Weight Training

weight training starts today! any running specific routines you all know of?

6.5 swampy, draining, rejuvenating miles. I feel awesome/ awful. How do you runners train in this?

continue

It's hard being at the cottage sometimes when you let your mind get ahead of you think about all that is gone. Meghan, Chuck and Gram were staples there. They made the cottage, the cottage in many ways. Their influence is seen, felt and their absence is painfully obvious. It is still the same relaxing place but what it means to me is being reinvented. I think its more a place of reflection now. I spent Meghan's birthday, which historically has been the period that we're up there, running. Two years ago Meghan and I started running. She would take a right at the end of the driveway and I would go left. I topped out at 2 miles and Meghan, every time, would do at least 3.
This past year has been all about challenging myself and accomplishing difficult goals that Meghan set mostly for herself(check the bottom of the page for the list of completed goals). I went snowshoeing finally (running 5k in snowshoes is nothing to shake a stick at.) The race, which was set up by the incredible Jen Nichol was amazing, so many wonderful people came out to both race and support. I really had a blast being in the snow and doing something far outside of my comfort zone. I then started training. Actually training. For the Half-Marathon. Something also outside of my comfort zone. I typically will start something and quit after a month when it gets difficult. Running was different, I was completely prepared by Meghan's birthday and it was the best run I've had to date.
I don't want to stop running so I signed up for a marathon this fall. I also am going to start incorporating my goals as I move forward. Making goals that push you forward is the best lesson I've learned from Meghan. There's no point to not having something to work toward that is harder than the last challenge you completed.
(I know, I know....what?! why?)
I'm running the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington DC on Oct. 30 with the George Washington University Cancer Institute".
I have a Fundraising Goal of $500 and would greatly appreciate your help in reaching that. I'm going to start posting my progress with Marathon training and School this fall. I'm definitely going to need periodic advice and help with things and I know some of you out there have plenty to offer. I would love to develop this into a supportive community of people working towards their own progressive goals.

Life, Harder.

Happy Birthday Meg, this is for you, Chuck & Grammarama.



13.1 Complete

13.1

I'm sorry in advance for any grammatical errors, this just sort of came out quickly and I literally have to walk out the door to go to the airport right now. I can't wait for CANADA!

Without further adieu:

I couldn't take New York and never feeling like I was going to get my head above water. I worked 12 hours every day and still couldn't afford every day expenses, I was always exhausted and I wasn't able to do the things I wanted to do. I didn't feel like my life was progressing in the direction I wanted it to and I missed my friends. I missed being in DC and doing the things I used to when I lived there. Moving again also scared me. I was worried that it was a nomadic trend and I'd never be able to get settled. I wanted to find somewhere to be for a long time, to plant my feet and feel secure.
I moved back in march and slept on couches for about a month until a room opened up in a really good neighborhood. I started going to shows again, seeing my friends regularly and doing those small traditions that were important to my friend and myself. I found a good, steady job a few blocks from my house and I picked up where I left off with the running goal I sort of started back in the winter. I finally started to feel like myself.
I’m running 4-5 days a week and steadily improving. It's the best thing I think I've worked at so far. There is no other feeling like waking up at 5:30 and being done with 10 miles before 9. I am proud of myself for accomplishing that! Is huge to me to be in double-digit mileage. I know running the half marathon for Meghan next month will not be some nearly insurmountable struggle, and that is the point of the goal. To put in significant effort and training to accomplish something way outside my realm of fitness. To work at something, hard, to achieve it. The triumph of any goal isn't the finish, it's all of that struggle and fight to get there, that's the part that you remember and carry with you when you actually do finish.
The middle was always the important part for Meghan, the getting somewhere, the in between. She was excited when she finished something because of all she'd worked for and accomplished on her way to get to that goal. I feel the same way about the next big goal coming up. This Friday, on Meghan's birthday I'm running the half marathon than I've been training for the last 6 months. I feel really good about it; I know that I've put in the necessary effort for it not to be a huge struggle. Just the same way Meghan would have put in all the preliminary work to easily achieve something she would've wanted to. This is my path now, to set a goal, work hard for it, accomplish something more difficult than the last achievement and repeat. Meghan never stopped trying to be better and I won't either.

