My husband buys lottery tickets. There I said it. He does every few weeks when the lottery hits some obscene amount like 200 million he runs off to the gas station on the corner and buys two or three tickets and comes home holding them like the Golden Ticket that will lead him to all the chocolate he can eat. Or in his case to all the fishing one man can do in a lifetime. A ticket that will allow him to trade in his khaki's and computer for waders and bait and call the run of the fish instead the run of insurance rates. We haggle for about 24 hours about what we would do with that much money. Buy a bigger house? Smaller house? More land ? Less land? It's fun for 24 hours and then the next morning he checks his tickets and sadly pulls on his khakis.
Last week our washing machine kicked the bucket. It took me over seven hours to realize that the machine was not indeed working and the smelly things I was trying desperately to wash were not coming clean. The water wouldn't drain. I called my husband who vowed to "have a look" when he got home. When he got home that night he dropped our four year old on my nose which bled heavily and we somehow lost track of him "taking a look" at anything. It was two more days before he had time and after a good hour of "looking" at it we realized we needed professional help, which wouldn't be the first time. That was Saturday. On Sunday evening I had to wash a couple things in the sink and I won't mention what but some things just had to be cleaned. Today I had the dilemma of what to do with all the laundry that was piling up. I called my sister in law who was happy to lend me her machine so I collected two loads and went out the door, stopping at my friend's house who also volunteered her machines. When I got to her house she offered to just do both loads for me, unmentionables and all, while I hit the grocery store ( it would seem we were also out of anything edible in our house as well). I think my pupils might have magnified to ten times their normal size. All I could ask was "Really?" And she said yes. So I left my laundry and peeled out of her driveway before she could rethink her offer. When I called my sister in law to explain she wouldn't be seeing me she was incredulous that I had a friend who was actually doing my laundry. She said," Now if you could just get someone to clean your house!"
She's right of course. A mom's life would be much easier if we could delegate tasks we hated or chores that take too much time away from things we would really enjoy doing. This morning as I ran past another girlfriends house I thought about what a great friend she is as well. She helped us with our kids a couple weekends ago. My husband and I had a chance to go to Boston for the day with friends and in order to do this we needed our three kids cared for. So two friends who were available worked it out and took our three kids. One of them had our three plus her own three for nearly four hours. It occurred to me this morning, and it is not the first time but it started to sink slowly into each small fiber of my muscles that I am surrounded by fabulous people. That I have somehow managed to create a circle of friends who are giving and gracious and have given me a village of my own.
I have friends who will do my laundry and care for my children. I have friends who I can call when I need to cry and when I need to laugh. I have friends who check up on me and some who keep me in check. Those who cheer me on and cheer me up. Those who know I need more sleep than the average person and those who try to keep me awake so I won't miss the fun. I have friends who run with me, walk with me or just sit on the porch and have a drink. I have friends who inspire me to be frugal and some who inspire me to splurge. I have friends who run through screen doors and some who are more graceful. I have friends who call for advice and some who show up just in the nick of time. I have book reading friends and "Twilight" loving friends. I have friends who love me for my attributes as well as my faults, but are kind enough not to tally them up.
My girlfriend, who watched my kids that Saturday, when I tried thanking her simply said,"We're a village." Amen to that. My husband can keep buying lottery tickets. As far as I can tell we've already won.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Monday, June 7, 2010
The Sweet Smell of Summer
This morning I ran past a large honeysuckle bush and I hit it just as a slight breeze kicked up and the sweet smell form that bush made me want to stop and pull a couple flowers and suck on their stems. Which I suppose could have gotten me into trouble or at least some very strange looks from the few commuters heading off to work.
