Month: July 2023

july 31/RUNSWIM

5 miles
bottom of franklin hill and back
65 degrees

What a wonderful morning to be outside! Cooler, sunny, calm.

My new morning routine is to get up, feed the dog, make my coffee, and then sit outside on my deck. Sitting there, I noticed a few birds swooping down from our new gutters. Uh oh — they’re trying to build a nest.

I felt pretty good on my run. Relaxed for the first few miles. Running down the hill, my left hip felt a little tight. Not too bad. Last night, Scott and I talked about signing up for the Oct 2024 marathon, for our 50 birthdays. Can my knees and hips handle it?

Listened to birds, acorns falling from the trees, kids calling out for Dairy Queen for the first half of the run. Put in headphones and listened to “Camelot” on the way back.

At the bottom of the franklin hill, I turned around. As I walked back up the hill, I recorded a few moments from the run:

moment one

Running through the tunnel of trees
a few minutes ago
a wonderful silence
no cars
I could hear myself breathing
everything still
no wind.
I was mostly in the moment
although
every so often a wonder
about when a car would come
and break the silence
cut into my calm.

moment two

approaching the trestle
I heard some kids
yelling, yeah! dairy queen!
another camp group
a dozen kids in bright yellow vests
as they biked past me
one of them chanted, dairy queen! dairy queen!

moment three

as spoke about moment two into my phone
a runner passed me
looking relaxed graceful
his legs rhythmically bobbing up and down
mesmerizing

10 Things

  1. a still river
  2. a black shirt dropped near the porta potty
  3. one acorn dropping to the ground from a tree, thud
  4. another acorn being crushed by a bike wheel, crunch!
  5. 2 roller skiers, or the same roller skier encountered twice
  6. the Welcoming Oaks wondering where I’ve been
  7. a person asleep under the bridge
  8. a regular — Santa Claus
  9. another regular — Mr. Morning!
  10. a woman ahead of me, a dark shirt strung through the strap of her tank top, flapping as she ran

On this last day of July, a month about water, I want to include this passage from Roger Deakin’s Waterlog:

The following afternoon, under a blue sky fringed white with distant clouds on the horizon, four of us swam in 360 feet of turquoise water in a sheer-sided quarry on Belnahua. The island encricled a huge natural swimming pool, raised above sea level, whose waters were so utterly transparent that when we swam, we saw our shadows far down, swimming ahead of us along the bottom. All around, only yards away, was the deeper blue of the open sea, and the Hebrides: Fladda, Scarba, Jura, Lunga, the Garvellachs (the ‘Islands of the sea’, St. Coumba’s favourite place), Luing, Mull and Colonsay. The light and the skies kept changing all afternoon: from bright blue with distant dazzling clouds to deepening red and gold. Diving from the rocks into the immensely deep, clear, brackish water, intensified the giddy feeling of aquatic flying.

Waterlog / Roger Deakin (237)

I would love to swim here (or near here)– some day in my 50s, I hope. Last week I mentioned possibly seeing my shadow in the water, but barely because the water in the lake is opaque. I remember seeing (and writing about) my shadow in the pool last winter, how it felt like I was flying above the deep end. I love the idea of aquatic flying and the rare times I feel like I’m actually doing it.

swim: 2 loops (4 cedar loops)
cedar lake open swim
83 degrees

Always grateful for another swim. Was able to swim on course, even without the buoys. My calves felt a little strange, my nose was a bit stuffed up, but otherwise, a great swim.

Instead of listing 10 things I noticed, here’s the coolest thing of the night: the vegetation stretching up from the bottom of the lake. How tall is it, I wonder? On the last loop, rounding the far orange buoy at Hidden Beach, I swam parallel to the beach, right above the vegetation — is it milfoile? Whatever it is, it’s wonderfully creepy — a pale green, ghostly, reaching up toward the light or my torso. So much of it! When I have more time, I do a little more research about these plants, and try to describe them more too.

a note from Future Sara, 24 june 2026: the milfoil is very bad this year. There is a big patch covering part of the swimming area and the start of the open swim path that is so thick, I could easily imagine a less confident swimmer becoming entangled and drowning. Even with my strong swimming ability, I can’t easily swim through it, which makes swimming beside the white buoys impossible. As one (among many) ways to deal with this milfoil and the anxiety it causes, I’m gathering entries (like this one) by tagging them “aquatic plants,” collecting research, and writing about and around nets, entanglement, vines, threads, webs, strings.

july 30/SWIM

4 loops
open swim lake nokomis
69 degrees

Another great Sunday swim. Sunny and a calm. A little cooler, but not too bad. Felt very strong on the first loop, not so strong by the fourth one. Somewhere in the middle, I lost track of the number of loops I was doing. I entered the swimming area at the main beach convinced I had done 5, when I had only done 4. Oh well, that was enough for me. For some reason, today’s swim tired me out more than the 4 loops on Friday. I guess it is a lot of swimming. I swam more miles this week (10.5) than I ran (10). I think I swam more miles than ran this entire month. I did a rough check, and they were basically the same. Wow. I really cut back on running this month and increased my swimming!

Started the swim by being routed by someone with an orange safety buoy. No worries. I just stopped for a minute and regrouped.

Saw at least one plane, many minnows, the swimmer with green arms — I still can’t tell if it’s a wetsuit or a sun shirt (or whatever they’re called), pale legs under the water, sparkles on the water’s surface, a clear sky, then a cloud-filled one, shiny bubbles from my fingers.

I recited a few poems — lines from “A Nude Swim,” “Evaporations,” and “The Meadow.” Thought again about my body losing all of its loneliness.

Wow, this poem!

Glacier/ Claire Wahmanholm

It is everywhere. It is the water I am trying to teach my daughters to float in. It is the sky I tell them to keep their eyes on. It is the air I tell them to seal in their mouths should they slip underwater. I am a leaky boat, but I am trying to answer their questions. As deep as thirty Christmas trees. As deep as twenty giraffes standing on each other’s backs. There hasn’t been a sea here for seventy-five million years. I cannot explain that number. My daughters’ ankles are sinking into the beryl water. No one can float forever. On the map, pushpins skewer patches of icy green like rare moths. I am trying to say it’s too late without making them too sad. It’s like how you can’t take the blue out of the white paint, like how you can’t hear your name and not turn around. The calving of glaciers is the loudest underwater sound on Earth. I dip my daughters’ ears beneath the surface to let them listen. It’s like how you can’t put a feather back on a bird, like how the bird won’t fit back into its shell. We step backward into the house. I wring the glacier out of their suits. I wring it out of their hair. I wipe it from their faces, but it is everywhere. It is the storm, it is the drowned harbor, it is the current, it is the bathwater that the baby slurps before we can stop her. The horizon rises. It rains. The glacier hammers the roof, the glacier soaks a corner of the bedroom ceiling, which greens with spores. On the map, the pushpins hover over green air, the green air is a spreading shroud. The storm surges ashore, mercurial and summer-smelling. We are not accustomed to the sea, so we describe it like a sky. The waves are tornado green and loud. In the water, the polar bears look like clouds.

july 29/RUN

4 miles
marshall loop (to cleveland)
67 degrees

Ran with Scott on the Marshall loop, our new Saturday morning tradition. Passed by a chatting toddler with their parents — Hi! We’re taking a walk with our dog today! Half walked, half ran up the Marshall Hill. Talked about RAGBRAI and a few other things I can’t remember now.

10 Surfaces Run Over

  1. plywood (little bridges covering the water pipes on the sidewalk for the city construction project)
  2. grass
  3. mud
  4. a big squishy pile of muck on the sidewalk — yuck!
  5. cracked concrete
  6. asphalt
  7. dirt
  8. long, slender, brittle branches
  9. leaves
  10. acorns

Speaking of acorns, as Scott and I ran down the hill above Shadow Falls I heard 2 distinctive cracks on the pavement — crack crack. It was 2 acorns falling from the tree. Yep, the first signs of fall always come at the end of July and early August.

