life

The Battle

/ Sloan / Leave a comment

I start to sweat. My normally low blood pressure rises and my heart pounds even when my body is not working that hard. I get anxious and stressed out. Running, swimming and hitting the gym don’t do that.

I have such a love hate relationship with mountain biking. It’s a battle. A battle with Logic. Logic is the cautious side of my brain. The side that generally wins because she’s in control, she calm and cool. Logic fights with Competition, the side that peaks her evil head out rarely, but when she does she makes me uneasy. But that side also tells me to push harder, faster, further and makes me do things out of my comfort zone.

Logic tells me to stay on the easy double track; no rocks, roots or puddles to trip me up and knock me down. Then Competition chimes in and yells for her to shut the eff up, to go for it, to get uncomfortable and challenge not only my body, but my mind—basically my entire body: Mind, Body and Soul are put on edge during a ride.

 

I love and hate this so much. But yet I continue to do it—so it must be good.

             

A New Kind Of Normal

/ Sloan / 2 Comments

I feel guilty. I’m a huge guilt addict lately. However, what I realized I felt guilty about this morning was the fact that I haven’t ‘gone for a run’ in ages. Just a run to run. Recently, when I’ve laced up my running shoes I’m headed to the gym, I’m running the mile to the gym—only to hop on the elliptical and lift weights. Or I run the 1.6 miles to the pool to swim some laps then run home. The other day I did go for a run, but I found a set of stairs and I ran up and down them for 20 minutes instead of logging miles here at 3,000 feet—I added to my elevation gain and loss via concrete steps. Weird, I know.

 

            But what I realized on my way to the gym this morning was that I don’t have to run. I’m kicking my ass nearly everyday lifting weights, swimming, biking and elliptizing, (I have this weird love for the elliptical…) I’m doing good for my body and yet in the back of my mind I think I should be running. But why?

            I think I feel this way because for so long I was the runner in my circle of friends. (Let’s be honest, I still am in some of those circles,) but that’s who I was. And it’s okay to change. It’s okay to not do what you’ve always done and change up your norm. Right now I enjoy being a gym rat, I enjoy logging laps at the local pool, I enjoy laying on my couch and reading a novel, I enjoy selling drinks and French fries rather than wool socks and running shoes! I’m still in a routine, I’m still exercising (all norms in my life,) but changing it up and creating a new normal is kind of exciting.

 

I have no doubt I’ll get my running legs back eventually, but for right now I’m enjoying a different kind of normal.

This is Going to be Good

/ Sloan / Leave a comment

I’ve always been good at procrastinating. Shit just gets done easier when there’s A LOT to do and a little time. When I have two jobs, class, volunteer responsibilities, and a training plan to follow I am happier, healthier, in better shape. I’m generally amazed at what I can accomplish. When I have three weeks to ‘get everything done’ nothing gets’ done.

            I sit here on a Saturday afternoon putzing around not cleaning, not packing, not getting ready to once again move my life. D-day is tomorrow and my suitcase of clothes and bag of shoes sit in ruins around my mother’s spare bedroom. After this post, I swear I’ll start the laundry and begin rolling my clothes to make them all fit as much as I’d rather kick back and not, I will, I must.

 

Back to Maryland. Thank god. Once there I won’t get crazy looks when I get carded at the bar and whip out my random Maryland driver’s license.  I’ll live near a lake, near the mountains and have work that will keep me busy and active, and hopefully another job that will keep me on my feet and social. I’ll play in the woods, paddle around the lake and explore the productive side of me that I have missed for way too long.

            Tomorrow I say goodbye to the flat lands of the mid-west, goodbye to the lake that stretches for miles and goodbye to my friends and family that have supported me. I’m excited and nervous and ready to embark on this new journey. I’m excited to say hello to the mountains, make new friends and reconnect with some old ones. This is good. This is going to be really good.

What a stranged shaped state

What a stranged shaped state

**More on where, why, and what next week. NOT back to Baltimore, I’ll give ya that much!***