It is something about the smells around me that keep my mind in a constant state of nostalgia. The honeysuckle bush this morning sent my mind back about 25-30 years and our summers spent at the beach. It was a nice area. My mom could let me go off and ride my bike around the point and go to the playground. I spent warm days playing in the sand and taking boat rides with my dad. One summer we rented a small red cottage. It had linoleum floors throughout, which even to a seven year old it was not exactly "cozy". It had a screened porch that was off the kitchen and overlooked the backyard. There was another row of houses in front of that screened porch but beyond that was the beach. We had a sliver of a view from our yard. The yard also had huge boulders that were surrounded by honeysuckle bushes. My friend, Emily and I used to sit on those rocks and pluck the honeysuckle flowers and suck the juice right out of them. Those rocks were awesome you could leap from one to the other. When we came back from the beach I could warm myself on them like I was some kind of lizard instead of a tow headed, gangly kid.
The beach that was across the street was called East beach. It had lots of rocks but it had a dock you could jump and dive off of. I loved that dock. We would play match stick. Someone would throw a small matchstick into the water then jump on it and splash around like a drowning person hoping to make enough foam to keep the matchstick hidden. A group of kids would stand on the dock, eyes on the prize and then a scramble would happen as the matchstick was spotted. Over and over and over again we played. One evening my dad took me to the dock for a night swim. I remember he had a on pants and a windbreaker. I had on a bathing suit and blue lips. As a mom now I can just imagine that was something my father probably wasn't hopped up to do. I may have been relentless in my pursuit for the ultimate night swim and he may have just caved in. I don't remember. I do remember that swim and jumping into the dark water and swimming as fast as I could back to the dock before Jaws surfaced. It was thrilling.
I remember the group of women who would sit near us on Main Beach. One woman had an arm full of silver bangle bracelets. She was probably in her seventies then. She just looked ancient to me. She was crispy from all her sun exposure but there she was every day, sitting in her chair book on her lap, bangles glistening in the bright summer sun.
I remember our plaid cooler filled with grapes and peaches and sandwiches on rye bread with mustard. I remember my dad's sandals as we rode on the bike to the beach. They had a hard sole and made a solid plunk along the pavement, followed by the scrape of beach sand. I remember the brown bike with the rickety seat on the back and how I swayed to and fro as we rode around the point. I remember the six o'clock whistle that came from the fire station every night as we sat on the beach enjoying the best part of the day.
I remember playing War with two decks of cards with my mother and I remember the view of Kiddy Beach from our Burrows Street cottage. I remember the painting of the salmon struggling upstream and how lonely it made me feel. I remember outdoor showers and corn on the cob and rides on the carousel at Watch Hill and the thrill of catching the golden ring and winning a free ride.
All this I remember from the smell of that honeysuckle bush. Now if it could just help me remember where I left my keys....
It is something about the smells around me that keep my mind in a constant state of nostalgia. The honeysuckle bush this morning sent my mind back about 25-30 years and our summers spent at the beach. It was a nice area. My mom could let me go off and ride my bike around the point and go to the playground. I spent warm days playing in the sand and taking boat rides with my dad. One summer we rented a small red cottage. It had linoleum floors throughout, which even to a seven year old it was not exactly "cozy". It had a screened porch that was off the kitchen and overlooked the backyard. There was another row of houses in front of that screened porch but beyond that was the beach. We had a sliver of a view from our yard. The yard also had huge boulders that were surrounded by honeysuckle bushes. My friend, Emily and I used to sit on those rocks and pluck the honeysuckle flowers and suck the juice right out of them. Those rocks were awesome you could leap from one to the other. When we came back from the beach I could warm myself on them like I was some kind of lizard instead of a tow headed, gangly kid.
The beach that was across the street was called East beach. It had lots of rocks but it had a dock you could jump and dive off of. I loved that dock. We would play match stick. Someone would throw a small matchstick into the water then jump on it and splash around like a drowning person hoping to make enough foam to keep the matchstick hidden. A group of kids would stand on the dock, eyes on the prize and then a scramble would happen as the matchstick was spotted. Over and over and over again we played. One evening my dad took me to the dock for a night swim. I remember he had a on pants and a windbreaker. I had on a bathing suit and blue lips. As a mom now I can just imagine that was something my father probably wasn't hopped up to do. I may have been relentless in my pursuit for the ultimate night swim and he may have just caved in. I don't remember. I do remember that swim and jumping into the dark water and swimming as fast as I could back to the dock before Jaws surfaced. It was thrilling.
