Can do

This morning was the first Saturday morning in months that did not involve a crack-of-dawn alarm clock. The reason: no morning run on the schedule thanks to a bout of plantar fasciitis.

It's been six days of no running. By all accounts I should be going bonkers.

But here's the thing...
I stumbled across this quote and it has become my recovery mantra:

"When you catch yourself slipping into a pool of negativity, notice how it derives from nothing other than resistance to the current situation."
Donna Quesada, The Buddha in the Classroom: Zen Wisdom to Inspire Teachers

So...
I'm trying not to fight the situation.

• I can't run, but I can catch up on my reading goals for the year.
• I can't run, but I can spend an hour on my stationary bike in the cool sanctuary of my air conditioned living room.
• I can't run, but I can spend a morning preparing class materials for the start of fall semester.
• I can't run, but I can fill the refrigerator with fresh produce and make delicious meals like whole wheat pasta with broccoli rabe and spicy chicken sausage.
• I can't run, but I can sleep in one day for a change.
• I can't run, but I can go to yoga class for the first time since May.

There is only one "can't" but there are a whole lot of "can-dos."

(PS - Dear readers, please remind me of this mantra if I still can't run 3 weeks from now and the effects of good these intentions wear off...)

What can you do this weekend that makes you happy?

Thursday thanks

Today I'm thankful for "the foot that is up..."

Let me explain...

Just 12 days ago, Pensacola was underwater. Today I awoke to a breathtakingly gorgeous summer day - hot air, cool breeze, bright clear blue skies.

Similarly gorgeous, clear, blue day a few months ago

Walking along the north shore of Santa Rosa Sound, I could see for miles out across the water. Looking closely (glasses on, of course) I could pick out the Pensacola Beach "beach ball" water tower more than 5 miles away.

Neighbors said "good morning."

An osprey flew overhead.

My steps and my heart felt light to be surrounded by so much beauty.

With a day this perfect, it is nearly impossible to believe that bad weather has ever struck this part of the world, or that it will again. But, of course, it has - and it will. And in some ways, those dark days make the bright ones even brighter.

One of my all-time favorite quotes, from The Count of Monte Cristo, sums up this principle nicely:

“There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness.”
Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

I feel that way after a hard race or a long run. The last few miles are sweaty and painful - with blisters, quads, and lungs screaming equally for attention. But two hours later, when the running is over, and after a long cool shower, the feeling of being still is a kind of peace that has no equal.

"My head monk asked how it was walking. I said it hurt without shoes. And he said, 'It hurts on the foot that's down, but the one that's up feels really good - so focus on that one'."
Deepak Chopra (on preparing to be ordained as a Buddhist monk)

Today I'm thankful for the foot that's up.

What are you thankful for this week?

The Myth of Sisyphus

              Source: google.com via Justin on Pinterest

In Greek mythology, King Sisyphus commits treachery against the gods, and is condemned - for eternity - to roll a boulder up a hill, over and over again. Sisyphus toils as he pushes the boulder upwards, and just as he nears the top of the hill, the boulder rolls back down and he must begin again. The punishment of eternal, repetitive, fruitless labor was the worst torture the Greek gods could dream up.

Clearly this is where some clever devil got the idea for hill repeats.

This morning I headed out to a local park to practice the personal equivalent of rolling a boulder up a hill. I did a 1.5 mile warmup, then marked off a tenth of a mile, and proceeded to race up as fast as I could, turn, walk back down, and do it all over again. By the time I reached the top, I felt like I was going to hurl. By the time I got back down to the bottom, I recovered enough to repeat the drill again.

Sounds terrible, right?

Perhaps... Unless you're a runner or a fan of Albert Camus (or both). In his classic essay The Myth of Sisyphus, Camus writes:

"The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

And it's funny...
Because, twisted as it seems on the surface, I think Camus might be right.

I didn't "accomplish" anything this morning (if by "accomplishment" we're talking about a concrete, tangible result). But I did knock out my hill repeats at a 6:45 PACE!

And that was enough to fill my heart.

Maybe Camus was a runner?

Wet weather

Wringing the water out
of my rain-soaked shirt

I spent most of the last decade running in San Diego where, according to NOAA records, it only rains about 40 days/year and there's a good stretch of 3-4 months with no measurable precipitation at all.

Needless to say, I didn't add many rainy day runs to my life list when I lived there.

Florida, not surprisingly, has changed that situation right quick.

Today, with an 8-miler on the calendar, Hubby and I drove home from a blissful, sunny, 24-hour mini-vacation in Panama City Beach and drove right into a rainstorm. (Maybe I should have run before we checked out of the hotel? But the storm was heading toward us... Earlier departure = more dry driving time, and I hate driving in the rain.)

We got home, unpacked the car, and I surfed the weather radar for an hour. When I finally saw my opportunity -- no rain outside at that moment, and a clear spot on the weather map -- I laced up my running shoes and headed out.

Lesson learned: I was not cut out to be a meteorologist.

Within 2 blocks of home, the sky opened up. (So much for that clearing on the weather radar!)

