement to sum up so many things in my life. But, thank goodness for animals.
And power bars - home-made, gluten free power bars which will hopefully propel me through my hikes in Moab later this week and will power my friend through her first mornings back at a previous job. It has been many years since I've cooked quinoa, and the smell of the simmering milk and vanilla and quinoa on the stove made me think that I need to try it for breakfast again sometime soon.
Oh, and I ate a decent lunch today. Hurrah. Small steps.
I did go for my first run post-couch to 5k today. Wiped snow from my eyelashes on occasion, and kept reminding myself to trust my feet (eek! ice!). Overall, it was actually pretty fun if I let myself feel that. Today's "keep running" mantras included, "what's my border collie's name?" See, as part of the next phase of life we will be adding a dog to our family. It will be a Border Collie from a rescue - I'm somewhat a Jack Russel person but my life really isn't. Border Collies are high on my list. So, knowing that my BC will be running with me sometime in the future is keeping my feet moving forward some days.
And of course, since we have decided that we really want a red and white male border collie (pardon the switcheroo capitalization throughout, I like the familiarity of small letters), my old coworker sent me an email today of a lovely black and white female they have up for adoption. Wrong gender, wrong time, we're going to put our house on the market and we have two cats in residence already, etc., etc. But is she cute as pie? Of course she is.
Thank goodness for animals. Small statement to sum up so many things in my life. But, thank goodness for animals.
And power bars - home-made, gluten free power bars which will hopefully propel me through my hikes in Moab later this week and will power my friend through her first mornings back at a previous job. It has been many years since I've cooked quinoa, and the smell of the simmering milk and vanilla and quinoa on the stove made me think that I need to try it for breakfast again sometime soon.
Oh, and I ate a decent lunch today. Hurrah. Small steps.
Friday, November 19, 2010
not quite couch but close enough, to not quite 5k but close enough
Today I completed Week 9, Day 3 of the Couch 2 5k Program. For those to whom this sounds like gibberish, this is a nifty interval training program designed to get one from "the couch," as in not fit and essentially at potato status, to running 5k (a bit over 3 miles) over 9 weeks. Three days a week, with the longest day start to stop 40 minutes. Thanks to the efforts of lots of folks, one can find free bits of music to stick on the ipod, complete with a computer voice telling you that you're doing well and that it's time to run now.
Here is what I have decided about running: It is hard. But, I am capable of doing it for sustained periods of time. In this case, 30 minutes straight. We'll see where it goes from here. Also, while I am sure many people think it's the bees knees while they are actually running - I do not. I power through, use mantras, play the music louder, issue commands to myself that I am making it happen... that sort of thing. But then I feel really good about 50 yards after I start walking at the end, and catch my breath.
But here is the sublimely cool thing about running. I can do it. International shoe companies who exploit foreign work forces' marketing slogans aside, I can actually do this. I worked through this little program, week by week, self-consciously chugging along the bike path that leads to nowhere (yes, we really have a bike path in the town of my employ which starts at a cross street and then dead-ends under a bridge) and here I am, capable of running a half hour.
The goal now is more - specifically, next December (as in 2011, yes) I want to run in the Winter Sun 10k in Moab. I pointed at the sign and said, I am going to do that. So, I am going to do that.
What else can I do? Nine weeks, I did this. I feel great, physically, from it. My pants fit better, and I am not above feeling smiley about that.
If you can change this ("I'm not a runner") then you can change that. Time to tackle the thats.
Here is what I have decided about running: It is hard. But, I am capable of doing it for sustained periods of time. In this case, 30 minutes straight. We'll see where it goes from here. Also, while I am sure many people think it's the bees knees while they are actually running - I do not. I power through, use mantras, play the music louder, issue commands to myself that I am making it happen... that sort of thing. But then I feel really good about 50 yards after I start walking at the end, and catch my breath.
But here is the sublimely cool thing about running. I can do it. International shoe companies who exploit foreign work forces' marketing slogans aside, I can actually do this. I worked through this little program, week by week, self-consciously chugging along the bike path that leads to nowhere (yes, we really have a bike path in the town of my employ which starts at a cross street and then dead-ends under a bridge) and here I am, capable of running a half hour.