No rowers on the river, just little waves. Lots of runners, walkers, and one biking who sped by very close without warning us and another who was much slower and kind, gently calling out on your left as they approached. Oh — and someone hauling ass on an eliptigo. Excellent.

watched / read / said

Watched a replay of Katie Ledecky winning her 6th straight gold in the 800 at the World Championships in Fukuoka. She hasn’t lost this race in 13 years. Wow.

Read (with my eyes) the first few pages of Andrew Leland’s The Country of the Blind. He’s talking about how strange it feels to know that you will go blind. I can relate, even though his condition — retinis pigmentosa — is different than mine. I look forward to reading more of this memoir today.

Also read, this time with my ears: I’m finishing up the wonderful audio book, Symphony of Secrets. A bad title, but an excellent book.

Yesterday, Scott said something that I’ve heard before, but that I found particularly funny. Talking about how some program he was using broke or stopped working or something like that he said: it shit the bed. Then he said, who shits the bed? wetting the bed, I can see, but shitting in it?

Also said: Talking about how frazzled I would be if I listened to audio books at twice the speed, I hesitated and then said, I would be a basket case. As I used it, I knew there must be some bad origin story for this phrase. Yep. It involves WWI soldiers and lost limbs, and that’s all I’ll say.

july 28/SWIM

4 loops
lake nokomis open swim
71 degrees

Yesterday, it was very windy and HOT — upper 90s with feels like temp of over 100 — so I decided to skip open swim last night. I’m glad I did. I think I would have been sore and tired, having battled the wind and the waves. Instead today was a great swim. Calm water and not too crowded. I felt strong and fast and confident.

Again, I couldn’t see the orange buoys, but it didn’t matter. I was fine. I’ve been writing for years about how I can’t see those buoys. Slowly, what it means to “not see the buoys” has changed. It used to be, I only see the buoys every few minutes, not all the time, or, I only see the flash of orange or a small orange dot. But today, on the way to the little beach, swimming into the sun, I only saw the buoys out of my peripheral as I swam by them, never when I was trying to sight with them. Looking straight ahead, using my central vision, I only saw glare and water, trees, and sky. This did not worry me at all. The only time I could see an orange buoy with my central vision, and again, just barely, was after I rounded the second green buoy as I swam back to the start of the loop. Mostly I could see the green buoys as the idea of green or a small green dot. One time, as I got closer (but I was still 50+ yards away), I knew I was heading toward the second green buoy but I couldn’t actually see it. I paused, lifted my head high out of the water, then turned to look out of my peripheral. There it was. When I looked through my central vision again, I could see it because now my brain knew where it was. That’s one way my brain compensates for bad cones.

On the back half of loops 3 and 4, I recited A Oswald’s “Evaporations,” A Sexton’s “A Nude Swim,” and T Hoagland’s “The Social Life of Water.” Fun! I like reciting these poems. I thought about Sexton’s line, we let our bodies lose all their loneliness and Hoaglund’s lines, all water is a part of other water and no water is lonely water. Also thought about Ed Bok Lee and his idea of water as wise, ebullient, and generous in “Water in Love.” I tried to love like the lake loves, open and generous to everything and everyone. I gave attention to feeling not lonely — connected, entangled, beholding and beholden by the fish or the lifeguards, the other swimmers, the buoys.

10+ Lake Companions

  1. the woman who, as she neared the safety boat by the lifeguard stand on the beach to drop off her stuff, called out, I forgot my cap in the car! Then later, when I asked, pointed out the far orange buoy to me
  2. the lifeguard on the shore, speaking into her walkie talkie, instructing the lifeguards where to place the buoys
  3. the swan boat, far off to my left
  4. the plane sharply ascending above me
  5. the small piece of debris that I accidentally swallowed then felt as it briefly got stuck in my throat
  6. the small piece of debris that somehow got trapped in my googles, then in my eye until I blinked it out
  7. the swimmers with bright pink buoys tethered to their torsos
  8. one of the few swimmers wearing a wet suit on this warm morning
  9. the breaststrokers
  10. the women giggling and calling out to each other as they approached the first orange buoy
  11. the woman discussing her swim with another swimmer after she was done, I’m slow, very very slow

All of us, together, loving the lake and each other.

Before my swim, I read a great interview between two writers discussing illness and the writing life, Sick and Writing: Two Poets Converse. Here are some passages from it that I’d like to remember and reflect on:

detection, diagnosis, disease

poetry is not so much a means of healing as it is a method of detection, occasionally therapeutic but essentially diagnostic. Which of course implies that poetry is rooted not only in dis-ease but in causes hidden.

Jennifer Sperry Steinorth

to articulate what this singular life is like, in the thick of it

Not that we’re writing to solve the mystery of being; it’s more the need to see clearly. To look at the undersides of leaves, to watch butterflies emerge from their chrysalises. To be amazed. To look at the adventure of our infirmities, even. As Marianne Boruch said, it’s about detection.

*

I’ve wondered if I write them [emotions] to feel in control, to feel in connection with others who suffer, or simply to articulate what this singular life is like, in the thick of it.

Fleda Brown

on erasures

I like the idea of receptivity with regard to erasure. I have often used the metaphor of excavation to speak of that work, though I too balk at the idea that I am digging up something that already exists, something latent in the text. Rather, it is as if I am excavating the dead from a text that buried them—a kind of channeling.

JSS

trying to find the awe in awful

The word awful has awe in it, but when I feel awful it doesn’t feel like awe—maybe it should. Pain alienates us from one another, from ourselves, and from language. It disrupts connectivity. But through writing or other forms of making, we struggle against that disconnect.

jss

on taking walks in order to face the lion

 I sometimes need multiple walks a day; movement outside in the ordinary splendor of the world allows me to enter the tragic spaces of the past and the ongoing darkness in the world and in myself, without being swallowed by it. Jane Hirshfield talks about this in her wonderful essay “Facing the Lion,” inspired in part by Allen Ginsberg’s poem “The Lion for Real,” “The trick then is to let the lion into the house without abandoning one’s allegiance to the world of the living: to live amid the overpowering scent of its knowledge, yet not be dragged entirely into its realm.” Moving my body out in the world—outside the intimate spaces where I write—being in conversation with others—all of these help me hold the dark and light together. That this work demands so much discipline—even when I feel otherwise stable—speaks to the toll our work can take.

jss

the relief of a diagnosis

 Sometimes when I tell people my diagnoses they tell me they are sorry, and I understand they think the diagnoses are awful, and I get that, but I am so thankful for the diagnoses. It’s such a relief to know what’s wrong—even when nothing can be done to fix it.

Maybe knowing what’s wrong—the diagnosis—helps us—if not to fix what’s wrong, then to adjust our mind to new uncertainties—to let something go?

jss

Discovered that Fleda Brown has a wonderful blog, The Wobbly Bicycle. I’ll have to keep checking it out!

Here’s the poem-of-the-day from yesterday. If I had swam last night, I would have posted it then. It’s fitting for my swim this morning, thinking about my love for/of others in the water. Also, it’s a nice nod to the swimmer I heard after I exited the lake who said she was slow, very very slow.

