I haven’t been home much this weekend. Errands, a lunch w/ friend, a new television machine (even though i haven’t watched television shows in years), running both Friday and Saturday and then dancing Saturday night.
So i was looking forward to having a nice, simple meal. Fish, crabcake, brocolli, silence. I guess i got as much of the latter as anyone can get around here and was enjoying the former.
I eventually went to bed.
Continue reading “hurt”
I have really, really missed dancing. After my world came apart at the seams in 1998, my fear of dancing vanished like the night when the sun rises. But i have other things to do first.
The week before last i ran a total of 10 miles; 2.5 miles every other day. This week i went a bit further. This is a snapshot of what i’ve done lately:
10 Jan (Th): 2.5 miles
11 Jan (Fr): 2.5 miles, dancing afterward
13 Jan (Su): 2.5 miles
15 Jan (Tu): 2.5 miles
18 Jan (Fr): 2.5 miles, 32 minutes
19 Jan (Sa): 3.0 miles (36 minutes), dancing afterward
I RAN THREE MILES LAST NIGHT. Three fucking miles. Thirty six minutes. The last two minutes i poured it on, bumping my speed up 10%. I could have kept going but i began to have spots in my vision. My top BPM was 164.
Continue reading “the infection and the temple”
Everyone knows about my love for Bill Evans. A few notes from him and my heart soars or sometimes plummets. Either direction and he can still drive me to tears. Your reaction may differ but there is so much beauty, pain and splendor in the first couple of minutes of this composition than most people achieve in their entire lives.
Just to remind myself, this is why i’m going to the gym so much these days:
In the time since i last wrote about this, i had finally hit my 30 minute mark. Since then, i’ve repeated that about three or four times. Last night was a bit different. Usually when i hit the 20 minute mark, i’m hurting but okay. At 25 minutes, i’m really questioning if i can make it to 30.
Last night i hit 25 minutes and i knew i’d be able to hit 30 “easy”. I put easy in quotes because it’s not easy. Fuck no. Not even close. I mean, i’m overweight and “running” for a half hour. No, it’s not easy. But last night was the difference between hitting 25 minutes and forcing myself to keep going and then last night, hitting 25 minutes and just going because i could.
I could and so i did. And i earned every fucking step i took.
So no, i’m not happy with what the scales have to say about me but i continue to eat fish and vegetables and have limited my intake of poultry/ beef/ pork to less than one pound a week (and usually less than half of that). I’m drinking almond milk these days instead of dairy milk, too. I have to say, someone showed me a resource for raw milk sellers and it turns out there may be two dairy farms in my area that are selling jersey made raw milk (grass diet), so i may try that for a bit just to see what i think of it. I’ll never give up my cheeses but if i can make a few small changes here and there, it adds up to much larger changes in the long run.
The long run. I guess that’s what this is about. Changes. Self image. Self respect. Dignity. Health.
There’s a lot on my mind these days. Recent discussions about some of my failings, an acknowledgement of my darker side- my “shadow” that someone deliberately provoked and brought out of me and how i move forward from here. I’ll be posting more later.
addendum: last night i had a meeting in Vancouver. Since it didn’t begin until 7, i decided to go to the gym instead. I really didn’t think too much of it but thought i’d go ahead and try to run. Normally i wouldn’t do this since my previous experiences have taught me that the ADP (is it ADP?) in my muscles isn’t recovered enough to run two days in a row. Guess what? I did it. Two nights in a row, 30 minutes each. In fact, last night was 32 minutes and the last minute of that was deliberately running faster. My heart rate peaked at 160 bpm which is great since the last time i pushed myself like that, it was 200. Three minutes after slowing down my bpm was at 130. Not bad. Not bad at all.
This isn’t even close to being one of my better works but i like that someone was able to get me to see how to draw my bees in a way other than straight-down.
The back story is this is a painting i made for a woman that i will probably never see again (unless i land a job in WA). It’s too bad because she has this beauty and brightness that i’m very drawn to and i’m sorry that i never got to talk to her nor get to know her as well as i wanted to. Sometimes i like doing nice things for people for no apparent reason because people have been nice to me and i like to pay it forward and because during this time in my life, i have a heightened sense of wanting to show someone that they’re appreciated.
I’ll post a better version of this later.
Shelly: good god. why are there still VGA ports on the newest IPS monitors????
me: why do chickens have nipples ? some things are just best left unquestioned, shelly.
Shelly: well yes, you do have a good point.
The principal of my school sent an e-mail with bad news. One of our teachers lost control of his truck on a patch of ice on IH-84. While he survived, his seven year old son did not. Since the teacher is the head coach for our baseball program, his son was a school mascot of sorts and would often be seen in tow with other teachers during teacher work days.
I have been told that his trucks velocity was such that it not only broke the barrier and careened down to the Columbia river, but that the truck was found at a depth of 40 feet. He was not driving recklessly, by the way. He was driving the same speed as everyone around him was.
For years, i’ve heard people up here say how well they drive on ice. STOP IT. You do not drive well on ice. You have been LUCKY while driving on ice and nothing more.
As heartbreaking as this is for everyone, my message today is simple: ICE KILLS.
I do not give a fuck as to how well you believe you can drive on ice. I do not care if you spent your childhood negotiating country roads in the winter or how many times you’ve been over the same slice of gently iced pavement. By its nature, ice changes the car or truck you’re driving into nothing but a projectile.
And if you believe it doesn’t matter, it matters to someone else. Someone out there cares about you- not to mention that we are each responsible for the safety of others when we drive.