I remember the group of women who would sit near us on Main Beach. One woman had an arm full of silver bangle bracelets. She was probably in her seventies then. She just looked ancient to me. She was crispy from all her sun exposure but there she was every day, sitting in her chair book on her lap, bangles glistening in the bright summer sun.
I remember our plaid cooler filled with grapes and peaches and sandwiches on rye bread with mustard. I remember my dad's sandals as we rode on the bike to the beach. They had a hard sole and made a solid plunk along the pavement, followed by the scrape of beach sand. I remember the brown bike with the rickety seat on the back and how I swayed to and fro as we rode around the point. I remember the six o'clock whistle that came from the fire station every night as we sat on the beach enjoying the best part of the day.
I remember playing War with two decks of cards with my mother and I remember the view of Kiddy Beach from our Burrows Street cottage. I remember the painting of the salmon struggling upstream and how lonely it made me feel. I remember outdoor showers and corn on the cob and rides on the carousel at Watch Hill and the thrill of catching the golden ring and winning a free ride.
All this I remember from the smell of that honeysuckle bush. Now if it could just help me remember where I left my keys....
Friday, June 4, 2010
I'll Take the Desk Job
Somewhere I have a Polaroid of me on a Christmas morning all dressed up in my American Red Cross nurses uniform. It was a white dress with small red crosses on each lapel. It had a white nurses cap and a blue cape. I loved that cape. It made me feel like Florence Nightingale. My mother was a nurse and had , at one time, worn a very similar outfit, minus the cape. She might have been jealous of that beautiful cape to tell the truth. But she did have the starched collars and the cap.
My mom graduated from a hospital school of nursing program in 1956. Her yearbook is fabulous. We would sit and thumb through it together. That was the time when bed pans were made of stainless steel and intravenous bottles were made of glass. She would always point out the picture of her and a colleague standing with her favorite doctor. She had quite the crush but it happens to the best of us. But the best of us get smart and move on. Really it was all very romantic to me.
My mother loved being a nurse. It was her passion. She was organized and smart, a bit of no-nonsense and compassionate. The perfect blend for a nurse. She landed her dream job in the emergency room not too long after graduating. She worked the evening shift with a resident ( MD in training) and an LPN or aide. Yes I said emergency room with a staff of three. But remember this was over 40 years ago. She had quite a few stories from those days but the two I remember the most, due to gore factor , was the one about the farmer and the one about the "meat cleaver guy". The farmer was from Berlin and he had been gouged in the eye by one of his bulls. My mother left no detail unturned but I will spare you, plus I am not writing on a full stomach. The other poor soul was a man from a New Britain meat packing company whose arm had gotten caught in the meat cleaver and they had to bring him in meat cleaver and all. She would tell these stories with a twinkle in her eye and really if you didn't know her well you might have wanted to move a step or two away.
I was admitted to a nursing program myself in 1990. I am not sure what possessed me. I think it was all the romance of those photos and the starched white uniforms, whatever it was it was soon evident that in this arena it was safe to say I was not my mother's daughter.
First semester in and I am wandering a hospital unit, looking for the charts to read up on the patient I would care for that morning. My clinical instructor grabbed me. She had a familiar twinkle in her eye as she told me about a "debridement of an decubitus ucler." Honestly just the sentence ran a slight tingle down the backs of my knees. She pointed me to room and gave a gentle push. Reluctantly I entered the room and found two doctors standing on either side of an elderly man's bed. The man was swearing up a storm and who could blame him. He was positioned on his side with his bottom out for all the world to see. His ulcer was indeed not a pretty site and one of the doctor's had already begun the process of debriding. Within seconds he hit a nice vascular spot and I hit the floor. Well, I didn't hit the floor since someone caught me half way down.