Romance/ Susan Browne

I swim my laps today, slowly, slowly,
reaching my arms out & over, my fleshly oars,
the water silken on my skin, my body still able
to be a body & resting at the pool’s lip,
I watch other bodies slip through the blue,
how fast the young are
& how old they become, floating, floating,
forgetting the weight of years
while palm trees sway above us,
a little wind in the fronds, children playing
in the fountains, one is crying, one is eating
a peanut butter & jelly sandwich, I’m hungry
& wonder, has everything important happened
& what is more important than this,
like a secret adventure, like an affair I’m having
with everyone I see, their soft or washboard bellies,
their flat or rounded butts, their rippling hair
or shiny domes, their fragile ankles,
their beautiful bones, all our atoms swimming, swimming
& making us visible & I shove off the wall,
reaching my arms out, embracing the whole
magic show, with ten more laps to go.

july 26/RUNSWIM

3.3 miles
trestle turn around
71 degrees
humidity: 94% / dew point: 67

Hot and steamy today. Went out for my run right after the rain ended. Everything wet, dripping, swampy. Headed north through the tunnel of trees. Noticed a tall, precarious stack of small stones on the ancient boulder. Was passed by a shirtless runner with a bright yellow baseball cap on backwards. For the next five minutes of my run, I watched as his bright yellow head slowly bobbed out of sight. Encountered another biking camp group — 20 or 30 kids in yellow vest on the bike path. Not sure how they were doing it, but they managed to get several cars to honk for them. Turned around at the stairs just past the railroad trestle.

For most of the run it was overcast, but at the very end, as I ran back through the neighborhood, some sun emerged and my shadow joined me. Hello friend!

Listened to 1 biker talking to another — most of it was just out of range, but I heard, I always slow way down there and look carefully, otherwise I keep going, the biking kids, and cars. After turning around, put in headphones. Started with Billie Eilish’s latest song for the Barbie movie, “What Was I Made For,” then was inspired to put on The Wiz and the Tinman’s song, “What Would I Do If I Could Feel?”

I started thinking about my desire to use my runs to help open me up to the world — to feel things deeply and generously. And now, as I write this, I’m thinking about Emily Dickinson’s poem about grief and the formal feeling that comes after it, “After great pain, a formal feeling comes,” which I first posted about on this blog in march of 2021.

10 Wet Things

  1. sidewalk puddles
  2. half my street for a short stretch
  3. the leaves on the sprawling oak tree near the ancient boulder
  4. the edges of the trail
  5. one branch leaning over the trail, brushing my face
  6. my face — from sweaty effort, running through rain-soaked branches, under dripping bridges
  7. the air — hazy, steamy, fog hovering just above the trail
  8. the tip of my pony tail
  9. wheels — bike, car, stroller
  10. mud on the dirt trail, mostly where the ruts are the deepest

This was the daily poem on poems.com. A great winter poem to revisit in January. I love Major Jackson’s poetry.

lxxxi. / Major Jackson

Pine shadows on snow like a Jasper canvas,
if only my pen equaled the downy’s stabbing beak
this January morning, her frantic
chipping, more resolve than frenzy, to make a feast
of beetle larvae, if only my wood-boring eyes
could interrogate the known like pillars of sunlight
through fast-moving clouds scanning the side
of Corporation Mountain where on a distant ridge
white plumes dissolve like theories. I cannot hear
through winter’s quiet what’s worth saying.
Saplings stand nude as Spartans awaiting orders.
The entire forest is iced-up and glistening.
Sealed in its form, the austere world I’ve come
to love beckons, earth runnels soon resurrected
into a delirium of streams and wild fields. Till then,
branches like black lines crisscrossing the sub-Arctic.

swim: 3 loops (6 cedar loops)
cedar lake open swim
92 degrees

A warm night with very little breeze. Not good for cooling Scott off on the shore, but good for me and swimming in calm water. For the first few loops it felt a little harder to breathe — was it the heat? Felt a little sore during this swim — just under my right shoulder.

The coolest thing about my swim: just heading out from shore, swimming over some vegetation, dozens of small fish (much bigger than minnows) swam right below me, almost as if I was acting out Anne Sexton’s poem, The Nude Swim, real — All of the fish in us had escaped for a minute. Were these all of my fish, escaping into the water? Or, were these Sexton’s real fish that don’t mind my fish having escaped? Either way, a super cool image! As I think about it some more, I like imaging these fish as escaping from me — swim free little Sara fish!

added the next morning: Just remembered something else about the swim. Mostly the water was warm, which felt nice when I first entered the water, but as I rounded the far buoy, the one at Hidden Beach, I swam through a few pockets of very cold water, which felt nice after swimming in such hot air.

july 25/SWIM

3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
90 degrees

Today, before open swim, I memorized parts of 2 more water poems that I’d like to think about and maybe attempt to recite as I swim: part II of Alice Oswald’s Evaporations and several stanzas from Anne Sexton’s The Nude Swim:

II / Alice Oswald

In their lunch hour
I saw shop-workers get into water
They put their watches on stones and slithered frightened
Into the tight fitting river
And shook out cuffs of splash
And swam wide strokes towards the trees
And in a while swam back
With rigid cormorant smiles
Shocked I suppose from taking on
Something impossible to think through
Something old and obsessive like the centre of a rose
And for that reason they turned quickly
And struggled to get out again and retrieved their watches
Stooped on the grass-line hurrying now
They began to laugh and from their meaty backs
A million crackling things
Burst into flight which was either water
Or the hour itself ascending.

The Nude Swim/ Anne Sexton

On the southwest side of Capri
we found a little unknown grotto
where no people were and we
entered it completely
and let our bodies loose all
their loneliness.

All of the fish in us
had escaped for a minute.
The real fish did not mind.
We did not disturb their personal life.
We calmly trailed over them and
under them, shedding
air bubbles, little white
balloons that drifted up
into the sun by the boat
where the Italian boatman slept
with his hat over his face.

Water so clear you could
read a book through it.
Water so buoyant you could
float on your elbow.

Very windy at the lake and choppy in the water. Lots of breathing only on one side. After one rough loop I thought I would only do 2, but I stopped after the second for 20-30 seconds and decided I could do one more loop. Glad I did. The final loop seemed easier, not sure why — maybe it was because it was a little less windy, maybe it was because I practiced reciting the Oswald and Sexton poems, or maybe it was because all my swimming this year is paying off and I’m getting stronger. Very glad I went back out for that third loop!

I found the Sexton a little easier to remember and recite in my head as I swam than the Oswald, but it was fun to recite both. Favorite lines: “and let our bodies lose all their loneliness” and “from their meaty backs a millions crackling things burst into flight which was either water or the hour itself ascending”

10 Things

  1. warmer water — but not too warm
  2. fluffy, shredded clouds in the sky
  3. crowded beach and swimming area
  4. breathing mostly on the right side
  5. traffic jams at the far orange and green buoys
  6. a canoe and some paddleboarders on the course
  7. light brown/tan water with a few streaks below
  8. more pink safety buoys than orange or yellow
  9. vegetation wrapped around my shoulder
  10. more vegetation poking up from below


july 24/RUN

3.1 miles
2 trails
73 degrees

And the week of heat begins. A few days ago, the high was expected to be 103 on Wednesday. Now just 98. Still too warm. I could feel the heat in my run this morning. Harder to breathe. Even so, running feels better. My knees and hips don’t hurt. Hooray!

Listened to kids and cars and birds for most of the run. Turned on “The Wiz” for the last mile.

10 Things

  1. the energetic din of kids getting dropped off for camp at Dowling Elementary
  2. “Uptown Funk” playing on the playground at Minnehaha Academy — I could hear “too hot” through the trees as I ran past. I wondered if it was the edited version or if some kid might go home tonight singing “hot damn”
  3. passing a woman walk-running with her dog on the short hill down to the south entrance of the winchell trail
  4. as I write this entry on my deck, I can hear one of the kids next door whining or whimpering non-stop inside of their house. I am almost positive it’s a kid, but could it be a dog? wow
  5. the water was a burning white
  6. haze hovers above the water’s surface — it looks so hot!
  7. calling out excuse me and thank you! as I passed 3 walkers spread across the path
  8. flying fast down the hill into the tunnel of trees, everything a blur
  9. up on edmund, farther from the river, hearing the faint voices of rowers
  10. no roller skiers or overheard conversations or regulars

july 23/SWIM

5 loops!
lake nokomis open swim
75 degrees


5 loops! The most I have swum this summer at one open swim session. I had to get out after 2 loops to go to the bathroom and then stopped for a break after loop 4. With those breaks, I finished 10 minutes before open swim ends. If I began right when open swim started and didn’t take any breaks, could I do 6 loops in the 2 hours? Maybe that should be an end of August goal?

