Reading, Running, and 'Riting

      I'm struggling to paint and draw this weekend. I tried to work on my acrylic piece yesterday and hated what I'd accomplished, so set it aside. Tried to sketch a little in my daily journal today and just couldn't produce more than a doodle of the three snail mail letters I have sitting here waiting to be answered. I just don't have it in me this weekend.      Yes, I am finally divorced after a year and a half of  waiting. The weight of the past twenty years, rather than at last washing away instead somehow feels like it's crushing me. Then Thich Nhat Hahn passed away early Saturday morning and I feel like I just can't get air into my lungs. So I've decided I'm going to take some time to just be and cry. A little. Or a lot.     I've watched a couple of the ceremonial videos from Plum Village in Vietnam as they prepare to lay Thay's body to rest. The Full Moon Temple packed with monastics chanting, paying...

      Along with the goals set for the new year, comes the time constraints of a typical twenty-four hour day and a seven day week. Five of those days spent working forty plus hours, another chunk devoted to house  work, weekly errands, taking care of kids and pets...less and less time is left for those things we actually want to do.      This year I want to run, paint, write, read, hike, bike, learn piano, learn another language, lose my COVID 30, race again, and maybe even date again--ha! I thought honestly about this today and it just overwhelmed me--how am I ever supposed to find the time?      Now, this time last year I was working almost sixty hours a week and stressed to the point of near nervous breakdown, so I'm very thankful to be back to a more reasonable forty-plus hour work week. And I  already get up at three each day so I have time to run and workout in the morning before hopping on the computer and diving i...

    It has been a very Monday Monday here today, just little things going wrong, one after the other. Things that make you feel stupid and brainless, but honestly things that  aren't your fault when others seem to think you're a mind reader. Left my psychic cap in bed this morning apparently...but anyway...     The good news is:           1. I ran this morning and didn't pull any muscles or pop any joints.           2. I messaged NRC's team on Twitter and they helped me figure out why the app wasn't tracking my            treadmill runs (you have to hold the phone while you're running--I always just let it sit up on the little ledge with my iPad...) but NOW!! Now it's tracking and giving me credit for the runs I'm accumulating for The Stack! I'm maybe a little too excited about this but after worrying that I'd have to sit out the rest of the month and miss the challenge, ye...

      Having a bit of a down week here. Monday morning during my run something popped in my left hip and along my thigh forcing me to stop the run, limping just trying to walk as the belt on the treadmill slowed its speed. I've been babying this leg all week, trying not to panic about running out of time to complete the NRC January Stack challenge if I'm not able to run the rest of the month. Even just walking on the treadmill, if I increase the speed too much I feel a strain from my knee up through my quad and hip.       Then Friday morning, walking Tucker to the park in the snow, my left foot found a hole, twisting my ankle as pain shot up the entire leg. Not what I needed. I've had an ice pack strapped to my thigh daily, attempting gentle stretches throughout the day but it's so hard to give myself permission to be still, to give my leg a chance to heal. And Saturday's morning errands, I somehow found the cart with a crooked wheel that forced m...

       I have given up making New Year's resolutions a long time ago. I mean, they never really stick anyway. After a week or maybe a few weeks if you're particularly strong willed, those vows made at midnight begin to fade away and old habits come sliding back in like a favorite pair of comfy old shoes. You know the ones, soft and all stretched out, slip them on and go. No one likes to fuss with unlacing, stretching, squeezing your foot in, struggling to pull the back up over your heel...too much hassle. And so it is with resolutions...we tell ourselves, "Maybe next year..."     I think a more positive way to begin a new year is to write down your goals, set some strong intentions, and wrap it up with a mindful mantra, or a simple Word for the Year. Last year my word for the year was "reclaim". I wanted to reclaim some of what I'd lost in the last few years of my marriage, the stress of separating, during a pandemic, starting a stressful new job ...

    If you're like a lot of us, you're still waging war against the pandemic pounds. The holidays certainly didn't help either. The fifteen pounds I'd managed to drop this summer was quickly reduced to ten and it feels like I'm back at square one again. Weight loss can feel like a never ending battle and being fifty-plus seems to make it all the more difficult.     One trick a lot of programs offer is a 'cheat day' or 'cheat meal' but that can lead to a very slippery slope. You may KNOW you're not supposed to indulge in sugary treats or fatty fried fast foods but,  really, the word "cheat" implies that maybe those no-no's are allowed at least in small quantities from time to time. Hence, cheat! It doesn't feel like cheating if it isn't otherwise 'bad', right?     So, it occurred to me that maybe we need to refer to these indulgence days as Treat Days instead. 'Treat' has a more positive  connotation and you m...

     I had been a Samsung Galaxy girl for as long as I'd owned cellphones and tablets. And I was hooked on their super cute fitness challenges that showcased animated worlds and races that were really fun and engaging. Then this year my kid converted me to IOS and I was sad to no longer be able to participate in the Samsung challenges. But  then last summer we indulged ourselves with Apple watches. Oh yeah, I'm a complete convert!     I am now addicted to closing all three rings every day and have to have perfect stand tallies-no missing blue dots on my line! But even better are the myriad badges you get to earn every week, every month, and then they throw in random challenges every now and then just to keep things interesting. Not missing my cute little Galaxy challenges quite as much anymore. And every new month's challenge is different than the previous, so you really can't get bored. Just look at these fun badges!     And, as a runne...

      All good book nerds enjoy setting new reading challenges at the start of every year. I've done some really fun A-Z challenges, Bingo variety, reading from different genres, the good old Beat the Backlist (even though I never make much of a dent in my backlist because new books just somehow keep finding their way onto my TBR.) My intention last year was just that, to clear out my bookshelves, read through as many of my paperbacks and then, once read, donate them to our office library at work. I did make a little progress but not nearly as much as I'd hoped.      One thing COVID has given me is an appreciation and greedy appetite for free e-books from the library. I had been a hardcore, in-hand book junkie for the greater part of my life. Until I took a serious look at the number of books I owned, calculated by how much each cost...that was a  real  eye-opener. Especially considering most books are typically only read once then passed alo...