When I retold this story to my mother later that night she laughed. I am thinking ,though, that this worried her. I imagine the conversation between my parents that night as they got ready for bed:
Mom: "Really what are we going to do with her? She can't take a little blood?"
Dad: "She'll be fine. Maybe she'll get a desk job."
Another year in and on a weekday morning, as I turned my hair dryer off I could hear my mother yelling for me. It wasn't her usual calm,"hey the phone is for you" kind of call but a bit of panic laced her voice so I ran out to our small living room to find my mother on the carpet , face down. Her highly sensitive control on her wheelchair had gotten caught on her sleeve and her foot had gotten caught behind the small front wheel , sending her in catapult fashion out of her chair and onto the floor. Blood was coming from above her eyes. I started running in circles, complete taken over by panic. Really when I saw the blood I didn't know where to start or what to do. Very calmly from the floor where half of her face was obscured by carpet my mother told me to get a towel because the blood was going to ruin her carpet. When I got to the drawer in the kitchen she heard the drawer open and yelled,"From the rag basket!" So I ran down the hall to the rag basket. Only my mother would be more worried about what towel I was using then how much blood was coming out of her head. Once the blood was contained and her foot released and her face no longer kissing the carpet our next dilemma was to get her up off the floor. Me lifting her was not an option since she was about 5'10" and I was about 5'2" and 100 pounds after a bath. Calling for an ambulance would cause too much curiosity in the neighborhood so our other option was to check on our neighbors down the street. A house full of men. A dad and his four sons. And just my luck the oldest was home. When I told him what happened he was out his door and had my mother back in her chair before I could even catch up to him. He picked her up like a normal person would pick a penny off the ground. I loved those guys After thanking our neighbor we headed to the emergency room since the bleeding would not stop. On the way home, after watching me turn green and nearly passing out in the ER watching the resident stitch my mother up, my mom gave me some advice about avoiding ER nursing.
Many years into it now and I have some of my own stories. The elderly woman in Maryland who I found sitting covered in black vomit and I all but called a code until her many children explained to me it was just her "chew". She had missed her "spit cup". She had given me a toothless smile as if forgiving me for being such a Yankee. And the man in South Carolina who ran naked from room to room yelling about white horses chasing him. My stories aren't too gorey and I have always been honest in telling people I do not care for blood and body fluids, mine or anyone else's. My mother found my aversion amusing and liked to compare her ER days with my calm days as a school nurse. No comparison really. But we both managed to find that place in a crazy profession where we felt needed and content. And my mother being the person she was was happy when her daughters were happy, even if meant having a nice desk job.
My mom graduated from a hospital school of nursing program in 1956. Her yearbook is fabulous. We would sit and thumb through it together. That was the time when bed pans were made of stainless steel and intravenous bottles were made of glass. She would always point out the picture of her and a colleague standing with her favorite doctor. She had quite the crush but it happens to the best of us. But the best of us get smart and move on. Really it was all very romantic to me.
My mother loved being a nurse. It was her passion. She was organized and smart, a bit of no-nonsense and compassionate. The perfect blend for a nurse. She landed her dream job in the emergency room not too long after graduating. She worked the evening shift with a resident ( MD in training) and an LPN or aide. Yes I said emergency room with a staff of three. But remember this was over 40 years ago. She had quite a few stories from those days but the two I remember the most, due to gore factor , was the one about the farmer and the one about the "meat cleaver guy". The farmer was from Berlin and he had been gouged in the eye by one of his bulls. My mother left no detail unturned but I will spare you, plus I am not writing on a full stomach. The other poor soul was a man from a New Britain meat packing company whose arm had gotten caught in the meat cleaver and they had to bring him in meat cleaver and all. She would tell these stories with a twinkle in her eye and really if you didn't know her well you might have wanted to move a step or two away.