The water was wonderful — calm, not too cold, buoyant. The air was hazy and I couldn’t see the orange buoys at all for sighting. I also couldn’t see the flash of the white boat that I use for sighting. Before starting, I lined up my path with the far shore and the white boat, then began swimming, trusting that my body — my shoulders, my hips, legs, feet, brain — knew the way to go. And they did. And I didn’t panic or wonder if I was off course. All these years of working on letting go of the need to know exactly where I was going, the need for confirmation with a clear view, is paying off. I can swim without needing to SEE.

The water was opaque, the color of brown lentils. I kept seeing flashes just below me. I wondered if they were big fish or just a trick of the light. None of the flashes bumped into me, so I didn’t care what they were.

As I swam, I devoted some of my time to listening to the different gurgling and sloshing and splashing sounds my body made as I moved through the water — the slosh past my ear, the gurgle of my mouth, the splash as my arm lifted out of the water near my leg then reentered above my head.

On the back end of at least 2 loops (the stretch from little beach back to big beach), I recited the Tony Hoaglund poem I just memorized — The Social Life of Water. I thought about the different types of water and then where humans fit in — aren’t we 98% water? I also thought about the last few lines:

But you, you stand on the shore
of blue Lake Kieve in the evening
and listen, grieving
as something stirs and turns within you.

Not knowing why you linger in the dark.
Not able even to guess
from what you are excluded.

I thought about how different it is to be standing on the shore versus being in the water, swimming through it, being rocked by the waves, hearing sounds underwater, feeling the cold. I don’t think I can understand like the line, all water understands, suggests, but I do believe that I witness the social life of water in a different way when I’m in it.

july 22/RUN

3.8 miles
marshall loop
70 degrees

Ran with Scott up to Cleveland, over to Summit, beside St. Thomas, down to the river. Stopped and hiked around the Monument before starting to run again. A nice, relaxed run — we talked about the difficulties of taking care of aging parents, terrible comments online, being able to still smell bland smells but not intense ones, swift carrots in Zelda, and whether or not a person who is completely blind (seeing no light) could run if they were tethered to a guide (pacer).

10 Things

  1. dodging sprinklers
  2. the sound of falling water
  3. wooden ramps covering temporary water pipes on the sidewalk making a dull thud when I ran over them
  4. rowers on the river — 2 8 person shells lined up like they might race
  5. a new favorite view of the river from the east side — under the monument on some jutting rocks, a wide view of the lake street bridge, the blue river, longfellow flats on the west side
  6. roots as makeshift steps
  7. mud on some limestone, small gravel and dry dirt on other limestone
  8. the shshshshuffle of a runner’s striking feet from behind
  9. a woman talking on a phone outside — I support all sorts of things in Minneapolis and I’m a SENIOR!
  10. small decals on the lower corner of an out-of-business restaurant: wine glasses and plates and beer mugs? — I can’t quite remember

While I drank my coffee this morning, I memorized a delightful water poem by Tony Hoagland — The Social Life of Water.

july 21/SWIM

3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
75 degrees

What a beautiful morning at the lake! Too bright for sighting, but nice for making each swimmer’s body glitter and glow. As I waded in water right by the shore, I noticed dozens of little minnows swimming just ahead of me. I walked slowly and watched as they scattered. Spotted a bird and a plane in the sky. Again, I couldn’t see the orange buoys until I was swimming past them.

The water started smooth and was buoyant. I floated on the surface and felt the strength in my triceps as I finished my stroke. A wonderful feeling — all the loops I’ve already done have gotten me to this point, able to power through the water.

Saw some ducks, but no seagulls. Several canoes and kayaks crossed my path. I don’t remember noticing any swans.

Swam 2 loops, got out to go to the bathroom, then did a 3rd loop. There were several dozen swimmers. The swimming area was mostly empty of kids — too early + no lifeguard on duty yet?

I wish I could have stayed at the lake, looking at the water and the buoys, maybe doing one more loop, but I didn’t have time.

july 20/SWIM

3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
78 degrees

Another great swim! Sunny, warm, not too windy. I couldn’t see the buoys at all, but I stayed mostly on course and the one time I was off, I didn’t care. Swimming from the little beach to the big beach I suddenly noticed the buoy was way off to my left, so I stopped and turned sharply and headed towards it. I’m pleased with myself for being so unworried about messing up. I’ve been working on it for a few years now.

I started strong, but was ready to be done midway through the 3 loop. Near the end, my body felt awkward, especially my shoulders and feet.

I didn’t have time to write this right after my swim so I’m doing it the morning after. Can I remember 10 things?

10 Things

  1. a dark plane passing through a white cloud above me
  2. several sailboats with white sails have joined the orange-sailed boat to my right
  3. the sun on the water’s surface: shimmering, sizzling
  4. sighting the buoys: almost always, nothing but empty water, trees, sky
  5. sloshing water passing by my ears
  6. grazing the side of the orange buoy as I rounded it, watching it twist slightly
  7. crossing over vegetation just below me near the big beach
  8. more orange safety buoys tethered to torsos than yellow ones
  9. before the swim: enchanted by the gentle undulations of the water
  10. after the swim: standing below the lifeguard stand drying off and listening to a female off-duty lifeguard flirting (?) with a male lifeguard up in the stand — it sucks that I won’t be here for the party…are you going back to Ireland?

july 19/RUNSWIM

run: 3.4 miles
2 trails
74 degrees / dew point: 62

Running is feeling a little better, at least on my knee and hip. Mentally it’s difficult to get back into the effort that continuous running takes. For the first mile or so, I chanted triple berries in my head — strawberry / raspberry / blueberry. It helped. Everything is wet this morning — a quick thunderstorm in the middle of the night. Puddles, dripping trees, mud. Slippery.

Waved at Mr. Walker Sitter — not sitting but walking today, good morninged Mr. Morning!, passed a bunch of kids on bikes in yellow vests with an adult, thanked a man for moving his dog over to the side so I could run by. A few minutes later, saw something on the winchell trail ahead of me — a puddle? a tree branch? No, a blue tent wrapped up and around a supine body — two bare legs sticking out wearing hiking boots. Not moving. Were they asleep? passed out? dead? Why were they on the paved trail? Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing? Not sure what to do, I kept running, knowing that the kind man with the dog would be encountering this same sight in just a few minutes. For the rest of the run, I wondered if I did the right thing. I asked RJP and she thought it was good I didn’t stop, especially since someone else (a man with a dog) was close behind me and could stop.

As I write this entry (at 10:45 in the morning), some (but not all) meteorologists are forecasting possible severe thunderstorms (a tornado) for late afternoon. Will they cancel open swim? Will a tornado touch down?

hours later: No! Open swim was not cancelled, although it looked ominous (or om, as I like to say) when we got there. I managed to swim 25 minutes before it thundered. Excellent!

swim: 1.5 big loops
cedar lake open swim
dark skies, threat of a storm

One half of the sky was a deep blue/purple, the other started mostly clear and light blue but quickly was covered in clouds as I started my swim. The water was choppy and dark and cold — why so cold? It’s almost 90 degrees! A good swim. As usual, I felt strong and fast and happy plowing through the waves. Because it’s cedar, people were swimming in whatever direction they wanted — no worries, I’ve embraced the cedar chill. Decided to do 3 quick loops then check on the weather. As I neared the shore, I noticed all the lifeguards and kayaks out of the water. At first I didn’t know why, then I heard one of them say, we need to stay out of the water for 30 minutes. Oh — it must have thundered. And, as if on cue, it thundered again. Very happy to have been able to swim at all tonight!

july 18/SWIM

3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
85 degrees

Warmer today. Yes! I forgot to mention yesterday how cold I was when I left the water at cedar. My jaw ached, my legs were shaking a little. For the last loop my fingers were almost numb. It wasn’t that cold — in the 70s (air), 75 (water) — but it felt cold to me. Tonight much better. The difference was the air temperature and the amount of sun, I think. A nice swim.

