Pre-Running

I’m following a plan from Runner’s World, which begins with eight straight days of walking. Then ten weeks of interval training, combining walking and running for 30 minutes, four times a week. In the beginning, it’s much walking and little running, but as the weeks progress, the ratios change until it’s half running, half walking. At that point, soul-searching determines whether to make the leap to a full 30 minutes of running or a repeat of the half and half. Anyway. Three days gone and I’ve walked every day, in spite of a nasty and fluctuating head cold that is now settling, against my wishes, into my chest. Gr.

My three day total is sixty minutes of walking, with a total of about 3.6 miles walked. Hoo rah.

Oh, and the other goals, hm, I’ve blogged or written very long email messages every day. And I’ve been in bed for at least eight hours the past two nights, though, due to aforementioned head cold, not slept a full eight hours either night. I’m trying. :)

It occurred to me as I was responding to Cass’s comment yesterday that I may not have been clear on the challenge I’ve set out for myself with this running thing.

I have never participated in organized sports. Or disorganized sports of any time. The one and only time I tried out for a team, was trying out for the Powder Puff football game in high school. I was one of only three girls cut. I took a tennis class in college. I liked it, but I can’t say that I really set the court on fire. I really enjoyed an aerobics class I took in college once, but I think I was more inspired by the hot, long-haired, rock-star looking instructor than anything else. The only physical activity I have stuck with for more than a couple of months is yoga. I participated in a class for nearly a year, and have maintained a spotty individual practice since then.

I don’t object to getting sweaty. I don’t even object to a little satisfying achiness after a good workout. So I can’t really explain the lack of athleticism in my life. The past few years, a lot of my physical energy has been spent on my small children. What with the incubation and the nursing and the carrying and the chasing (times three), I figured I was getting a pretty good workout, even if it was sort of random and varying in intensity.

All children weaned and walking responsibly now, I find myself feeling a little sluggish and looking for something physical to do. Hence the running. It’s cheap (I shelled out for some fresh Nikes [my olds ones were at least six years old, and a little weary feeling] and borrowed a stopwatch from my oldest child), so it doesn’t betray my goal to minimize my consumption. I can do it almost anytime and anyplace, which is helpful when juggling the schedules of three children and a partner who is often in demand outside of the work day.

It feels like a big deal to me, and I’m inordinantly proud and excited to be trying to run. Funnier now, don’t you think, that I’m less worried about the running goal than the sleeping goal?

Goals

Random though the beginning of a new year is, it’s a convenient time for new beginnings.

So here we are—da da da dum!—My goals for 2008. These are my personal goals, and are rather inwardly focused this year (and yes, I have included a cliched exercise goal here). I’m hoping, as a mom, that the residual effects of these practices will be good for my family as well. Sort of like putting on my own oxygen mask in an airplane depressurization before I assist those around me.

1. To write every day. Blog, free-write, handwritten letters, story planning. Something written. I’ve decided not to count email, unless it’s a post of significant length. This mainly because I want to have substantive writing each day.

2. To do some combination of running, walking, or yoga every day. The meta-goal here is fitness. Short term goal is to be able to run for 30 minutes four times a week (I’m building up to that over eleven weeks). The long term goal is going to be distance running. Perhaps a marathon next year?

3. To get enough sleep. To be in the bed for seven to eight hours every night. In many ways, this is the toughest one for me. I like staying up late. I like talking with my partner, chatting with friends, reading, knitting, sometimes watching a movie. In the quiet house. The one where the children are all sleeping. So it is very easy for me to stay up to midnight. This is not so good when I have to get up at six or six-thirty to get a child off to school. It’s also not so good for the influence it has on my partner, who regularly gets up at five. So (deep breath) I’m going to try to be in bed by 10:30 on school nights and 11:30 on other nights. This is the goal I have the most doubt about, honestly. I’m laughing at it right now.

Wish me luck.

How about you? Any goals you want to share?

Shh, what was that your life was saying?

Here’s a phrase to ponder:

“a suicide bomber detonated in a crowded marketplace today”

The phrase strikes me as odd, because it wasn’t the bomb that detonated. It wasn’t that the bomber detonated the bomb. I have an image of a person with no explosive materials strapped to his body, walking into a crowd of people and just… Boom. I’m not trying to be funny here either. In order for a person to willingly kill oneself as a suicide bomber, to kill oneself while trying to takea bunch of other people along for the ride, well, it seems to me that such a person might actually have to detonate inside in some way.

I have to work on this one, and verify the phrasing of the article.

In a completely unrelated context, I heard the phrase “Let your life speak.” It was identified as a Quaker saying. I have pondered it all day, marvelling at the lovely simplicity of it. Wondering how my life speaks for me. Paired with the suicide bomber, the phrase is really rather different. When he detonated, was that his life speaking? Or was that his death speaking? Are they separate?

Did the boy in Omaha today detonate too, with a gun instead of a bomb?

Nano Winner

Yesterday evening I reached the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000. That’s 50,000 words in 25 days. And I did it without neglecting my children or missing too much sleep. The general level of tidiness around here has not declined significantly.

I *have* neglected my knitting, which means that knitted Christmas gifts are unlikely.

But the knitting will have to wait!!

Though I’ve reached the 50k goal, my story isn’t finished yet, and I made a deal with Someone that I would try to do Double NaNo. Yeah, I think I’m crazy too. :)

Onward!

Random things

Not a deep blog. Too busy nanoing. Day 5 total: 18046.

Things that have been on my mind (in no particular order):

o Birthday gifts for seven year old girls
o “hip” (gag) mamaness and post-child sexual expression
o “human capital” —related to recent references on NPR in China, and in Mothering Magazine about human care
o Marathon training for the sedentary hausfrau
o Grace and Jeremy. Heartbreaking. The latter is too close in oh so many ways.