Ten Years Ago This Week

I was gestating, graduating, and drinking water. Shortly after this picture was taken, I packed myself into a big black tent (ok, it was a graduation gown), and waddled out into the sun.  About a week later, the first Sonar was born.  

Eglentyne in May 2000, nine months pregnant, on the way to the graduation ceremony for an M.A. at Penn State

They get bigger when I'm not looking

There will be a Sonar upgrade next week (aka Birthday), so here’s a quick, pre-upgrade update on the Sonars. Click the pics to make them bigger, unless you don’t want to. 

X5 It was a good day to read in the sunshine

Sonar X5 in a garden chair, in the sunshine, with sunglasses, reading Ghosthunters and the Incredibly Revolting Ghost by Cornelia Funke

X7 Go ahead, try to wash off the shaving cream, I dare you

Sonar X7, with shaving cream splattered across the front of his chest, and a funny look on his face, waiting to see if a classmate can wash away the rest of the soap with a squirt gun

X9 I used to think 1 mile was hard. Now I think 5 miles is tough.

A sweaty Sonar X9 after finishing the final segment of the Beach to Bay Relay Marathon in Corpus Christi, with his finisher’s medal around his neck

A Shout Out to Sonar X9 edition of 10 Things: Running

Tomorrow is Armed Forces Day in the U.S., a holiday to honor soldiers serving in our five military branches.  Corpus Christi, Texas will also host the 35th annual Beach to Bay Relay Marathon.  Teams of six runners, in the heat and humidity of the early Texas summer (with a threat of thunderstorms), take to the streets, traveling from North Padre Island, over the John F. Kennedy causeway bridge, through Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, and finishing at Cole Park in downtown Corpus Christi.  Each runner takes a leg of about 4 to 4.5 miles beginning at 7 a.m. and finishing when the last walkers and runners cross the finish line and stumble into line for beer and pizza.  

This is no little deal, my friends.  An astonishing 15,000 runners and walkers from all over the world are participating this year.  Among the runners are Sonar X9 and his team of classmates from school.  Eight fourth-graders (some will do their portions together), nine and ten years old, will run the course, each for the first time.  Am I proud?  Heck yeah!  Am I nervous?  Hell yes.  Ok, I’m actually a little scared.  But good scared, excited scared.  Amazed at the perseverance of these kids.  Hopeful that their hard work the past few months will culminate in a good experience for all of them.  

We asked Sonar X9 what it feels like when he’s running.  He said at some point, it feels like his brain is floating free, like his legs are moving by themselves and that they’ll just keep going and going.  How far will they go?  We don’t know yet.  Hopefully they’ll carry him safely through his 4.4 miles tomorrow.  

In honor of these eight kids with a running bug (and the other nearly 15,000 crazy people who’ll be on the course with them tomorrow), I’ve dredged up an old 10 Things about running.  Cheers!

Make a list 1-10.  Tell me, what are the first 10 Things you think of when I say the word RUNNING? Go!!

[Don’t worry, we’re not running out of room.  Just leaving a little breathing space.]

1.  Speed and exhilaration, thrill and fear (of falling, of hurting, of failing)

2.  Blood pounding

3.  Brain free

4.  Muscles sore, then stronger, with sharp edges.  I aspire to the use of the word “chiseled” in my dreams.

5.  Time.  Must squeeze and lever to make the time. 

6.  Energy.  Too easy to give in to other demands and not run.  But when I do run, there is so much energy and electricity. 

7.  Fleeing.  To escape. 

8.  Approaching.  To speed the arrival and diminish the anticipation. 

9.  Racing.  Myself.  A clock.  Other runners.  The pursuer. 

10.  The electric twitch of muscle fiber as it cools and slows and begins to unwrap and build new edges.  

Where will your list run?  

10 Things: Space

Ok, this would have been more exigent if I’d posted it the day I wrote it, May 4th, but don’t let that stop us!!

Make a list, 1-10, and write the first 10 things you think of when I say SPACE. Go!

[This space left intentionally unblank.]

1. Star Trek. Space, the final frontier. 

2. The vast emptiness of space. 

3. 2001: A Space Odyssey. 

4 The International Space Station.

5. NASA!

6. Virgin Galactic and the private space industry, especially the Spaceport near Las Cruces, NM.

7. Space Races, and hitting the moon with a calculator, some duct tape and a dream. Surely we can do that again?!

8. Virginia Woolf.  Personal Space and a Room of Her Own. 

9. The Space-time cotinuum and Star Trek (again). 

10.  Parking spaces and Joni Mitchell.

11. (I can’t stop here!!)  Is there space here?  Do we have room?

