This seems like a good reason to write

Another round of posts started and orphaned in the "not published" state; I'm just so wishy washy, I can't even commit to a freakin' blog post.  Thanks to Theia for the kick in the pants, I'll use this post to participate and to share some other random happenings.

First to oblige my selection by Theia, seven random things about myself...

1. I really like the number 3 but sometimes I have a hard time writing it, like my fingers/hands don't work and I have to really think about it.   Please diagnose me, what am I dying of?
2. As a child I wanted nothing more ... absolutely nothing more than to have long hair.  That would never happen under my father's rule of "keeping it short, keeping it easy" so I often wore a yellow towel on my head, secured by bobby pins or a rubber band.   Yellow was necessary b/c I also wanted to remain a blonde.   My siblings had similar strategies and used slips, pantyhose (that's a weird word), etc. 
3. In a desperate attempt to live on extremely meager earnings the summer between my junior and senior years in college, I lived on a package of hot dogs and some grapes for an entire week.   Chew slowly, the food will last longer.   
4. College friends of mine and I thought up a delivery service of 7-11 Big Gulps (or Super Big Gulps, for an additional charge) for Saturday & Sunday mornings to all our hungover college friends and roommates.  Program never got under way as we were always in that same hungover crowd.
5. From years of traveling to the suburbs of Chicago for a big volleyball tournament each year, our family has a favorite truck stop along highway 55; eh yeah I guess we're truck stop people.   Stop by the Dixie Travel Plaza if you're ever on that stretch of I-55.
6. Some of my favorite smells are found at any construction site:  cement, wet rock, freshly cut 2x4s, dirt. Don't even get me started on all the chemical smells I adore.  
7. Just last week, a crowd of us were at a bar on 23rd St and ended up getting a picture with the Cowboy from the Village People; he definitely wanted the photo to be taken more than any of us.

As far as other non-random stuff, life chugs along.  I'm feeling entirely uncommitted to anything lately, which for me only differs slightly from unmotivated.   I feel like I'm in a better place than a few months ago, mentally, but little has really changed physically.   Part of this is b/c I haven't pushed myself back into training for anything in particular despite having the Houston HM on my schedule.  At this point it's me being stubborn towards me, and lazy ... lots of lazy.   I need a huge kick in the ass!

So there's that, just a small slice of the randomness I offer the world.  

Attn Runner Army, Beer Running Season is Upon Us!

It's getting to be that time of the year when most runners are readying for some off-months from serious training, recovering from recent marathons, triathlons, etc and looking to spend morning hours of the weekend doing something besides logging miles and miles of a long run.   Well look no further, beer run season is upon us!   If you're in the NYC area you've likely already attended at least one of Runner Army's various booze and/or food related running excursions and if you haven't, here's your chance.   And for the hoards of you running the NYCM, the timing could not be more perfect...

On Saturday, 11/12 at 11:30 come meet all your running friends at Brooklyn Brewery and spend the afternoon running about Brooklyn and ending back at the brewery for some delicious malted beverages.  The event is run by City Running Tours and this particular event will be celebrating their 2nd anniversary (which likely means cool schwag!)

All about City Running Tours and in NYC with full details and sign up here

Think of it as a warm-up for Claire's next beer run (12/3) and for what will likely be a repeat of last year's New Years Eve doughnut run.  

Hope to see you at the event!

Growing up with Jeff

The number of times my Mazda 323 (affectionately known as "Eggie", RIP) and I made the 300 mile trip between Chicago & St. Louis along highway 55 in the years 1997-2000 has to be in the hundreds.  Or so it felt.  We'd pretty much go on auto-pilot, left hand contained a large coffee and handled steering, right hand dealt with shifting and keeping the tunes going.  Most often I drove only in the company of Jeff.  Jeff Tweedy.

We'd been friends since before college, he then in Uncle Tupelo and me under-age drinking, playing volleyball and collecting a paycheck from Imo's pizza.  Both being from the greater St. Louis area, he on Illinois side of the Mississippi, we had our Midwestern roots in common & shared some of the same hobbies like going out on the Landing & hitting up the gambling boats.   By the time I was in college, he'd formed a new band, Wilco, but many of his lyrics' themes remained and certainly the ties to America's heart land.  I took comfort in hearing those twangy but rocking beats and felt our friendship was solid.  I wasn't wrong.  As he and his band mates grew in popularity they moved to Chicago and identified with that being more of their hometown; this worked out perfectly for me as I also moved to the Windy City after college.  We'd see each other from time to time, often at the Riviera and smaller venues in the Chicagoland area and around Southern Illinois.  But once...  once at the most amazing of shows ever, at the now defunct Lounge Ax on Lincoln, it was like being in the living room catching up with your friends and listening to some amazing music; I still have a cassette tape of the show recorded off a DAT tape.  If only I had a sweet Walkman so I could actually listen to it.

Eventually I moved to NYC and we saw each other less but I kept up with his latest releases and caught a show whenever Wilco was in town. I can't help but feel like I grew up with Jeff and his various band mates and just as their music has evolved so have my expectations of the newest albums ...but man oh man, the older stuff can twist my heart up in an instant.  To this day, listening to Summerteeth's Via Chicago transports me back to my days along highway 55 and so many of the other songs bring about a deep emotional response.  And so I was beside myself, last week, when after selling out both shows in Central Park at Rumsey Playfield, they released additional tickets.  Snagging up a couple quickly, J and I found ourselves in the middle of the park on a dark foggy night.  The skies hinted at rain but it never came, instead the familiar lyrics of an old friend filled the wind and filled my heart with a little of what I'll always miss of the Midwest.

Go get yourself some of Illinois's best... The Whole Love is available in iTunes now!

If not now, when?