I was admitted to a nursing program myself in 1990. I am not sure what possessed me. I think it was all the romance of those photos and the starched white uniforms, whatever it was it was soon evident that in this arena it was safe to say I was not my mother's daughter.
First semester in and I am wandering a hospital unit, looking for the charts to read up on the patient I would care for that morning. My clinical instructor grabbed me. She had a familiar twinkle in her eye as she told me about a "debridement of an decubitus ucler." Honestly just the sentence ran a slight tingle down the backs of my knees. She pointed me to room and gave a gentle push. Reluctantly I entered the room and found two doctors standing on either side of an elderly man's bed. The man was swearing up a storm and who could blame him. He was positioned on his side with his bottom out for all the world to see. His ulcer was indeed not a pretty site and one of the doctor's had already begun the process of debriding. Within seconds he hit a nice vascular spot and I hit the floor. Well, I didn't hit the floor since someone caught me half way down.
When I retold this story to my mother later that night she laughed. I am thinking ,though, that this worried her. I imagine the conversation between my parents that night as they got ready for bed:
Mom: "Really what are we going to do with her? She can't take a little blood?"
Dad: "She'll be fine. Maybe she'll get a desk job."
Another year in and on a weekday morning, as I turned my hair dryer off I could hear my mother yelling for me. It wasn't her usual calm,"hey the phone is for you" kind of call but a bit of panic laced her voice so I ran out to our small living room to find my mother on the carpet , face down. Her highly sensitive control on her wheelchair had gotten caught on her sleeve and her foot had gotten caught behind the small front wheel , sending her in catapult fashion out of her chair and onto the floor. Blood was coming from above her eyes. I started running in circles, complete taken over by panic. Really when I saw the blood I didn't know where to start or what to do. Very calmly from the floor where half of her face was obscured by carpet my mother told me to get a towel because the blood was going to ruin her carpet. When I got to the drawer in the kitchen she heard the drawer open and yelled,"From the rag basket!" So I ran down the hall to the rag basket. Only my mother would be more worried about what towel I was using then how much blood was coming out of her head. Once the blood was contained and her foot released and her face no longer kissing the carpet our next dilemma was to get her up off the floor. Me lifting her was not an option since she was about 5'10" and I was about 5'2" and 100 pounds after a bath. Calling for an ambulance would cause too much curiosity in the neighborhood so our other option was to check on our neighbors down the street. A house full of men. A dad and his four sons. And just my luck the oldest was home. When I told him what happened he was out his door and had my mother back in her chair before I could even catch up to him. He picked her up like a normal person would pick a penny off the ground. I loved those guys After thanking our neighbor we headed to the emergency room since the bleeding would not stop. On the way home, after watching me turn green and nearly passing out in the ER watching the resident stitch my mother up, my mom gave me some advice about avoiding ER nursing.
Many years into it now and I have some of my own stories. The elderly woman in Maryland who I found sitting covered in black vomit and I all but called a code until her many children explained to me it was just her "chew". She had missed her "spit cup". She had given me a toothless smile as if forgiving me for being such a Yankee. And the man in South Carolina who ran naked from room to room yelling about white horses chasing him. My stories aren't too gorey and I have always been honest in telling people I do not care for blood and body fluids, mine or anyone else's. My mother found my aversion amusing and liked to compare her ER days with my calm days as a school nurse. No comparison really. But we both managed to find that place in a crazy profession where we felt needed and content. And my mother being the person she was was happy when her daughters were happy, even if meant having a nice desk job.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Hills
If you happened to drive past me this morning at about6:50, near my house you might have been wondering why I was moon walking. I wasn't . Believe me I was trying hard to go up and forward but by the time I had reached my house I had reached my last hill and my legs were begging for a break.
