Running for my life

 Today, after many, MANY months (ok it's been a year) of saying that I'm going to start the C25K training plan, I finally did it. I downloaded an interval training app to my phone and headed to a nearby park with a pretty good fitness track.
The park was packed to the brim with families, so I was prepared to totally embarrass myself in front of a large group of strangers, but you know what? Nobody paid much attention to me and I was too busy trying not to die to notice if they were.
Man, am I out of shape.
I knew it wouldn't be easy but I did not anticipate the pain involved in beginning a running program. Yikes!

I can easily ride my bike 10 miles and never tire, but jogging is an entirely different animal. The program I'm using calls for intervals of 5 mins walking and 2 mins jogging.
2 minutes doesn't sound like very long, now does it? Lemme tell you- it's like a lifetime when you haven't jogged in over 10 years, and you have the lung capacity of an asthmatic toddler. Not to mention forgetting to take both my Claritin and my reflux meds. By the time I finished this morning, I thought my throat was literally going to burst into flames. I did not enjoy 1 second of that. I love to walk, I will choose walking over driving somewhere any day of the week, but running? No. I'm only doing this because if I don't use it, I'm gonna lose it and that was never so apparent to me as it was this morning.

I remember when I was 19, I had moved back to California from Washington state and I had no car, so everywhere I went I had to walk or ride my bike. I look back now and I think I must have been in the best shape of my life because I remember distinctly, one evening just deciding to go for a run.
I got up, went out the door and ran around the park about a dozen times. 3 miles, just like that.
Not that I was quick or elegant, no, but I was able. Just to get up and decide "I'm a runner now" without any planning or worrying. And why can't I do that now? Because at some point I just stopped trying.
So now I have to work 5 times as hard to do something that once came easily to me.

My feet feel like lead, every step seems like more weight has been added and I'm almost positive that I can walk faster that I can run. The entire time I'm doing this (which feels like an eternity but in reality is only 20 minutes at most) I am loathing it. I can't even formulate a thought to describe how much I am despising myself during those 2 minute bursts because the blood is roaring so loudly in my ears that it's distracting me.
When I finish, I'm not even proud of myself.
All I can think about is how the day after tomorrow I have to do this all over again, and then two days after that and so on and so on, forever and ever.
But if I don't just bite the bullet and get my metaphorical and literal ass in gear, I'm going to lose the ability altogether and then where will I be? Stuck on the couch, a useless lump, while the world passes me by? That is unacceptable. That's not really living.
I can't just sit here immobile anymore, waiting for things to happen to me.
From here on out, I'm taking a different road.
No, scratch that- I'll take the jogging path.

She will know you

It's been four years, almost to the day, and I still remember the look on your face the last time I saw you. 

The family all gathered closely, like we have a tendency to do during times of great (and even small) importance. 

I held your hand for some time, listening to garbled blurbs and snippets of nursery rhymes that had long ago embedded themselves in your memory, searching for some kind of recognition.  

You smiled up at me and said "Hi, cutie!" before drifting back to incoherence........

As I type this, my heart beating solidly in my throat, I am thinking of my 4th child. 

My only daughter.  

The great-grandchild that will not have the memories of you that the other children have. 

My Leia.

She was born 1 yr and 5 days after you passed, Grandpa.  

She is amazing.  She is everything I never knew I was missing.

I wonder, if you'd have known her, would you have called her Rosebud like your father had called me?

Would you have looked at her and seen me in her eyes?  

Would you give her the gift of always knowing she was loved, the gift of a full heart in even the most troubling times, of a family that never gives up on her, and no matter what trespasses she committed would you always forgive her? 

I know the answers to my hypothetical questions. 

You were my Grandpa, and I did not know you as others may have. 

I only got the best of you, and so that is what I will give to my only daughter.

She will know you through pictures, and stories, and the dozens of corny jokes that I remember.

She will know that you were her Grandpa, and maybe someday, somewhere in the farthest reaches of the Universe, you will know her, too.

Exercise in the hood

I'm trying to be healthy and so far it's been a success, although at one point recently I did think I was going to die from lack of pastry.
I didn't, though.  I got in a brisk 2 1/2 mile walk which felt amazing since it was beautiful out yesterday.
The only drawback to walking around here is that I live in close proximity to the kind of neighborhood where you find a liquor store, gun store, pawn, shop, another liquor store........cat-calls & unleashed dogs of ginormous size.........you get the picture.

I'm going to have to plan that walk out a little better.  Luckily it's raining today so I'll be working out indoors.
Problem solved. For now.

Getting Started

My husband Jude & I have been talking for some time now about getting in better shape & eating a healthier diet.  We have this discussion all the time while doing things like eating homemade chocolate cake or pumpkin cookies, for example.
Neither one of us are in terrible shape but hey, we could all use a little improvement, right?
Not to mention that between the two of us we have 6 beautiful children ranging in ages from 2-13 years, and I'd really like to set an example of healthy living for them.
Plus, I want to live a LONG time because I am convinced that I will one day be the World's Best Grandma.
Yes, I know I'm only 30 but it's good to plan ahead!

Well, anyway, anytime Jude & I have a goal to meet, the only way we are able to stick with it till the end is through a good old Competition.
Last year was the "Great Hair War of 2009" in which we competed to see who could grow their hair the longest and maintain it.  I spent the entire year successfully growing my hair out from a super short pixie to a shoulder length bob, until Jude decided to cut his crazy, curly mane, then I promptly reverted back to my usual pixie self.
But the point is- it worked.
Competition works.
So we thought we'd take the same approach with diet & exercise.
Jude will be maintaining his own blog, which I'll link here and vice/versa.
We'll post healthy recipes, tips, personal anecdotes & musings during this journey.
Oh and pictures. There will be a lot of pictures.

Of course, there's always the chance I'll go off in a totally different direction at some point, but I guess you'll just have to keep reading to find out, won't you?
;)
Stay tuned!