February Run

This morning as I was serving tables the pub had the television tuned to a sports channel as usual, but instead of football or golf they were showing an indoor track meet! I ignored it for a while but the women's 1500meter run caught my eye and I watched the battle commence. Slowly it happened - "maybe I can do this again."
*Sigh* Here goes. Maybe its watching others do what I did for so long, pushing their bodies, ignoring their pains. Maybe its this time of year and the weather, the fact that no one is going outside anymore and its the perfect setting for the pavement solitude I crave. It always gets me. As much as I love cuddling up under a blanket to read all weekend or letting my body slim away from "fit" to "just thin," I always have a buried motivation waiting to emerge. My runner-self hibernates through summer, waiting for these gray skies and north winds.
So today I went for a run. Apparently I looked "hard core," as Rae told me when I sent him a text photo of my thermal-t-shirt-stalking-capped-and-gloved reflection in the door. Yep. So hard core, in fact, that I ran with a kitchen timer in my hand because my "swatch" finally died a few weeks ago. And I just had to track my time/distance. Ha!
I saw the usual passerby faces -
90% with expressions that say "are you freaking mad?!"
10% looking straight ahead, ignoring your existence as they reason away their initial twinge of jealousy with a spiteful mocking of your cold bones (mind you, this 10% are probably runners themselves or those capable of doing so.)
My lungs hurt and my right knee began shooting some minor pains near the end of my two miles (or 2.2 miles according to Google Maps. So with that info I figure I ran about the pace I was estimating, 9-minute miles. I'm ok with that.)
Anyway, I did it. We'll see where this goes. Maybe it will follow my usual cycle. Or maybe I'll actually sign up for a race and do something about it. I'll keep you updated on all the sweating (or lack thereof) in the near future.

Yep, it really happened.

(me running and me carrying a kitchen timer - both equally shocking)

super hot post-run bath & beer 

(beer more on the cold side, though)

bathing my carrot

Frankie's periscope

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

p.s.  sorry about the header still saying "Fall 2011," apparently I've hit my profile upload quota so I'm in the process of getting more storage. Till then, we'll pretend fall is extended till now.  :)

khaki paint and white trim

Today I planted seeds, tomato and basil. Apparently that's all I had left from my garden stash, save some lettuce.

Frankie spent some time at "grandma's" house while our complex did pest treatments, but now he's back and happy as a little white clam to be lounging in his sun again.
Rae has started the weekend work schedule, which leaves Frankie and I to our own devices while he is away. So far the seed planting is about the most productive thing I have accomplished.
I've written blogs and deleted them. I've edited some random photos, put words in my journal if inspired enough, but mostly saunter around the apartment from small task to task. So much has been happening lately, I feel flat when I have down time. School is amazing - I made Phase 2 (the honors program) and have been busting out cuts and colors left and right, having a blast doing it. I'm president of our Green Team and facilitate our weekly recycling for the school. I'm working on my application for Beacon - a national week long workshop for future stylists who are good enough to go. I need to make sure I'm not spending myself completely before 5pm every day. I know its good to be passionate, and love what you're doing/learning. But balancing is new to me.
After 5pm Rae and I are planning our trip to South America for 2013. Well, Rae is planning it and I'm giving what input I come up with. We're figuring out fund-saving and bill-paying. Coddling the kitty when we can and hand-breaking the mouse. We're dreaming of baby and a tiny house on expansive land where we can garden. Our energy is carefully doled out each day, but here we rest together. Inside our khaki paint and white trim.

another little man

This is Hayden Ray at 1 month old <3

its baby time

If you're friends with me on facebook then I'm sure you've already seen these....but here are some shots of my little nephew Samuel at 1 month in on his amazing life!

preparation

We all procrastinate from time to time. Or for some of us, from day to day, hour to hour. I've long let my Aries self slide in this respect, "its just who I am!" And I do have a little bit of pride when I say that for the most part I've lived haphazardly and fly by the seat of my pants a lot. But when it comes down to making your dreams come true, creating the life you want, its either do or say. Go or stay. I can talk about my plans till the sun comes up, and sets and comes up a million more times. Or I can shut up and just do it. Research it. Plan it. Set all my mind, heart and energy to it.
My main problem (other than just plain laziness of course) has been that I have an all-or-nothing-eggs-in-one-basket-completely-emersed-in-one-thing sort of attention span. I feel deeply. I experience deeply. And because of that the feeling/experience is usually centered on one single thing/person/idea. I am consumed by one thing at a time. So, here goes trying to spread. Sit on the surface of many things without getting completely lost in just one. Living today and planning tomorrow all at once. I can do this.
Anyone else feeling the same?!

Here are a few photos from a walk Rae and I took on Martin Luther King Jr. day, and then I'm off to be productive. :)

Cheers to Friday!

2011

I've always heard that years seem to pass more quickly with age. Sometimes I think that must be true, as this last one seemed only a few blinks long...at least in physical matters and locality. Time flew. But in heart, soul and mind its been nearly an eternity.
My New Years Eve 2010 was spent with friends and acquaintances. It was spent with realization and revelation. 2011 was welcomed with promise. It would be a year of motion and growth and renewal. I knew it, I could feel it coming. 
I knew it would be uncomfortable at times, and it definitely was for a while. The first few months were a constant cycle of battling with myself. The person I was wasn't in step with the person I felt like I was, and definitely not the person I wanted to be. We were three separate entities fighting for my life to live. My heart sat beneath my stomach for some months, before climbing back to its rightful place. But even then it remained untouchable for a time. I learned, I listened. I gave in to temptation a few times and immediately regretted it. I lost and gained and lost again. I reached the closest I have ever been to the bottom of myself. By this time I had moved "home" to my grandparents house and began to re-root myself in the safest place I knew. Inside that wooden frame with my grandparents' souls, with the old creaks and moans, I strengthened.
I began meeting that person I wanted to become. I found her in those peach colored walls, where she sat calm and wise, watching over my sleep. In my garden's tending, beneath the earth where my carrots formed and grew. I found her in my flowerbed flourishing with the petunias. With the setting of every evenings sun I became more of her.
So everything that followed was air from this runway. Leaving the bank, deciding on cosmetology school, meeting my person, making my own niche (thus far) with hair...on and on. This year has been my best. My favorite, I should say, as I haven't always been at my best. I've been my worst, and my best as well. I exited this year full and thankful. {Full and thankful enough that even working through the midnight cheers while my love slept didn't bother me much.}  :)

and now for my visual rep of these last 12 months for you visual folks (myself included)...

january

{solitude, leaving}

february

{the move, more solitude and self pity}

march

{morning toast and tea, with a side of silence}

april

{garden time, growth, from the ground up}

may

{garden, rae, school, etc etc ETC! wow, this month was SO full, but the carrot covers it all}

june

{school!}

july

{rae comes home from Africa - safely- }

august

{carrot, reflection}

setpember

{blonde - that was a big deal for this brunette}

october

{Taos & Santa Fe, enough said}

november

{gardening @ Common Wealth, giving ourselves}

december

{this deserves two photos: a new baby, my first nephew!}

{and home, happily at home}

Happy New Year, everyone!

pizza for "old" people

I will happily admit that Rae and I conduct our lives like elderly people. Haha! We are up by 6am, home and settled in for cooking dinner by 6pm, and in bed by 10pm. And we love it! We get out when we can, but cooking at home has helped us save so much $$ when we needed to do so in the past few weeks and now we've become accustomed to our evenings in together.
Since I'm not the cook Rae whips up all our meals, first plan then execution. So the other night we did pizza...probably my favorite and most fun meal we do!

"dusty" flour floor

yummmm!