I can tell that it’s harder for me to see the orange buoys. I barely ever see them now. Really just the idea of orange — I look in the direction I think the buoy should be and orange appears in my head. Maybe this sounds strange, but I think what’s happening is that my brain is getting some visual data that’s too faint for me to recognize consciously — my brain, everyone’s brain, does that. I’m pretty confident I’m going the right way so I keep swimming. So far, the buoy always shows up (approximately/roughly/almost) where I thought it was.

10 Things

  1. silver flashes below me — fish?!
  2. a lifeguard’s voice through a bullhorn announcing the safety break (at 6:15) — I heard it as I swam parallel to the main beach in the long stretch between the second green buoy and the first orange one
  3. racing swan boats! — 3 or 4 of them off to my left as I swam toward the little beach
  4. a single sailboat with an orange sail
  5. a paddle boarder in the swimming area
  6. a vine wrapped around my shoulders, prickly and long — I didn’t want to stop swimming so I quickly ripped it off with my stroking hand
  7. crossing above the rope that is attached to the buoy on one end, an anchor on the other
  8. looking under the water and seeing the pale legs of a swimmer in front of me
  9. barely grazing the foot of another swimmer near the far orange buoy — did it irritate or surprise him? Did he think it was a fish or a swimmer or something else? Did he even notice?
  10. the diagonal line of swimmers taking the shortest and most direct path from buoy to buoy — seeing them on my left side every time I breathed, I could see elbows, forearms, the white of their spray, the green of their caps, the yellow of their safety buoys

Found this poem the other day:

Trust/ Thomas R. Smith

It’s like so many other things in life
to which you must say no or yes.
So you take your car to the new mechanic.
Sometimes the best thing to do is trust.

The package left with the disreputable-looking
clerk, the check gulped by the night deposit,
the envelope passed by dozens of strangers—
all show up at their intended destinations.

The theft that could have happened doesn’t.
Wind finally gets where it was going
through the snowy trees, and the river, even
when frozen, arrives at the right place.

And sometimes you sense how faithfully your life
is delivered, even though you can’t read the address.

I like trusting the world — not that I always do, but I’m trying to.

july 17/RUNSWIM

run: 3.05 miles
2 trails
60 degrees

Another cooler morning. Sun, low wind, good air. I’ve cut back on running this month because my left hip is tight and my left kneecap has been shifting in the groove a little too much. Plus, I’m swimming more. Oh, and I had to take several days off because of COVID. And then, of course, we (much more Scott than me) moved Scott’s dad out of his apartment and into assisted living. A strange month.

Listened to the cars, blue jays, a few rowers, and an adult instructing some kids on bikes — you’re biking uphill now, so you should shift gears for most of the run. For the last mile, I put in my headphones and listened to Camelot.

10 Things I Ran On/Over/Around

  1. soft, dry dirt
  2. grass
  3. concrete
  4. dead leaves, still intact
  5. dead leaves, half mulched
  6. dead leaves, mostly mucky dirt
  7. asphalt, only a few cracks
  8. asphalt, rubbled
  9. limestone steps
  10. tree roots

10 Living Things Encountered

  1. a runner with her dog on the winchell trail
  2. a walker from behind — excuse me excuse me right behind you!
  3. the voice of a rower drifting up from the river
  4. the voice of 2 women walkers drifting down from the road
  5. the fee bee of a black capped chickadee
  6. a group of bikers — an adult + several kids
  7. an older male runner
  8. a young female runner
  9. someone emerging from the porta potty, rubbing in hand sanitizer as they crossed the trail
  10. a screeching, moaning, whining voice coming from an alley — a raccoon? a dog? nope, a kid in a stroller

swim: 3 loops (6 small loops)
cedar lake open swim
79 degrees

A great swim! Not too windy or wavy or crowded. I barely saw the buoys but it doesn’t matter at cedar. People swim everywhere here. I thought I saw my shadow below me in the water. Is that possible? No fish, but a few birds. Every so often the sun reflected off the water and everything glowed. Today’s reason it’s wonderful to swim in the lake: I don’t need to SEE (as in, fine detail, fast focus, clear images) to navigate. And, my way of seeing — forms, relying on big landmarks, not panicking when things don’t quite make sense — helps me to see as good, or probably better, than most normally sighted people.

july 16/SWIM

4 loops
lake nokomis open swim
68 degrees
foggy and drizzly

Hooray for 4 loops! A few sprinkles before I started, then some rain while I swam. Difficult to tell that it was raining; I couldn’t see it dropping through the opaque water, but I did hear hit the surface. Felt strong and happy, not too sore. Every so often my knees would lock up, but my new trick of doing 2 or 3 frog kicks was all I needed to unlock them. The water was full of swells and rocked me back and forth. The last lap was the worst. With the small waves coming from behind, it was hard to get power with my stroke. I knew I was moving, but I felt like Shaggy running in place.

Swam 3 loops then got out of the water to make the long trek to the bathroom. Annoying, but even if I wanted to (which I don’t) I can’t get myself to pee in the lake. Nothing comes out. Got back in the water and felt strange — warmed up, floating through emptiness, hardly feeling anything

10 Things

  1. before starting: cold air and cold water
  2. a woman in a pink suit, bracing herself before running in the water, first yelling, I can’t do this! then letting out a battlecry as she dove in
  3. hazy, foggy, fuzzy view — I thought my goggles were fogged up, but it was just the moisture in the air
  4. the sound of someone letting the air out of their buoy after they finished
  5. feeling buoyant, on top of the water, fast
  6. a bright light off in the distance — a car’s headlights in the parking lot
  7. bright green arms — does someone have a green wetsuit?
  8. the first orange buoy at the other end of the lake far from me as I rounded the second green buoy
  9. an empty lake in front of me then suddenly a yellow buoy appeared (with plenty of time for me to avoid the buoy and the swimmer dragging it)
  10. waves rushing over me, into my side, from behind — sometimes I could see a light spray out of the corner of my eyes caused by my body crashing into the wave

An important thing to remember

This summer some bird that I don’t ever remember hearing before has been screeching regularly. A very irritating sound that cuts through everything else, especially when it happens over and over. Scott figured out what it is: a kestrel! Beautiful, graceful birds when they’re flying, but not when they’re calling out their warnings!

july 15/RUN

2.5 miles
mini marshall loop
70 degrees

Ran with Scott up the marshall hill to cleveland, then over to St. Thomas and back down to Cretin. We were planning to get some coffee at Black, but it looked very crowded. Instead we walked down the hill to Loons and got it there. We ran most of it, except for the stretch of hill from the bottom to cretin. We walked that section.