The goal now is more - specifically, next December (as in 2011, yes) I want to run in the Winter Sun 10k in Moab. I pointed at the sign and said, I am going to do that. So, I am going to do that.
What else can I do? Nine weeks, I did this. I feel great, physically, from it. My pants fit better, and I am not above feeling smiley about that.
If you can change this ("I'm not a runner") then you can change that. Time to tackle the thats.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Enjoy... Slow down
What do you do after you meet Gluten Free Girl and the Chef? You go home, you make your great-great-grandmother's gingerbread gluten free for the first time ever (next batch: more molasses, more teff flour), and you start a blog. Logical, yes?
In my eighth grade yearbook, on the page where we listed what we wanted to do someday, I said, "write a novel." Twenty-three odd years later, not too surprising, I have not accomplished this.
But I did used to write. It fired me, it fed me, and it made me feel like my presence mattered. It was a way to make sense of the world and myself and to find some clarity when all seemed mud.
For some reason, when I moved westward I left my spark behind. I left my pen to paper, my finger to keyboard, behind. I abandoned much of myself over these many years here in the west. Now, on the verge of making a significant commitment to living "in the West" it feels time to be ME in every way.
One powerful thing I have begun to discover about myself and my world is that yes everything can change. I was unhealthy and often in pain - I made the change to decide that this was not tolerable, sought help, found out I have Celiac disease, changed my diet and changed my life entirely. I feel good for the first time in a decade. I decided that I was tired of feeling broken - sad, depressed, resigned to life being bad. With help I changed the way my mind accepts my life; it understands now as do I that this is not really living life. Time to change perspective, attitude, outlook, and energy. I felt lost and hollow without horses in my life. By embracing change and saying, this is not how my life will continue, this way of depriving myself of my greatest job in life has been whacked out of its rut and it will not go back.
These are small things. Change is small. That is the biggest discovery, I think. Changing your life happens by changing what you have to drink at breakfast. It is tiny steps along the way that feel better, feel more authentic, feel more "me" and right.
We'll see where this goes. This post is hardly the standard of writing I aspire to - but it's also the first thing I've written other than a note to friends in almost a decade, so I'll let it stand as the honest first, scared effort at 10pm after Shauna told me to write. Thanks for that - I will.
In my eighth grade yearbook, on the page where we listed what we wanted to do someday, I said, "write a novel." Twenty-three odd years later, not too surprising, I have not accomplished this.
But I did used to write. It fired me, it fed me, and it made me feel like my presence mattered. It was a way to make sense of the world and myself and to find some clarity when all seemed mud.
For some reason, when I moved westward I left my spark behind. I left my pen to paper, my finger to keyboard, behind. I abandoned much of myself over these many years here in the west. Now, on the verge of making a significant commitment to living "in the West" it feels time to be ME in every way.
One powerful thing I have begun to discover about myself and my world is that yes everything can change. I was unhealthy and often in pain - I made the change to decide that this was not tolerable, sought help, found out I have Celiac disease, changed my diet and changed my life entirely. I feel good for the first time in a decade. I decided that I was tired of feeling broken - sad, depressed, resigned to life being bad. With help I changed the way my mind accepts my life; it understands now as do I that this is not really living life. Time to change perspective, attitude, outlook, and energy. I felt lost and hollow without horses in my life. By embracing change and saying, this is not how my life will continue, this way of depriving myself of my greatest job in life has been whacked out of its rut and it will not go back.
These are small things. Change is small. That is the biggest discovery, I think. Changing your life happens by changing what you have to drink at breakfast. It is tiny steps along the way that feel better, feel more authentic, feel more "me" and right.
We'll see where this goes. This post is hardly the standard of writing I aspire to - but it's also the first thing I've written other than a note to friends in almost a decade, so I'll let it stand as the honest first, scared effort at 10pm after Shauna told me to write. Thanks for that - I will.
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