When we first moved out here we came from a pretty flat area. Urban. We lived close to everything, grocery store, pharmacy, mall, my parents. And running , although I did it very infrequently , was a breeze there was hardly a hill in sight. Then we moved out here and all I can say is that if I wanted to be that parent who told her kids she had to walk to school up hill both ways, I really wouldn't be making it up. It is impossible to get to our house with out hitting at least one steep hill. Just when you go down a hill and think you are in the clear you round a corner and there is another hill. My husband likes to joke that if a tsunami hits we are fine we'll just have water front property. Which makes me think of " Mrs Twiggly and her Tree House". A great children's book about an eccentric woman who lived in a tree house and all the townspeople made fun of her until there was a flood. And then everyone wanted to rent space from Mrs. Twiggly. People laugh at us I am sure but not because we live a on hill.
So as I am training for this half marathon I calculated how many miles I need to run each week to gradually get myself to 13 miles total. I started out at 2.5 miles on Main Street which is relatively flat. We have a group who runs together on whatever days we can manage. There are now about 10 of us but you will rarely see all 10 of us at once. We're all moms and we run at 6 am so sometimes someone oversleeps. Sometimes someone wakes up and realizes her family will be much better off if mommy gets one more hour of sleep then if she goes out and chases the rising sun. The great thing is there is almost always someone who wants to run. We moved off of Main Street once we realized what a pretty run it was near my girlfriend's house and so we established a loop that was 3 miles. A week or so later I overslept and decided to run in my own neighborhood, the one with all the hills. I took a left out of my driveway and started the first steep climb, cussing pretty much the whole way because it really is steep. I know I was running but I am sure it looked like drowning by asphalt to cars going by. I made it to the top and took another left and breathed a short sigh of relief because this was just a slow incline. I detoured through a new development, one small hill and was back onto flat running. This stays flat for awhile and then you get to go down hill. Of course around here once you go down you must go up. This is called Great Hill Rd. Really it is. So up Great Hill I went and then down Great Hill I went which then brought me to another left and another pretty flat surface which then brought me to the bottom of my road which then I realized I had given myself 4 hills to run up. It wasn't pretty. That hill is not pretty. But that loop got me to 4 miles which was very inspiring.
This morning there were no emails that shot around about running so I decided it was time to up the anty and try the group loop of 4 miles but start from my house which would add about 2 more miles. I jumped out of bed at 5:45 ( mostly because I heard the baby fussing and I knew if I was still in the house my chance of getting out once she was awake was slim to none). I hit the pavement and as usual cussed myself out for about the first mile. It really is the worst part. Maybe because my body really isn't ready yet and it is just screaming at my mind to stop and go back to bed. I ran downhill and around the bend and got just past the meeting place for the loop and saw ahead of me a pony tail bouncing and knew it was one of my running mates. She had a pretty good pace and was a bit ahead of me so I just kept running behind her. After we had passed the small red barn and the clump of beautiful horses who stand by the side of the road the distance between us had lessened. Probably because everyone, except for myself, can't stand the smell of those horses and it pretty much slows the best of them down. I gave her a shout and we finished the last big hill together. As we came to the spot where I would branch off and run up hill 4 times. I groaned. My friend laughed but it was a friendly, understanding kind of laugh. We separated and she gave me a shout of "power through, you can do it." I heard that in my head all the way up those 4 hills. That and a little "Boom Boom Pow" from the MP3 player and we get to my moon walking episode. It was not an attractive run. I am pretty certain "Kermit" made an encore presentation. I could picture that Frog on that high bicycle and just knew what my limbs must have looked like but I kept going until I reached my driveway. I think my vision blurred at one point because I was attacked by drool and a wet nose from our dog who I could have sworn was no where to be seen when I came up the hill.
Be that as it may, I have brought myself up to 6 miles, well okay 5 and about 3/4 of a mile but as my friend A . A would say "if it is close round up" and so round up I will and up and up and up.....
