Jailhouse Jog

Well, yesterday I was to run the Jailhouse Jog for St. Jude in Peoria. I did run part of it. It was a humbling experience, but I just couldn't finish it. A good bit of it was on grass, I had to pee, I got up a 4am to get there. Only 160 cals for breakfast, 3 one hour workouts last week, one the night before the run. I thought I was strong enough. Afterall, it was only 3 miles...I can do that! Not yesterday. Excuses, excuses, excuses....I just couldn't catch my breath, couldn't get into a rhythm, my calves were cramping, silly head games, I tried visualizing St Jude and the wonderful people and how I wanted to run with Michael someday and I just couldn't focus, couldn't settle down. I am a runner, a badass runner-some say, but yesterday, I was a pussy...

I am confused...

This Chic-fil-a thing. It confuses me. I believe that a business owner should not be kept from being in business because it's company philosophy is one way or another. If Chic-fil-a wants to say that they are only supportive of marriage between a man and a woman, I believe that is their right. I a am thankful that this tidbit of information came out. I have never eaten at their restaurant and now that I know that is their philosophy, I never will eat there. I am not a biblical or religious scholar as I recently learned that my religion is not simply "catholic", but "Roman Catholic", but that is another discussion. BUT I seem to vaguely recall that at the end of days, God is the ultimate judge of the rightness or wrongness of our life on earth. It puzzles me that it seems that most of these fundamentalist religious groups, individuals or whatever, Have somehow decided that THEY get to judge. Do you think they will be surprised when they meet their maker and they find out that their beliefs and their interpretation of the bible is wrong? I can't imagine why anyone would care if Tommy has 2 daddies or 2 mommies. Surely that couldn't be any worse than having no daddy and that has surely become commonplace. Life is hard enough to just live your life being the very best person you can be. If that is what you are and it makes you happy? Who am I to judge?

It was a long weekend.

It all started well. My final undergrad Mothers weekend at the University of Illinois. Compared to 4 years of high school, these 4 years of college have gone SO quickly. Please don't misunderstand. My #1 son is not perfect, I have never thought myself the mother that says, "OH Jack would NEVER" simply because I know he very well might.

I am so proud of my tall, strong, handsome, smart, funny, bullheaded, bossy, arrogant, opinionated, ridiculous #1 son that my heart is bursting. I have taken so much grief from so many people, "well, you are just not that into being a mom", "you are too easy (or hard) on him" "you give him too much" "you'd better get him under control"....he was certainly not easy to raise, he was my first and I didn't even bother buying a book...I learned when he was about 6 months old that I could not control him. I have erred on the side of depending on him to be more of a grown up than he should have had to be and that caused problems that I don't know if I will ever be able to rectify, but I think he understands and will someday forgive me. I am his parent for sure, but I think we are friends, too.

We had a good weekend. We shopped and spent a ton of money. We ate good food, I met some of his friends, we drank some beers, had some alcohol fueled whipped cream and a shot or so. But I left Champaign with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. He is done. No way he does not graduate on May 12th. The event I have been working for since August 8th, 1990 has occurred. He is educated, I will have his picture in front of the Alma Mater in his cap and gown, i bought him a Univeraity of Illinois diploma frame. How I will manage to get through graduation with any makeup on at all will be a miracle...as Jack would say, "Angie, you are one hot mess"...

He starts graduate school at the University of Illinois on May 20th, so at least I get to look forward to 2 more Mothers Weekends...

I drove home and met the family for MG's swim team banquet. Long story short, at the end of the banquet, her coach of 4 years, Joan Jobst, resigned. Joan is a good coach, she is a tough coach, but a fair coach. She is a coach who stays on the sidelines during a meet. She commands and receives respect from her swimmers. She is not a demonstrative coach. This year when MG's Medley Relay team made a State cut, she huged each of the girls and I felt that was the highest of compliments and so did MG. I was embarrassingly tearful as is normal for me. Joan is all we know. She will be missed.

Running?

I want to be a runner, I want to run a 5K, but running is SOOOOO boring...the gasping for breath seems all consuming and I just can't settle to focus on something peaceful.  I think of the beach at Tybee Island, GA and the color and the waves lapping and after about 15 seconds, I've got nothing else. 
 
I stared the C25K last fall and made it to a 20 minute run.  By run, I mean 4.3 or so on the treadmill.  I participated in the Turkey Trot in November, I've heard all my life, "Well, Ang, you just aren't a runner".....When I say run, I have no desire to be fast, I would be happy to be able to accomplish a decent steady JOG,
 
I've started back at the middle of the C25K and this morning, I accomplished the warm up (5 min), run (4 min), walk (2), run (6) and a cool-down - totalling .98 miles.  That was all the time I had for a work-out. 
 
I want to use the running as my "regular" exercise because you can do it anywhere and still do the Step and the weights and I'm going to check into martial arts for the summer (with MG)
Do you have any ideas?  Perhaps this is just a practice thing?  I did manage the 20 minutes at one time, but this morning the 4 and then the 6 minutes, OY....I wanted to poke my eyes out.

I am told that I just need to keep working at it. It is a goal, a long term goal... A work in progress