12.  Taking up space.  Not useful, at least not in that place or to those around it. 

13. The Space Bar I.  Star Wars and one of the most famous bar scenes in film. (You didn’t think I could do “Space” without Star Wars, did you?)

14. The Space Bar II.  At the bottom of the keyboard.  So useful.

15.  Spacers, between teeth or tiles or planks or people.

16.  Give me some space! I just need my space! Back off!  Get out of my personal space!  (Not you.  You stay where you are.)

17.  I have a space here, but do I have the time?

18.  Don’t space out on me.  I’ll stop now.  You put some space down there in the comments.  You don’t have to do 10.  Tell me your favorite though. 

Oh, and May the 4th be with you.  

10 Things: Excuses (A Very Special 10 Things, with Bonus Things)

You should read that title in the same voice as the ABC After School Special promos, because this one’s personal.  And maybe a little bit ruthless.  See what you think.

You may know that I aspire to be a novelist.  But for someone who would someday like to see her name in print (or at least on a Kindle with a real publisher’s name nearby), there has been precious little in the way of real-life writing going on around here.  I have a lot of excuses.  I’m going to tell them to you whether you want to hear them or not (though, if you don’t want to hear them, then you are free to leave).  I will also demonstrate how bogus these excuses are. B-O-G-U-S.  Chant it with me, all of you other procrastinator-writers and lovely friends.  

Do you have an aspiration or goal languishing in the kitchen junk drawer?  What are your favorite excuses?  Do this little exercise with me and maybe we can exorcise some excuses and get on with it.

Number a page 1-10 and write down the first ten things you think of when I say the word “Excuse.”  Go!!

1.  To offer or request pardon for a potential offense, especially one of manners or decorum.  “Excuse me.” “Please excuse Martha’s nosepicking.” (I’m channeling the dictionary.)

2. To grant sanction or pardon for an absence or other work or school behavior. “An excused absence.”

3. An explanation for a behavior, provided to procure pardon or justfy the behavior.  Usually does NOT adequately substantiate the behavior. “Making excuses.” “What is your excuse?”

STOP!  

This is the sort of “excuse” that’s troubling me.  Rewind.  Start again at one.  (Took me long enough to get here.)  GO!

1.  I’m too busy.  I don’t have enough time. (BOGUS: I have time to sit here and twitter and read, so surely there’s time to write in here.)

2.  I can’t concentrate unless the house is quiet/empty/clean/freshly painted/smaller/bigger/or it’s a different season. (BOGUS: just get over it.  Conditions were never perfect for a baby, and I had three of those.  Conditions will never be perfect for writing or anything else, so I just have to do it.)

3.  I have no good ideas, or I can’t sustain a good idea. (BOGUS: There are at least 10 full writing notebooks around here with ideas waiting to be explored.  I just have to do it.)

4.  I have to finish… knitting a baby gift, sewing a running belt, excavating the laundry room, baking brownies… (BOGUS: Those things come and go, don’t let them stand in the way of writing.  Especially if someone else can bake the brownies.  Thanks, babe.)

5.  I would rather… read this book, blog, twitterfeed.  (BOGUS: Maybe I’d rather do these things in the short term, but in the long run, the writing is what I really want to be doing.  All that reading will also enhance my writing and teach me things, so long as I don’t let the reading take up all of my time.)

6.  I’m committed to helping do… any number of things for my kids, for the school, for the community. (BOGUS: See #4 and Stop overcommitting yourself. “No” is a good word.”)

7. I’m tired.  (This one gets me, especially when coupled with…)

8.  I’d rather hang out with Dan and/or the kids, doing something fun, that doesn’t feel a little bit like scraping out the inside of my brain. (Still kind of BOGUS actually: The time I spend with them is so much more rich when I feel personal satisfaction.  I am also so much more sane when I write regularly, so they like me better when I’m writing too.)

9.  There’s too much crap on the desk.  (BOGUS: Ignore it or go to another table.)

10.  I’m too busy writing random lists of 10 Things. (BOGUS: The 10 Things are a warmup, a springboard for the more sustained projects.)

For me, a lot of these excuses apply to running as well.  I’m full of excuses and avoidance.  

Now it’s your turn.  What are your excuses??