"To be alive is to totally and openly participate in the simplicity and elegance of here and now" - Donald Altman

Days, weeks and months pass just as they did before, just as they have for the last 30+ years of my life.   It's different but it's not, it's scary but it's not.  I guess I'm thinking more of the quality and content of those days, weeks and months more and from a different perspective.  You'd think that in doing so some introspection would occur as well.  Well, you'd be wrong.  The thoughts aren't of the quality of my life but rather that of my father. And while it seems an easy conclusion to draw, it wasn't until my Monday morning running buddy, TK, said so did I know it to be obvious & of course true.  It's so much easier to focus on someone else, their needs, the support required for them than to look inward.  My family is pretty much the best of the most kick ass people I've ever known.  We're loud and dysfunctional as all hell but we've always got one another's backs and we can organize like no other.  You throw a task down and it's CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!  So while we're all moving forward in our new daily reality, each with our own facet of the challenge well underway, I've completely lost touch of just how much of my own stuff I've let fall away.

As any runner will tell you, we're big eaters, but because we're often in motion it all balances out.  I'm no different; sure there may be times after a big race or maybe when injured that activities don't exceed intake and a little weight is gained here or there but soon enough the balance is restored and all is right with the world and its supply of cupcakes & salty snacks.  Given my lack of doing much of anything, I'm both up in weight and down in activities; this needs to change.  A couple weeks ago I joined some friends and family to compete in a game-like contest of building better habits, dropping the crap and losing some tonnage.  Things are looking up thus far although they'd speed up a bit if I were to get back to building some mileage.  And thus why I'm posting here, I need just a touch more accountability.  I may also need to do something more drastic, like commit to a race before the year's up, something with some distance ... any suggestions?   In the meantime here's to running more on a daily basis & to refining my skillz on the kickball field (yeah, I joined J's team ... eeps!)

Coming up:  an overdue recap of the Spartan Race, and both the Fifth Ave Mile & a cool performance in BK

Swimming in the deep end

It would be safe to consider myself a swimmer.  Not of any competitive caliber, and expecting to win, but a strong, adequately able swimmer.  I can be away from a pool / lake / other body of water for years but once back in it's like I never left.  I've never felt intimidated by water, never feared it or felt like it would ultimately be the end of me.  On the contrary, it's quite like a cocoon.   A safe, warm place where I have fond memories of both solo adventures and time spent with family & friends.

Although I haven't been swimming lately, save for one trip for some laps a couple weeks ago, I feel like I've spent a good amount time mimicking that environment in my mind.  In the water, alone, I set the mood and the deeper I get, the further away from any source of light, the more it seems I may just not need the light.  The dark is comforting and tempting ... "stay here, don't fight it, you need nothing else."  Why would I leave and have other forces try to impress the light upon me?  I control this, I need no one else, I'm better off in the dark and so I dive deeper.   Deeper still.

I'm not used to a world of just dark, it's not where I reside most of the time and while comforting, it still scares me.   And so I welcome those beacons in the back of my mind making themselves known, "just how deep is this pool?" And then I immediately come up for a breath, a deep full breath.

I've been living in fear for the last several months, my father's diagnosis has left a large mark on my day-to-day and trying to move on with life, as he has, seems impossible to me most of the time.  My mind cannot focus and most activities have been deprioritized; among them being all of those things that would normally challenge me out of a dark mood, running being highest on that list.  I find it no coincidence that I recently came across this passage, without outwardly looking for it.

Today if you feel limited by your fear, remember: You can assume the worst and allow that to keep you paralyzed, or you can decide to stop wasting your energy analyzing evidence, and focus instead of creating possibilities.

Like watching grass grow

Quiet and relatively uninteresting times around here, running-wise. There have been a couple inflection points in the form of Reach the Beach (for which I feel I'm much too late to recap) and the first in the summer series of XC 5Ks in Van Cortlandt.  Both were fun experiences, challenging and sparks to my training schedule.  I'm definitely going to get up to the Bronx for more of that summer series and have also signed up for the Fairfield HM in late June, more to keep me out of any comfort zone.  Because let's face it, base building isn't the height of challenging, sexy or exciting and so most of my weeks look the same with only a slight increase in volume from week to week and not much fluctuation in paces.   At this point I have many weeks in the 40-50 mile range and am now increasing that to the 50-60 mile range.  Coach has me sticking with a plan that looks a lot like my build up to IL in May '10 although I'm going to try and incorporate more trail running & attempt to hit something a bit higher in my average MPW throughout the cycle, which means throughout the long and hot summer.  I'll be practicing my very best Fonzie & trying to stay coooooooool.  

Other highlights as of late, Memorial Day!!   Which, as we all know, is the unofficial season of outdoor cocktails and beers.  I tried my very best to represent and honor those whom have defended our country by visiting as many of NYC's outdoor patios & biergartens in a single 24 hour period as humanly possible.  And while I'll claim moderate success no summer is officially "on" until a visit to the original Bohemian Beer Garden in Astoria is made. 

And because this post is stupid, unorganized and not well thought out, if you want to read some great RTB recaps crafted by my teammates, check 'em out here and here.

I really Jean-Paul'ed that one

Spring into early summer line-up fails:  1
Maria:  0

Waking up in a panic with some vague recollection that the snooze button has been depressed, perhaps a number of times, is no way to wake up race morning.   Also, waking up a good 80+ miles from the start line without the required number of minutes between the present time and gun time to travel to said start line, is no way to wake up race morning.

Needless to say I didn't run in Philadelphia yesterday, I missed a great day of running and what looked like superb conditions for the Broad Street Run.   I also spent a nice chunk of cash on race registration and renting a Zipcar for a day I spent in and very near my apartment. 

I = loser