The Trolley Run

For the last few months I have been running. Not like marathons or anything, just your typical mom/treadmill time. I've never been a runner in my life. I would rather do just about anything else physically. I love yoga, riding my bike, hiking, canoeing and I really enjoyed my time when I was doing boot camp. Running just seemed boring to me. The ex is a runner. What I would actually call a fanatical runner. He was constantly training for some up and coming race. I was a tad bit bitter about the running. Perhaps that is another reason why I hated it. I always associated it with him. BUT now I am breaking my negative associations with him, by confronting them head on. I am replacing them with my own experiences and running was at the top of that list.

I used a program on my phone called Couch to 5K (C25K). It is a wonderful app to get you up and moving. It is around a 30 minute workout and really prepares your body gradually for endurance. I have known quite a few people who have started their running using this program so I felt confident about it.

As part of the training, I signed up for two road races; The Trolley Run(4 miles)and the Mothers Day 5K at Corporate Woods. My friend Teresa who is my exercise guru, told me to always have a race on the calendar as it is how to keep yourself motivated. She was right. I watched the date approaching and made every effort to be prepared.

On Sunday I ran my very first road race. It was the trolley run and it was exhilarating for me. As I started running I had butterflies. I haven't done much outdoor running so I was nervous about 4 miles of pavement. I was nervous that Kristi, my running partner, was a secret Carl Lewis, and was going to leave me in her dust. But no. She and I kept pace together the entire run. I enjoyed the pavement. I enjoyed the changing scenery. I loved passing each mile marker and finally I absolutely felt the biggest high when I saw the finish line. I never understood why people loved these races like they do until that moment. It was the best feeling in the world, completing that race. And while we weren't Carl Lewis(4 miles in 50 min 43 seconds), we had so much to be proud of. Two stay at home moms, who have three kiddos each, beaming from our accomplishment.

In three weeks she and I will run our next race. This time there is no hesitation or fear. I know I'm ready!

FFF (Favorite Facebook Friday)

I found out today that I could clean the bottom tray of my toaster out! I've only had it for...well we'll be married 11 years in May ;) I've just been shaking my whole toaster over the trash can all these years!

Remember when teachers, public employees, Planned Parenthood, NPR and PBS crashed the stock market, wiped out half of our 401Ks, took trillions in TARP money, spilled oil in the Gulf of Mexico, gave themselves billions in bonuses, and paid no taxes? Yeah, me neither.

‎3 things I fear about this trip... Sitting in Steerage... 1st Class Intl Lay Flat seats and champagne preflight solved that... The Chucacabre... He sucks blood! Thankfully, I'm single and traveling alone without a blood sucking boyfriend! And no sunglasses... Left those in the car! Thank God for Duty Free Shops!

How fickle my heart and how woozy my eyes.
I struggle to find any truth in your lies.
And now my heart stumbles on things I don't know.
This weakness I feel I must finally show.

So happy to see someone else discovering the joys of gnome ownership.

Perceptions

I was thinking about this word today. And it reminded me of my absolute favorite part of the book, The Shack. I can't find my copy so I am going to cheat and copy and paste it off the internet.

Emotions just are. They are neither bad nor good; they just exist... Most emotions are responses to perception- what you think is true about a given situation. If your perception is false, then your emotional response to it will be false too. So check your perceptions, and beyond that check the truthfulness of your paradigms- what you believe. Just because you believe something firmly doesn't make it true. Be willing to reexamine what you believe. The more you live in the truth, the more your emotions will help you see clearly.

Wow! It still sort of amazes me how those words wrap around my brain and make me think about all of the mis-perceptions that I have on any given day. I am probably the queen of them. I constantly read into things way too much and then I am sure my mis-reactions reflect that falsely.

I had lunch yesterday with a friend who tried to tell me last June where my marriage was going to end up. I immediately viewed her response(which was that my ex was having an affair) as her projecting her own life story onto me. Instead of listening to her, I shut myself off from her, her ideas, her family and quite frankly I was angry. Now looking back, I wasn't really angry at her. I was angry because I think deep down I knew that what her perception of our situation was, was probably correct. Perception is a tricky thing in relationships. Every single relationship and interaction we have, have two perceptions at least and sometimes more depending on how many people are involved. It can get very confusing and beliefs can be skewed. I apologized to my friend yesterday. I explained my perception to her and how very wrong I was to have judged her and basically written her off. It is good to know that I have forgiving friends. That is what she did, because she loves me. I love her and missed her and look forward to putting this behind us.

Birthdays

I love love love my birthday. I never understand people who prefer to just see the day die away without any kind of celebration. Today, my birthday is exactly one month away. So I am looking forward to celebrating this day in some way or another. No definitive plans yet. I am the sort though that likes to recognize the entire week before my birthday much to the annoyance of those around me. So it probably won't be just one celebration but a few. And with that, I am totally fine. I have decided that this year for my birthday I will be treating myself to two gifts. Two things that I have been lusting after for quite some time. I know they are things and I shouldn't lust, but let me have this one time of the year to indulge. The first are these:



Talk about a great workout! These nifty little handheld weights will kick your butt and hopefully mine. I used to love using the kettlebells at bootcamp. I want my own!