When we first moved out here we came from a pretty flat area. Urban. We lived close to everything, grocery store, pharmacy, mall, my parents. And running , although I did it very infrequently , was a breeze there was hardly a hill in sight. Then we moved out here and all I can say is that if I wanted to be that parent who told her kids she had to walk to school up hill both ways, I really wouldn't be making it up. It is impossible to get to our house with out hitting at least one steep hill. Just when you go down a hill and think you are in the clear you round a corner and there is another hill. My husband likes to joke that if a tsunami hits we are fine we'll just have water front property. Which makes me think of " Mrs Twiggly and her Tree House". A great children's book about an eccentric woman who lived in a tree house and all the townspeople made fun of her until there was a flood. And then everyone wanted to rent space from Mrs. Twiggly. People laugh at us I am sure but not because we live a on hill.
So as I am training for this half marathon I calculated how many miles I need to run each week to gradually get myself to 13 miles total. I started out at 2.5 miles on Main Street which is relatively flat. We have a group who runs together on whatever days we can manage. There are now about 10 of us but you will rarely see all 10 of us at once. We're all moms and we run at 6 am so sometimes someone oversleeps. Sometimes someone wakes up and realizes her family will be much better off if mommy gets one more hour of sleep then if she goes out and chases the rising sun. The great thing is there is almost always someone who wants to run. We moved off of Main Street once we realized what a pretty run it was near my girlfriend's house and so we established a loop that was 3 miles. A week or so later I overslept and decided to run in my own neighborhood, the one with all the hills. I took a left out of my driveway and started the first steep climb, cussing pretty much the whole way because it really is steep. I know I was running but I am sure it looked like drowning by asphalt to cars going by. I made it to the top and took another left and breathed a short sigh of relief because this was just a slow incline. I detoured through a new development, one small hill and was back onto flat running. This stays flat for awhile and then you get to go down hill. Of course around here once you go down you must go up. This is called Great Hill Rd. Really it is. So up Great Hill I went and then down Great Hill I went which then brought me to another left and another pretty flat surface which then brought me to the bottom of my road which then I realized I had given myself 4 hills to run up. It wasn't pretty. That hill is not pretty. But that loop got me to 4 miles which was very inspiring.
This morning there were no emails that shot around about running so I decided it was time to up the anty and try the group loop of 4 miles but start from my house which would add about 2 more miles. I jumped out of bed at 5:45 ( mostly because I heard the baby fussing and I knew if I was still in the house my chance of getting out once she was awake was slim to none). I hit the pavement and as usual cussed myself out for about the first mile. It really is the worst part. Maybe because my body really isn't ready yet and it is just screaming at my mind to stop and go back to bed. I ran downhill and around the bend and got just past the meeting place for the loop and saw ahead of me a pony tail bouncing and knew it was one of my running mates. She had a pretty good pace and was a bit ahead of me so I just kept running behind her. After we had passed the small red barn and the clump of beautiful horses who stand by the side of the road the distance between us had lessened. Probably because everyone, except for myself, can't stand the smell of those horses and it pretty much slows the best of them down. I gave her a shout and we finished the last big hill together. As we came to the spot where I would branch off and run up hill 4 times. I groaned. My friend laughed but it was a friendly, understanding kind of laugh. We separated and she gave me a shout of "power through, you can do it." I heard that in my head all the way up those 4 hills. That and a little "Boom Boom Pow" from the MP3 player and we get to my moon walking episode. It was not an attractive run. I am pretty certain "Kermit" made an encore presentation. I could picture that Frog on that high bicycle and just knew what my limbs must have looked like but I kept going until I reached my driveway. I think my vision blurred at one point because I was attacked by drool and a wet nose from our dog who I could have sworn was no where to be seen when I came up the hill.
Be that as it may, I have brought myself up to 6 miles, well okay 5 and about 3/4 of a mile but as my friend A . A would say "if it is close round up" and so round up I will and up and up and up.....
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