Year: 2017

A rest and recovery day. Tomorrow is the first day of Open Swim season where I get to swim back and forth across Lake Nokomis as many times as I want for 2 hours on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays!

This morning I experimented with writing about what I think about when I’m running:

Mundane Thoughts Mixed with Sacred Revelations

Running through my mind, almost
Unrelenting.
Mundane thoughts about my run: breathing, pace, how hot
I am. Mixed with bursts of insight, deep revelations,
New and
Ancient wisdoms, breaking

Through the noise, briefly
Introducing clarity
Only to evaporate in the heat. The
Noise returns. Chatter that
Shatters the sacred.

Listen up Over-thinkers

Is thinking overrated? Yes and
No. Sometimes you need to
Think through problems, possibilities. But
Everything, even thinking, needs to be
Regulated and balanced. Over-thinkers like me need to give it a
Rest. To
Undo the knot of this or that
Problem later…or never.
To stop thinking.
Impossible? It can be but
Often it’s
Not.
Something breaks through rumination. A chirping bird? A sighing tree? An aching calf?

I feel pretty good today. My strategic walk breaks must have helped me to get 30 miles for the week without being sore or tired. Yesterday I wrote a nonet poem about my morning routine. I liked the poem, but it functions more as an ideal, one that I sometimes realize, than an actual description of my daily habits. Plus, it doesn’t include the various disruptions that occur, especially during the school year. So I decided to add an additional version and rename the poem.

2 versions with descriptions that vary in how true they are: from almost true to mostly true to I wish they were true to too true to not true enough

Version 1

poetic form: nonet

Wake up at 6. Feed dog. Make coffee.
Write some while drinking the coffee.
Eat: cheerios, banana.
Wash face, brush teeth, comb hair.
Put on running clothes
and running shoes.
Go outside.
Walk some.
Run!

Version 2

Wake up at 6. Feed dog. Make coffee.

Get irritated at the dog because she wants to play and I’m too tired because I woke up several times in the middle of the night with restless legs or because I went to sleep too early and slept too long or because I woke up too early, then went back to sleep and had an intense, freaky dream or because I had the extra drink last night that I shouldn’t have had or because one unfortunate side effect of being 42 almost 43 is that I am no longer a “good morning!” person, but a “don’t talk to me (or lick me) until I’ve had my coffee and spent time sitting on the couch, slowly waking up” person or a “I feel regret or shame about some intangible thing that I didn’t actually do and this makes me uneasy until I’ve fully woken up and restored my sense of exuberance” person or because Delia has decided that she will not be ignored and that I will play with her, right now!

Write some while drinking the coffee.

This one usually works out, except for on the rare day when one of the kids gets up early and needs something…breakfast, advice, a hug, a performance of the “Let’s make Mom yell or cry or both” show.

Eat: cheerios, banana.

I also like walnuts, but it didn’t fit the number of syllables that I needed for the line, which was 8, so I left it out. In fact, walnuts are the key to this breakfast. When we run out of walnuts, I’ll still eat the cheerios and banana without them, but it’s just not the same.

Wash face, brush teeth, comb hair.

In a better world, one where dropping a deuce is not stigmatized as “impolite conversation” and where the coffee always does its job, I might replace any of the above with “go poop.” Sometimes I wash my face, sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I wait to brush my teeth until after my run. Most of the time I don’t comb my hair, I just put it back in a ponytail. But I always poop. Pooping is an important bodily function and the failure to do it before a run can be bad. Very bad.

Put on running clothes

Remind one of the kids that “it’s time to get up!” in a sing-songy voice that usually irritates everyone, including me, but I can’t help doing. Remind them again and again and again until there are 10 minutes left before school starts. Luckily, this is not as big of a deal as it seems. It takes 5 minutes to walk to the school from our house. This leaves 5 minutes to get dressed, eat and get out, which can be done if the kid is properly motivated. Threatening to take away their phone is usually motivation enough.

and running shoes.

After the kids have left for school, comfort the dog for a minute because she’s freaked out by all of the yelling and crying and frantic scrambling that has just occurred.

Go outside.

Maybe stretch, maybe don’t. Always try to squeeze the glutes a few times, which probably looks funny, but helps prevent hip and hamstring injuries.

Walk some.

“Some” usually means 2-3 minutes. If I’m walking all the way to the river road, which is 4 blocks, “some” = 5 or 6 minutes. But there’s always some walking involved. For fun, Scott and I like to imagine a comical situation where you might get up out of bed, jump into your clothes, run down the stairs and out the door and immediately start your run. No stretching. No warm-up. No walking. Neither of us ever want to do this, but we saw a neighbor run out their door in their running clothes and continue down the sidewalk one time and we hoped that this was just what they were doing.

Run!