10 Things

  1. bad air quality from the canadian wildfires, 1: a strange orangish pinkish light
  2. bad air quality, 2: hazy over the river — the river was sparkling in the sun, but dulled, not sharp
  3. bad air quality, 3: a haze over the St. Thomas campus, like a strange fog, not thick but fuzzy
  4. interesting patterns on the water’s surface — little grids of waves from the wind
  5. crossing over to st. paul, the river was empty of rowers
  6. crossing back over to minneapolis, Scott mentioned there were rowers. At first, I didn’t see them, but a few minutes later, I noticed a bump in the water in my periphery. Rowers! Suddenly I saw them: 2 small shells with 2 people each off in the hazy distance — this is the strange way my vision works
  7. no bells at St. Thomas
  8. a woman, possibly drunk, singing dude looks like a lady and then yelling out (to us?), I paid for my kids to go to this school! I wanted to speculate on what she meant, Scott did not
  9. an irritating crosswalk that kept barking (in a low voice) wait wait wait but then, when the light changed, didn’t reciprocate go go go, but emitted a rapid series of sounds, making me imagine a round of bullets being fired but not think, Oh, I can walk now
  10. a grand house on cleveland being gutted but not torn down and replaced with an ugly, over-sized new house (nice!, we both agreed)

a life update for future Sara to remember

On Thursday and Friday, Scott and I were in Rochester cleaning out and giving away the last bit of stuff from his parent’s apartment: lamps, chairs, a desk, cleaning supplies, a couch. The end of an era, his mom dead, his dad now in assisted living in the twin cities. Strange to say good-bye to all of this and to be reminded of how little much of your stuff matters to others once you die.

july 13 /BIKESWIMBIKE

8.5 miles
lake nokomis main beach
70 degrees

I’m writing this several days later. Another nice, low-stress bike ride. Hooray for being able to see enough to bike to the lake when I want!

swim: 1.75 loops
main beach buoys, lake nokomis
70 degrees

Clear, smooth, empty water! Not too cold. A great swim. Encountered a few kayaks, but no fish or seagulls standing guard on the buoys. A couple planes passing above me. Near the end of the swim, two other swimmers joined me. I remember my mind wandered a lot and that I breathed every 5, except for the last loops where I breathed every 3 then 4, 5, 6 — each for half a loop. I felt strong and relaxed and pleased with myself for having fired up to bike over here and swim this morning.

When I arrived at the beach, the bike rack was empty. By the time I left, full. A group of kids, I think. Saw some of them on the beach but I’m not sure where the rest of them were.

july 12/SWIM

1 loop
cedar lake open swim
75 degrees

Swam with FWA. He decided that this would most likely be his last open swim — he finds swimming across the lake to be boring. I would have liked to swim more with him if he had liked it but I could tell he didn’t and it isn’t much fun for me either when he swims so leisurely and for so little — always only 1 loop. It’s difficult for me to swim that slowly; I find it boring too, and cold. Brr.

As we stood in the water, about to start, FWA noticed some fish nibbling at his toes. They weren’t that big, but much bigger than the little minnows I’m used to. After we were done, FWA told me about how a much bigger fish bumped into his side on his way across — the fish left a red mark! In the 10 years I’ve been doing open swim club, I don’t think a fish has ever bumped into me.

Anything else? The water was a little clearer, but I still couldn’t see much. No fish sightings. Passed over the vegetation growing up from the bottom. No planes or big birds or boats crossing my path.

The water was smooth and clear and felt good. I look forward to swimming a lot more loops when I come here next Monday!

july 11/RUNBIKESWIMBIKE

4.6 miles
bottom of franklin hill and back
63 degrees

What a beautiful morning! The first 3 miles of run felt good. When I stopped to walk up the last quarter of the franklin hill then started running again, my left knee and hip felt tight. I wonder if I need to cut back a lot on my running and focus on swimming and biking for the rest of July?

10 Things

  1. roller skiers! 15-20 of them all in a row — the clack of the skis, the click of the poles
  2. rowers! didn’t see them, but heard the bullhorn and the coxswain instructing the rowers
  3. a glimpse of shimmering water through the trees
  4. someone sleeping under the franklin bridge
  5. the sh sh sh of soft, sandy grit under my feet near the trestle
  6. several bikes flying past me on the way down the franklin hill
  7. greeting one runner as I passed him from behind — good morning!
  8. bright yellow and green shirts on runners I encountered
  9. a woman walker in a bright pink sweatshirt
  10. passing a woman running who was listening to some guy talking — was it Ant? Stage 10 of the tour de france?

That was difficult to come up with 10 things. Was it because the run was difficult? I’m distracted?

Listened to the traffic and my breathing as I ran north, Camelot as I ran south.

bike: 8 miles
lake nokomis
74 degrees

Biked with Scott to the lake. Nice! We took the trail on the way there, the streets on the way back. The streets were less fun — too many bumps and holes that I couldn’t see. Just a reminder that I bike so well on the trail because I’ve memorized the path, every curve, crack, bump.

swim: 3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
75 degrees

The first loop was smooth, fast, no swells. Excellent. But by the time I started the second loop it started to become choppy. No worries. I happened to notice that they had placed the first green buoy out farther than they usually do. Nice — since I saw it, I didn’t get off course at all. I might have seen a few silver streaks below me in the water — fish?! Saw some swans, lots of yellow buoys tethered to swimmers, a couple planes. No ducks or seagulls or geese.

favorite stretch: after rounding the last green buoy, swimming parallel to the beach, heading towards the first orange buoy and the start of another loop. Such a cool sight, seeing the orange buoy far off.

Glad I only did 3 loops. As I exited the water, I realized it was raining — sprinkling. It’s funny how hard it is to tell that it’s raining when you’re swimming.

Anything else? Only remember feeling/seeing vegetation once: at the start of the swim, heading towards the orange buoy for the first time, I crossed over some milfoil growing up from the bottom.

An excerpt from a new book, Elixir, about water: In the Ladies’ Pool

july 10/BIKESWIMBIKE

bike: 8.5 miles
lake nokomis
77 degrees

An easy, not scary, bike ride. Was passed by 2 people — one didn’t say on your left, the other did but passed while another bike was approaching from the other way. Stewed over it for a minute, then let it go, happy to be able to see enough to still bike safely. The bike ride on the way back was good too. My left knee barely even grumbled!

swim: 1.5 loops
lake nokomis main beach
80 degrees

A beautiful, uncrowded morning for a swim! If only it had been a little less wavy. No whitecaps, but lots of swells. I was being rocked so much that when I stopped to check my watch after the 6th little loop, I felt dizzy and lightheaded. I swam to shore to stand on solid ground for a minute.

There were a few boats nearby — 2 kayaks + a swan. No other swimmers or paddle boarders or fish. One time, as I swam north, I saw something out of the corner of my eyes, just behind me. I thought it was another swimmer about to pass me, but it was only a wave.

Lots of military planes roaring above my head.

For future Sara to remember: currently reading Less / Andrew Sean Greer (audio book) and The Memory of Animals / Claire Fuller (ebook). Both great in very different ways. Less is strange and fun, tinged with some sadness and regret. The Memory of Animals — about a pandemic much worse than COVID — is scary and unnerving and captivating.

july 9/SWIM

3 loops
lake nokomis open swim
70 degrees

Windy, with lots of swells. Swimming towards the little beach, it was difficult to breathe on my right side. Then rounding the final orange buoy, it was difficult to breathe on my left side. For most of the return trip, all I could see was pale water — light yellow? brown? not blue. I always managed to see other swimmers before I got too close to them — a slash of yellow or red or pink. Didn’t see any silver flashes below, but saw one plane up above. The idea of trees everywhere, on the edges. A few menacing swans.

A good swim. No calf cramps. My left knee locked up a few times, but all I had to do to unlock it was a couple of frog kicks. Near the end of the second loop, my fingers were getting numb from the cold.

most memorable stretch of the swim

Rounding the far green buoy near the big beach, swimming parallel to the shore. Occasionally, the idea of ORANGE off in the distance (the first orange buoy marking the beginning of another loop). Swells from behind were pushing me along when I angled my body in just the right way. When the angle was off, it felt like the water was trying to suck me down — or, maybe it felt like the water fell away and there was no resistance for my hand to push through. So hard to stroke, to move. Flailing, but not in a frantic way. Suspended.