The second is something that I seem to be the only person left in the world that doesn't own one. I feel like everyone is taunting me with their fancy schmancy coffee makers. I haven't decided on which one I want yet, the Keurig or the Tassimo:





I can hardly stand the anticipation, although that's half the fun :)

My latest Musical motivation

I have had Pink on repeat constantly for about a week. My favorites include:


And:


Mumford and Sons:


Joshua Radin- He has such a soothing voice:

Choices

If you are a part of my inner circle of friends, you know that the last 36 hours have been a tad bit difficult for me. I try to allow myself to feel the emotions that sometimes flood over me, but at the same time I don't want for them to take over my life. Many times I give myself an allotted amount of time to be down, to mope, to self reflect. Yesterday was one of those days. I spent the day doing absolutely nothing productive to the outside eye, but in reality I was battling a flood of emotions and I was determined to come out on top of it.

The lesson I have learned from this whole experience is this: Life is definitely a choice you make. You choose how you react to every situation that comes your way. In the beginning of this process I chose to love my ex even though he was very difficult to love, but guess what? I loved him. Then I chose to be strong and faithful and once again I was. I chose to be happy and starting laughing and smiling a lot more than I had in years. I chose to try new things and I was pleasantly surprised to find things that I love that I never thought in a million years I would. It is all because I have figured out how to open my heart to these choices and truly allow them to take root in my life. It seems simple and honestly it really is once you start accepting the control you have over your own life.

So today is a new day. It is sunny and beautiful. I will meet two friends for coffee. I will run my 3 miles, I will spend some time in the sun and I will pray. What a wonderful day of choices. My chin is up and I am the only one that can allow that to be ruined.

You change your life by changing your heart.
Max Lucado

FFF (Favorite Facebook Friday)

A Friday compilation of the things that made me laugh or think a little bit more deeply, oh and the tunes from my music friends :)

There are 2466 bar stools that match my criteria. Except most of them don't. Liars.

A friend who ALWAYS has the most comical pictures of himself:


7 days to Peru...I have so much luggage I'm gonna look like GD Kate Winslet boarding the Titanic when I get on MARTA to the airport!

My kind of dirty can't be washed off unless they have created hand sanitizer for the soul!



And this week on my own FB, I shared this quote from Eat, Pray, Love:
If you're brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting, which can be anything from your house to bitter, old resentments, and set out on a truth-seeking journey, either externally or internally, and if you are truly willing to regard everything that happens to you on that journey as a clue and if you accept everyone you meet along the way as a teacher,and if you are prepared, most of all, to forgive some very difficult realities about yourself, then the truth will not be withheld from you. Eat, Pray, Love.

Closing out a chapter in my life

I have been a blogger for a few years. I had a family/personal blog that I haven't touched in a long time before I came here for my writing therapy. I went to it early this morning, read every single entry and decided that I am finished with it. It chronicles a life that is lost. As with so many things in my life right now, it is best to just leave it where it ended. I won't delete it. It will remain out there in cyberland and perhaps be revisited by me at times(there are some really great pictures of my girls on there): http://fbucks2f.blogspot.com/

Good Bye Five Bucks!

People I want to meet

I often run across people who completely intrigue me. People who I have not actually met in real life, but would really like to meet.

www.thebloggess.com : I want to see her office. She is such an ecclectic person and honestly I think I would love to hang out with her even if it was at a Japanese brothel of sorts and of course I really really want to touch James Garfield. I wonder if she lets you pet him?


Rachel Luft(Turds and Whey in my Blogroll): A friend of mine from one of my mommy boards. She definitely fits into the intriguing category. She lives a life like nobody else I have ever met. Her German husband, Uli, is sort of famous in the medical community because he was present here(it's gross,don't click if you have a weak stomach):
http://www.snopes.com/photos/medical/maggots.asp
Besides that, she is a one woman sitcom waiting to happen. For real. I imagine Rachel and I sitting at a great restaurant somewhere, outside, drinking expensive wine and talking about all of her many celebrity sightings and The El Tapatio man. I would totally make her talk like him. Oh and I so wish she would blog more. She is a fantastic writer.


Robert Downey Jr.: I have had a crush on him since his Weird Science days. I have loved him through all of his troublesome career and have always included him in the "somebody I'd love to meet" list. He is so intelligent and funny, two qualities that mean the most to me. For some reason, I imagine us roller skating together. That is how we would hang.



I figure I will meet one of these people(Rachel) at some point. There is a distinct possibility that I might someday also meet The Bloggess but probably not in her home with James Garfield. As for RDJ, that is probably never going to happen, but a girl can dream.

Pinterest

I joined Pinterest awhile back after an invite from a friend. I joined and then forgot about it....until last night. And now? I am in love. I am in love with falling in love with ideas. Ideas that I will probably never put into motion in my own life but which I can appreciate. Ideas such as these teacup lights:

Or who would ever have thought to make shapes out of hard boiled eggs?!?

What about a malted chocolate marshmallow cake?


It was a visual shopping trip that I spent 2 hours going through. And the really great thing? I didn't spend a dime.

FFF (Favorite Facebook Friday)

A compilation of all of my favorite posts and status updates via my friends from the week.

Why do we close our eyes when we pray? When we cry? When we dream? Or when we kiss? Because we know that the most beautiful things in life are not seen, but felt by heart. ♥

Just saw a fender bender between a Hummer and a Taurus. Ironically, the Taurus won.

There's a reason I am not writing the story and God is. He knows how it all works out, where it all leads, what it all means. Ann Voskamp

For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin — real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. Then life would begin. At last it dawned on... me that these obstacles were my life. — Alfred D. Souza

A setback is a setup for a comeback.. Author unknown

MUSIC from my Week:
much like there is "an app for that," i believe there is "a song for that" tune in.





And I had a good laugh this morning as I posted a sarcastic status update and was pleasantly surprised to see that 3 of my friends GOT my humor. Facebook Polls are annoying LOL!