Back at it....

I ran last night. Ok I walk/ran but Lyndsey tells me I RAN! So I'll go with that.

Let 's back up a bit. I am 45 yrs old and as the Indigo Girls like to say "heavier by the year and heavier by the load". I am struggling with this aging idea. Mentally I feel 16 most days. I laugh I cut up I enjoy life mostly. Yet in the last year or so exercise has been hard for me.

I love to walk. I could walk all day long and am frequently excited by a long 5 mile trek. No problem. With the brown eyed boy, I like it even more. As predicted he is not allowed to walk at the moment and I a joining him in a life of sympathetic sloth.

The kicker here is that I have signed up with a bunch of friends to do a Color Run in October. Mostly we will run some per- determined distance in our tennis whites and have chalk thrown at us and come out looking like Neapolitan ice cream I think. It'll be fun. I have to get into shape.

The issue is this. I used to be 16 yrs old and weigh 102 lbs. Yall can fuss at me all you want about that but
I was. I was captain of the track and cross country team. Ran my butt off in August heat and proudly puked at the top of a hill in a fancy neighborhood in Knoxville. I was never fast but I could outlast anyone. I ran at least 8 miles of a half marathon two years ago. I trotted through it and it was fine. I did it and got the t shirt.

I am competing against that 16 yr old and losing badly.

Now? Ack. I need to do this so I won't collapse on this fun run with a bunch of friends watching. It hurts. Ok running is supposed to hurt? I know that mind over matter crap. My knees hurt. My toes hurt. It is hot as hell and I am in peri menopause. Basically that means do not stop me from getting into a cold body of water ASAP at the end of any physical activity.

I have tried the "your patients would give their eye teeth to get up and run" thing. That doesn't work. Frankly I think they would rather feel good enough to sit with their grandkids on their porch.

Yes I am healthy but it still sucks. I have tried the "oh who cares if you're 45, this is good for you!" Whatever. And don't even give me the "body is a temple" speech.

I don't want to feel middle aged....and based on good genes in my family, I am smack it the middle. I just got hearing aids and I need new glasses.

I'll go run tomorrow I guess. I needed a day to rest today.

It will still suck out loud.

Week 3 and a new appointment

We have completed week three of four for the first heart worm shot.

I think there may be a countdown calendar for the next leg of the treatment. Thanks to good friends who have agreed to sit with him at various times, we have managed. And likely managed well. I think he's high maintenance but then again it's probably me instead.

Our evenings have consisted of sitting on the porch instead of walking. So my activity level has reached one step above sloth. He has turned the living room into Lewis dogcave.

Our next shot is July 30. I actually consulted Lyndsey for the date so I actually don't have that nervous breakdown I came close to the last time. Since I am going off meds, it's best for all of us.

We'll make it I believe.

He still won't mow the yard though I bet.

What we call normal

This morning in an effort to restore a little normalcy to our day, I put Lewis on his tie out so he could do his morning thing without having someone monitor every drop of piddle and poo. He's been calm and settled all week and if he gets hyped up, I could bring him back in.

This worked fine as I found evidence of such things in his usual spots in the yard (why is that the case I wonder). All the better because it was 6 45 am and this meant we could either go back to bed or lounge all morning.

The weather was tolerably cool and together we sat on the back porch enjoying some outdoor time that we have both missed terribly. I put in some laundry, made coffee, and sat.

Then came the obsessive licking.

Lewis's pads were damaged last week at an unnamed local dog boarding place on Gallatin Rd....and he has worn a cone head for the past week. After settling my anger at this pad condition ( and receiving a less than satisfactory response from the unnamed dog place on Gallatin Rd), I have discovered that this cone head has helped calm him a good deal. That and all the drugs he is on....

All of that to be said, without the cone head this morning, he began obsessively licking his front paws. Ignoring my warnings, he continued. I went inside to retrieve the cone head. I put it on him and with his usual pitiful brown eyed pout, he settled down. I read the paper...well FlipBoard, checked email, Facebook. Even read today's lectionary text. (Sing us one of the songs of Zion followed by cleaving one tongue to the roof of ones mouth)

And then, the squirrel appeared. under the bird feeder and within the cone head sphere of sight. Lewis bounded off the porch, into the yard...with the cone head on.

I think even the squirrel laughed.

Well here we go. The long awaited heartworm shot. As you can tell he's thrilled. I think he's more thrilled that I awakened him early to go get this thing. Per the vet at noon, he took the shot "well". Whatever that means.

While I have waited today...and by waited I mean, I had a flat...waited on the AAA guy named Kirk. he game ME a bottled water. I took the car to the tire place... and waited. I went to lunch while I waited. And then waited as a patient's partner told his story. And came home and am waiting now for a phone call.

In the meantime, over these last "waiting weeks", I have two friends who have had babies. I have had two friends lose a mentor to death. I have witnessed a wedding and a reunion of hearts of those that surrounded them. I have seen what friendships do to sustain people. I have driven to Ohio and back and then watched as 20 something people drove into the morning light to go to church camp.

So maybe I haven't waited and done nothing. Surely not. An article today that is making its way around  "the facebook" talks of the need, deep deep need, for idleness. To sit. To ponder. To be.

I was anxious about this day as I was returning to work having been away and having missed out on too many deaths...or so I thought. I dont feel like I have done much. I was and am anxious about the evening to come.

And then I remembered my dear Dot telling me to wait in line is a gift from God to be quiet and take it in.

This life.

This life of babies and weddings. Of friends and family. Of creatures to care and love.

And await my dream guy.

All will be well.