Anything else? No seagulls, no fish, no dragonflies, no sailboats getting too close to the course. No strange squeaks or screams or shouts. Sometimes I breathed every 5 or 3, but mostly I breathed every 4. 1 2 3 4 breathe right 1 2 3 4 breathe right

Carl Phillips

About this Poem

There’s the usual kind of swimming—as in, through water—and then there’s that swimming that the mind always seems to be doing, I find. This poem feels to me a bit like both things, the combination of thrill and fear when there’s finally no land in sight.”

about “Swimming” / Carl Phillips

Immersed. Overwhelmed. Experience an abundance or overabundance of.

july 8/RUN

4 miles
marshall loop (cleveland)
66 degrees

Another beautiful summer morning: cool, quiet, not too humid or crowded. My quads and knees are still a little sore, and I was a bit stuffed up, but mostly I felt fine. Ran up the marshall hill, only stopping briefly for a red light near the bottom. Had a green light that was about to turn at the top so I sprinted across the street, then kept going.

Saw the river today as I ran over the lake street bridge. All I remember is seeing some rowers — 2 small shells. What color was the water? Was it flat? smooth? sparkling? I have no idea.

Anything else I remember? Noisy birds, bikers, pairs of runners, voices drifting across Summit avenue from some building at St. Thomas.

Carl Phillips

This morning while drinking my coffee, I came across a link to a PBS interview with one of my favorite poets, Carl Phillips. Maybe I should study Phillips for the rest of the month? I’d like to revisit his collection of essays about writing (My Trade is Mystery), and spend time with some more of his poems, like this one:

Western Edge/ Carl Phillips

I need you  
the way astonishment,  
which is really just  

the disruption of routine, 
requires routine.  
Isn’t there 

a shock, though—  
a thrill—  
to having done 

what we had to? 
Unequally, but 
in earnest, we love 

as we can,  
he used to mumble,  
not so much his 

mouth moving,  
more the words  
themselves sort of  

staggering around lost  
inside it . . . Now 
show me  

exactly what 
you think being brave 
is.

What is it to be brave? Often, I bristle at anyone describing my ways of adapting to losing my vision as being brave. Resourceful, resilient, creative sure, but brave?

What is it to be brave? For the past few months, Scott and I have been watching Escape to the Chateau. One of the main “characters”/actual people, Angel/Angela, calls the gloves she wears whenever she cleans or sorts through very old things, her “brave gloves.” While sorting through stuff in the 150 year old attic — I’m glad I’m wearing my brave gloves today!

What is it to be brave? Why does Alexi Pappas title her memoir about running and training and depression, Bravey? What is a bravey?

What is it to be brave, and how is that connected to courage — and what type of courage? I’d like to reread a paper I wrote way back in 2001 or 2002 about redefining courage.

COVID DAY TEN

Almost done with masking in the house! I’m feeling mostly normal; just a little too much crap in my trap (snot). Scott has lost a lot of his sense of smell and taste, but I haven’t/didn’t.

july 7/BIKESWIMWALKBIKE

bike: 8.5 miles
lake nokomis
65 degrees

Biked with Scott over to lake nokomis for open swim. I knew it would not be crowded and that I wouldn’t have any problems avoiding people. I was right. A (mostly) easy bike ride. I could see the trail, didn’t have to make any dangerous passes. On the way back, my left knee started hurting again. I’m sure it’s related to the strange knot/ball I have on the inside of kneecap and how I have difficult stretching to touch my toes with my left leg bent.

swim: 1 loop
lake nokomis open swim
68 degrees

Windy. The water was very active — not rough and choppy, just full of swells. Difficult to breathe to my left. I thought about doing a second loop — I was intending to — but my calf had a little twinge and my legs felt weak, so I decided not to risk getting a leg cramp in the middle of the lake — no thanks! — and stopped at one loop. I’ll swim again on Sunday and do 2 or 3 or more loops then. What do I remember from the swim?

10 Things

  1. the taut rope stretching at a diagonal from the lime green buoy to below the water — swimming a tight turn around the buoy and swimming just above it
  2. the fuzzy flash of the overturned safety boat near the little beach
  3. the view above: water trees sky a few random flashes
  4. the view below: emptiness
  5. a flicker of pink ahead of me — someone’s cap
  6. a slash of orange to the side, a few splashes — another swimmer wearing an orange safety buoy
  7. being gently rocked by the waves
  8. feeling heavy, my hips and legs not wanting to float
  9. 2 swimmers standing near shore, taking a break between loops, taking about the course
  10. a tiny twinge in my calf — not a sharp pain, but a gentle reminder: maybe you should only do 1 loop today…remember what happened that time you did too much and your leg knotted up?

walk: 45 minutes
around lake nokomis
70 degrees

After my swim, we had a small lunch at the new restaurant at the lake, Painted Turtle. Excellent. Then we took a walk around the lake, stopping to sit at a bench to watch the birds, the water, the boats. We took the dirt trail under the bridge and over to the other side of lake. Here it feels more like a nature trail, with giant dandelions, excessive amounts of lily pads, and even more birds. Favorite sight: a medium-sized dog proudly carrying a huge stick in their mouth.

COVID DAY NINE

Felt a little snotty this morning — not stuffed up, just needing to blow my nose a lot. A little drained. Otherwise, fine. Managed to keep a big distance between myself and anyone else. Plenty of room in the water to avoid others, lots of empty grass right next to the trail when we were walking.

july 6/RUN

4 miles
minnehaha falls and back
65 degrees

A cool morning. Great for running! Ran a little longer than yesterday. Started on Edmund but crossed over to the river road trail at 42nd. Felt good on the way there, a little tired on the way back.

Encountered walkers with dogs, a roller skier, some bikers, a noisy truck, a few other runners. Thought I heard a little voice at the falls say, she can’t hear me! Imagined she was talking about me. Wondered what she might have said, then imagined responding playfully, yes I can! A few minutes later, walking up the hill, I watched that little girl and at least one adult almost get stuck, trying to pedal a heavy surrey up the steepest part. I considered stopping to give them a push, but I thought it would be better to keep my distance. Gave a woman directions to the pool at Wabun. Avoided tree roots, wiped the sweat from my face, wasn’t able to see the river — too far away.

Listened to cars passing by and the strange rumble, buzz, whirr of a giant machine running south. Listened to “Camelot” heading north again.

COVID DAY EIGHT

Feeling mostly okay, just a lingering cold — not stuffed up, but needing to blow my nose a lot. Ready to be done wearing a mask in the house. Just a few more days! Could I possibly still be contagious?

Today is Scott and my 27th wedding anniversary. Because we’re still both sick, I don’t think we’ll be doing anything fun. Bummer. Oh well, at least we can quarantine together.

july 5/RUN

3.1 miles
turkey hollow
68 degrees

A beautiful morning! Birds, sun, breeze! Ran twice as much today as I did yesterday. By the end, my legs felt like rubber, but my breathing was okay and I didn’t feel light-headed. I’m continuing to avoid people by running in the dirt trail between edmund and the river road.

10 Things Heard

  1. cardinals
  2. black-capped chickadees
  3. crows
  4. blue-jays
  5. robins
  6. kids playing at minnehaha academy — laughing, yelling, clapping
  7. blasting from a radio: “HandClap” from Fitz and the Tantrums
  8. the wind in the trees making the leaves shimmer
  9. construction sounds: rumbling, scraping, buzzing, roaring
  10. [put in “Camelot” for the last mile]: “I Wonder What the King is Doing Tonight,” “The Simple Joys of Maidenhood,” and “Camelot”

COVID, DAY 7

Physically, I’m almost feeling normal. Mentally, I’m tired of this strange isolation and nowhere-to-go-ness.

Duh: So, even though he tested at least 4 times and got a negative result each time, Scott has COVID. Last night’s 5th test was positive. We both should have realized that, with his symptoms and contact with me, he had to have it, but my very first test was instantly positive so we assumed that if he had it, his would be too. He wasn’t quarantining, so we’re hoping the kids won’t be getting it next.