I considered turning around and picking the run up again later, but really, the rain didn't hurt. And I don't melt. Plus, I have a streak to maintain, so I had to get in at least a mile.

Once I got used to the squishing, I realized that running in the rain is kind of fun. The roads were nearly empty. All the off-leash dogs were inside staying dry. The world was quiet. And I got to splash in puddles like a little kid.

I sloshed past a house where a woman was sitting on the porch, in a bathrobe, smoking a cigarette. I thought to myself:

I'll bet she thinks I'm crazy.
And I know I think she is.
To each their own...

I also wondered:

If I hadn't started out on this odd little holiday run-every-day streak, would I have braved the rain?

The answer is... I probably would have rescheduled. (San Diego turned me into a bit of a weather wuss.) So I'm glad I had an incentive to get out and run today, despite the rain. It was much more relaxing than I thought it would be.

Do you brave the elements, or do you head for the gym at the first sign of bad weather?

The things I carry

In this photo are four items that I always have with me when I run, and one that I never do. Can you guess which is which?

If you guessed that I ditch the phone for my runs, you'd be 100 percent correct. Yes, I know it's all beat to hell around the edges, but that's because I'm clumsy in general, not because the phone comes running with me.

I never run with my phone.

I tried once.

The result was less than optimal.

I carried my phone during a Rock 'n' Roll marathon, thinking it would help me locate my family post-26.2 miles. (It did.) However, my at-the-time landlord called me, repeatedly, mid-marathon. When I finally answered, he informed me that he was bringing a potential new tenant over to see my apartment THAT DAY. Despite the fact that it was illegal to not give 24-hours notice and that I was running a marathon, he insisted that he'd be bringing a stranger into my apartment in a few hours.

I was so angry, I ran faster. But that's the last time I carried my phone during a run.

Running is my away-time. I enjoy the hour (give or take) away from technological distractions and my OCD obsession with checking my email. (Yes, the phone is old and beat, but I have web access!)

In terms of concerns about running safety, I carry pepper spray. I figure that's a more effective deterrent than a phone, knowing that in a confrontation my hands might be too shaky to dial, but that pepper spray doesn't need a direct hit to work like a champ. (And hopefully you and I, dear readers, will never need to find out whether the spray or phone works better in a pinch.)

On the other side of the spectrum, I have seen runners not just carrying a phone, but full-on talking on the phone while running! And last week I caught sight of a woman running, talking on the phone, and walking her dog. Now that takes some skill. If it were me, I'd have dropped the phone while tripping over the leash... but I digress.

To be honest, whenever I see a phone-runner, a catty little voice in the back of my head thinks: "How can you be running hard enough if you're chatting? Put down the phone and RUN!" Then again, that's what people probably thought about me for answering my phone mid-marathon.

I should have turned it off.

What do you always/never carry on a run?

Do you ever run with a phone?

Yoga for free (seriously)

Thanks to Girl in the Pink, I just tried a free yoga podcast from Dave Farmar.

I've been practicing yoga for years... with more or less regularity. I am a firm believer that yoga makes my running better. (My IT band issues went away when I added low lunge and pigeon pose to my routine!) But I tend to be a practice-at-home girl, because, really, how many of us can afford to go several times a week at $10-20 per class?

Do you practice yoga regularly?

For most of this year I was lucky enough to have a free class available to me once a week. (Score!) But the teacher moved out of town in June, so I have been in a bit of a yoga slump. I tried other teachers, but haven't yet found one that "fits."

That is... until GITP posted about the podcasts.

There are a couple of wonderful things about Dave's yoga "classes"

1. They're 100 percent free.
   
2. There are dozens of classes of 60, 75, or 90 minutes each that are labeled beginner, intermediate, and "all levels," so you have a wide range of options.
   
3. You can download to iTunes OR stream live (follow the liberated syndication link).
   
4. There are no gimmicks. No place to enter your email address and get bombarded with spam. I heard no ads. I am not getting paid to rave about the podcasts. As best I can tell, Dave is just one really generous yoga instructor.
   
5. Did I mention FREE?
   

To try the yoga downloads yourself, visit: http://www.davefarmar.com/podcasts.php

If you try, stop back and let me know what you thought!

Zen running

Last week there was a break in the weather, and we had five glorious days of morning temperatures in the 60s. By the second day, I was literally bounding out of bed in the morning.

I couldn't wait to lace up my shoes and get outside for a run!

While I was out enjoying the cool morning air, I remembered a quote from the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hahn:

"If we are not aware that we are happy, we are not really happy. When we have a toothache, we know that not having a toothache is a wonderful thing. But when we do not have a toothache, we are still not happy. A non-toothache is very pleasant. There are so many things that are enjoyable, but when we don’t practice mindfulness, we don’t appreciate them."

For a few moments I was reminded of how wonderful it is to be able to just run. Sometimes in the need to stick with a training schedule, or squeeze a run into a busy schedule, running becomes something we "have" to do, rather than something we "get" to do.

And when the weather gets hot again, my runs will remind me of why a cool shower is an amazing, incredible experience, instead of just an everyday one.