If you're interested in coming to the run, send me an email. It'd be cool to have some company.

Also, I got accepted to school, I start this fall and I can't wait!

Thank you, for the last year.

Another G&T kind of day. I'm really proud of all that has been accomplished in the past year and I have no doubt Meghan would be very proud of my progress. I know we all miss her so much but it's important to not dwell on how sad this all can be but how important her life was and how much she refuses to stop inspiring us all to live harder.
Raise that glass high.

slow brain

It's been really hard to get anything concise to come to the surface in the past month. Uncle chuck passed away a week after grammarama and that was surprisingly hard to deal with. He was a huge part of supporting me during Meghan's treatment and passing away. He was the epitome of gentle giant. I definitely looked up to him and wish i could've done more for him when he got sick earlier this year and I can't do the man justice with words, he is larger than life.

I feel worse for feeling less, like the well has run dry from everything that we've all dealt with in the past year, I feel like I can't feel anything else in that way or be really, really sad when I know I should. It's confusing and makes me feel guilty. soul-sucker for sure.

I guess I have to lead those night walks through the woods now (you know who you are and what I'm talking about)?

too many shoes

meghan's grandmother, grammarama, passed away monday morning.
send your love and how they've changed you (they all definitely had a part in making meghan....meghan) to the most amazing and resilient family i've had the good fortune to wriggle my way into:

maggie_baker1@hotmail.com
willabake@hotmail.com
baker_222@hotmail.com


this is where life made complete sense. raise those gin n tonics, you ladies are so missed:

maker

It's for some reason enormously hard to write lately. I didn't until very recently feel like my life was in complete upheaval. Moving from couch to couch is fun only for so long. Sometimes you just need to retreat to a space that is entirely your own where you feel safe and contained and stable. That's something I haven't had for over six months. Thanksgiving was hard. Christmas was hard and new years was almost too much for me to handle. It took me by complete surprise. I really wasn't at all expecting to be affected by it, especially because it's never been a holiday that's held much weight with me. I've wanted it to be fun in the past but it never amounts to much. The ball drops, and then you go to bed (last year Meghan didn't even make it that far and wanted to go to bed at 9!)

So yeah, I was expecting the holidays I do really enjoy (especially thanksgiving) to be upsetting. But it wasn't. It didn't feel like anything. New years is a very clear and definite end to what you've been through in the past, measurable amount of time. And in this past year there's been almost to much to take measure of, it's too broad of a scope. My head felt like it was shutting down with all of that weight that night. I couldn't grasp it. I didn't want to. I didn't want it to be over. It felt like some massive ship still very visible slowly sailing out of port. There is absolutely nothing in my power to stop the inertia of something that massive or even to slow it down and it's the saddest thing to experience. I don't want it to move away from me or feel any more distant than it already does. I miss Meghan so much. I even miss her being sick. I miss anything of her that's remotely tangible and within reach. But I can't stop that lumbering beast of pain, memory, hope, love and life from leaving me. I don't know what to do.

I am able to find happiness in small doses and sometimes not feel guilty about it. I do have my own space. My retreat. I'm here and I'm doing it. I'm existing and continuing and growing in spite of the difficulties the world has decided to heap on my shoulders. Meghan wants that. She forces perseverance and strength on me. I ran the farthest I've ever run in my 29 years today and it didn't even come close to defeating me. I beat the hell out of that 10k. Meghan is unquestionably carrying me, allowing, enabling and inspiring every step because I know she would be at this level if not far beyond by now. I owe it to her to be healthy and happy and fighting my way through every single rough patch, whether it's running, unemployment, homelessness, isolation, desperation, panic, guilt or remorse. I owe it to her memory and her life to look take all of these in for what they are and continue on the course set before me never looking back. I am here, I am the maker of my own way and I am going to kick the shit out of simple existence.




this guy is really inspiring:



Feb 19th I'll be completing another of meghan's goals at this event. It'd be great to meet some of you there, please come out, I think its going to be a lot of fun.