In related drama: FWA has his driver’s license behind-the-wheel test in Austin today. For a few dark moments last night, we thought he might have to cancel it, which could mean waiting months for another testing time. update: He passed!

current mood: worried (about an ailing parent and unmotivated (or differently? motivated) kids, being an irritating Mom) + impatient (can this quarantine be over, please, I want to go back to open swim)

Found this poem this morning. Reading this first verse, I already liked it, but when I read the “about this poem” section, I fell in love with it.

Oak Skin/ Kris Ringman

Every wood I’ve stepped into
has a watchful crone, a witch whose skin
resembles the bark of an ancient oak. 

She spins her wool by moonlight,
she threads her fingers through the moss,
and knows exactly which mushrooms to pick. 

I don’t need my hearing to feel the changes
in the wind when she slips out of the gaps
between the rocks and the trees, her voice 

I feel in the roots I step on, in the stones
I try to avoid with my bare feet that always
manage to bruise me, test the calluses I’ve grown 

with each stride I’ve taken through these trees.
I’ve sung to her beneath the arms of the beeches
reaching towards the birches, though she never 

listens to me. I imagine she laughs at the tune
I cannot keep, before moving on, gathering weeds
by the stars, mixing potions to use on people 

like me, who would walk into her arms gladly,
wishing she were an old aunt I could visit to learn
everything about this world she keeps to herself.

About this Poem

“As I slowly lost my hearing from the age of six until twenty-one, I spent more and more time in the woods and wild places where my deafness has never mattered. This poem is a homage to those places that I am still enthralled with and the never-ending magic of the forest I wish I could learn and share with other humans.”
—Kris Ringman

Yes! I go to the gorge/the river/the lake because my vision loss doesn’t matter there. I’m not constantly reminded of its loss or my limitations. On the trails I know so well, I can see or, when I can’t, I don’t need to.

july 4/RUN

Today, on COVID DAY 6, I went for a short run!

1.3 miles
neighborhood
70 degrees

Since I’ve been feeling better and restless, I decided to try a little running this morning. The goal was a mile, but I ended up doing a little extra. I was worried that I might have trouble breathing, but I didn’t. It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t too hard either.

10 Things (5 present, 5 absent)

  1. At the end of my block, a bird shrieking non-stop, like an alarm. It kept circling above me and shrieking, almost like it was calling out, away! away! away! For a few seconds I wondered if it was going to swoop down and attack me
  2. plastic pipes lining the sidewalk — part of the sewer project they’re doing all summer. Each pipe connected to the next with black cable-ties
  3. the hollow sound of my foot stepping on the wooden platforms placed over the pipes
  4. my favorite halloween house, still for sale
  5. one runner slowly approaching to my left, breathing heavily. He was very slow. I crossed over to the other side of the road, hoping that would make it less irritating (nope). I slowed way down, almost walking, so he could finally pass
  6. no bikers
  7. no rowers
  8. no roller skiers
  9. no river (too far to see it + forgot to even glance across the road in its direction)
  10. entire stretches of the route lost, forgotten — no memory of running past cooper field or the half-finished house that was abandoned for years then finished and now for sale for $800,000

COVID update

Feeling much better. A little stuffed up, but otherwise fine. It’s strange to feel almost normal but still have to mask and quarantine. Tedious. Disruptive. I wonder when I’ll stop testing positive?

2 things to remember

1

Found this list of 5 nature memoirs to check: The Best Nature Memoirs. When I’m done with Sharpe’s Ordinary Notes, I’d like to return to one book on the list — Savoy’s Traces, which I’ve tried to read a few times already. It’s on the Libby app.

2

A note from Christina Sharpe’s amazing book, Ordinary Notes, about the need for white people to shift from guilt to grief, complicity to relation, detachment to entanglement:

a screen shot of Christina Sharpe's Note 46

july 3/COVID DAY 5

technically it should be day 4 because the first day of symptoms is day 0, but it makes me more hopeful to imagine today as day 5.

Woke up feeling closer to almost not sick. No fever, only a little congestion, not too achy. As I write this, it’s 5:00 pm and I’ve spent much of the day outside in my red chair under the shade of the crab apple tree. It’s been 92 degrees all day. So hot! Still better than being cooped up inside. I finished listening to The Covenant of Water — loved it — and am continuing my reading of Christina Sharpe’s Ordinary Notes — wow!

An interesting twist: Scott does not have COVID — he’s taken 3 or 4 tests in the past few days — but he’s sick. Had the chills last night, a headache, was stuffed up. What? Very strange and unfortunate. If he had COVID we could quarantine together.

I decided to take another COVID test today, hoping that somehow it might have already passed totally through my system. Nope. Still got it.

This morning after finishing my coffee, I re-memorized Ed Bok Lee’s “Halos.” Such a great poem about vision loss!

Tonight, we set up a tv outside in the backyard and watched stage 3 of the tour together while we ate dinner. Our first dinner together since Thursday night.

current mood: it’s only day five!?; grateful that it didn’t settle in my chest; more restlessness — I told Scott that this might be the longest I’ve gone without a substantial walk/exercise in a decade.

july 2/COVID DAY 4

Woke up restless. No more fever, but everything seems fuzzy — that’s probably just my vision. A slight sore throat, a little stuffed up.

Had a little more energy than yesterday so I took Delia on a short 10 minute walk; gathered clothes, brought them down to the basement and started the laundry; made myself some scrambled eggs; closed all the windows and turned on the air. Too much. Suddenly it became harder to breathe. I sat in my chair and focused on deep breaths for several minutes. My fingers and toes felt tingly — anxiety, or not enough oxygen? No fun.

In the past, when I’ve had colds, I’ve always run through them. Usually I feel better when I’m running. Not this time. I think I’ll just sit on the couch in my room or outside on my red chair for the rest of the day.

So far, COVID is manageable, but it’s a drag (or a d-r-a-g drag, which I started saying a few years ago and now can’t stop).

Current moods: acceptance, a willingness to endure and get through
Activities: watching Le Tour, finishing up the audiobook, The Covenant of Water, sleeping

july 1/COVID DAY 3

For future Sara, I’m documenting my mostly mundane COVID experience.

day one, my birthday: I woke up feeling agitated — unsettled, anxious, uncomfortable. I went for a 2 mile run with Scott without any problems. A few hours later, my throat started to hurt a little, which was concerning and added to my agitation. I swam three loops (2 miles) without any problems at the lake for open swim. Finally checked my temperature: 99.5. Slept on the couch.

day two, june 30: Slept okay. Woke up, got coffee, went back to sleep for several more hours. Took a COVID test mid-morning. I already knew the answer: positive. Slept the entire day, only waking up to take another dose of NYQUIL. Felt feverish, whoozy, not wanting to do anything but sleep, which I did. Low fever (99-100) all day. Ate a little food, drank some water.

day three, today: Woke up with a raw throat. Hurts to swallow, a feeling I despise. Felt less feverish, a little more like myself. Still tired, sleeping off and on, but also restless — thought about walking on the treadmill for a little while to get my restless body moving but didn’t. Sat outside in my red chair twice to get some fresh air and vitamin D. Mid-afternoon, my throat only hurts slightly. Still have a 99+ fever.

It’s surprising to everyone in the house that I’m the one that got COVID. Me too. In the 2-5 day window of infection, I was only in 3 stores and one other public building. Scott was in these buildings too. Why doesn’t he have it? One theory: he didn’t get it, but carried and spread it to me when he played for the musical last Saturday.

One other thing to note: I’m quarantining in our bedroom, only leaving to go to the bathroom, or out in the backyard. When I need something, I text Scott or one of the kids and they leave it outside my door. I mostly communicate with them by text or through masks and closed doors. I’m starting to feel isolated and it’s only day two of my quarantine. Also, I can see how the need to rely on others to get you everything will start to become a drag soon.