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Posts from the ‘Other’ Category

May 5

Saturday, in photos

I’m thankful for calendar reminders that alert me when I forget to write something down on my actual planner. Case in point: I signed up for a symposium on data and journalism sometime in April. Then I kind of forgot about it. I knew, just knew, I had something going on this weekend, but I couldn’t remember what.

Queue emails sent from event organizers. And a Google calendar alert.

I’m so incredibly glad I didn’t miss it. I would have kicked myself if afterwards I realized it too late (or even worse, realized it as it started).

Sam actually was heading into the Bay Area on Saturday morning, so I hitched a ride to a BART station near Castro Valley to get to the University of California, Berkeley campus. The event was free to J-School alumni (super stoked about that).

I think all the walking I did qualifies as some sort of exercise. Yes?

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The main entrance to campus. A powwow was being set up there. Later in the day, I accidentally walked into a Queer Conference while trying to navigate to one of the cleaner bathrooms on campus I know (most exciting thing about that was the bathroom I went into was designated a “gender friendly” bathroom, welcoming men and women, I thought that was pretty cool). In total, I saw three homeless guys napping on lawns. And I saw a drama open house/demonstration being set up at the base of a hall.

All those reasons? That’s why I love Berkeley.

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I made my way up from the BART station in downtown Berkeley. There’s no real direct route up though campus, really there are no direct routes through campus in general.

So I slowed down a little and took in Berkeley’s park-like atmosphere.

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I also got some walking hill work done. Berkeley’s campus has a lot of hills. Some brutal and mostly upward. Others rolling. I wasn’t much of a runner while I went to school here, but imagine the hill training possibilities on the campus?

It’s no wonder I used to see the ROTC programs running through campus.

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The all-day long event brought out an array of speakers. There were six sessions, with question and answer periods. There was a breakfast buffet and a networking lunch, too.

The topics included a detailed look into policy in the afternoon. Questions of ethics were broached too. One of the things that came up a couple times was new ethical issues in data presentation and journalism that weren’t even considerations a couple years ago.

I didn’t go for credit at school or anything. (I filled my outside of class required time earlier this semester with the three-day journalism conference where I literally work all hours I’m awake.) I did it because some of the key concepts taught can be applied to my community college classroom. I’m already writing some of it into the curriculum for next fall.

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Speaking of lunch, these cookies were served. I’m not sure exactly what they were (don’t worry, the green on the plate is from a pesto pasta), but they were delicious. It was a brown sugar, pecan melt-in-your-mouth kind of cookie. I’ll admit it, I ate two. I was tempted to grab another one. I really, really wanted to.

The event ended at about 3:45 p.m. I realized I likely couldn’t get back to the train to make the train I thought I would. So I decided to take a longer stroll through campus. That included taking in some of my favorite sights.

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The Campanile is one of those landmarks that can be seen throughout the entire Bay Area. The first time I visited the campus in 2004, when I was considering applying for admission, my husband and I went up and got a bird’s eye view of the area. I remember going up again, right before I graduated and looking around. It was one of those capstones of my two years in graduate school.

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Sather Gate is about as well known as the plaza in which is stands. Sproul Plaza was the center of the Free Speech Movement once upon a time. You walk through the area, even now with it’s fenced-in buildings and can’t help but feeling connected to history. But there’s a sense of history nearly everywhere you step at Berkeley.

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I headed back down to the BART station and made my train. Despite sitting most of the day, I had kind of walked all over the place to get to and from the symposium.

The train ride back was less eventful than the one there, which involved watching a guy to pull ups on the overhead hand bars in a train car. By 5:30 p.m. I was back in car heading toward home.

That’s when Sam asked if I wanted sushi.

Of course I wanted sushi.

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That’s the orders of Sam, her son and me. Her son ordered this roll called the “Titanic.” There was so much fish in it that it kind of fell apart everywhere. That’s why it has the name it does, Sam’s son told me. I got a deep-fried California roll because I really wanted something with a tempura texture.

After a long day in and around the Bay Area, it was glorious.

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A little wine and a mini True Blood marathon later and I was in bed exhausted. I’m supposed to run mid-length to long run today, but I’m holding out until later this afternoon or this evening. I’m going to try to at least hit eight miles. I kind of feel like I have to do some sort of running today to at least put a dent in all the good food I ate yesterday.

The cookie isn’t going to burn itself off. Neither is the amazing sushi.

I’m kind of using this weekend as a rest for the next two. On May 11, I have the Mermaid Run Sirena 18. On May 18, I’m flying to Portland for the night with Sam to run the Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon.

Then I get a week of downtime before three weekends full of racing.

Things are about to get very hectic.

Apr 28

My week, in photos

Because it’s been a long, crazy week. And I only ran 10 of my 15 miles on Saturday then worked all day. So I present, my week, in photos.

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I woke up late Tuesday because I had turned down the ringer on my phone for some reason. I literally threw myself together to so I could be at school by my student’s 9 a.m. lab start. I was greeted, just before 9 a.m., to this site right outside my building.

Fire alarm.

We waited outside for about 20 minutes before getting the all clear.

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Speaking of school, college students are a much more lively bunch than high school, middle school or elementary school bunches. Why? They are funny, in a subtle way.

I found this gem of a posting right outside my office. It speaks to my inner dork and brings me back to my original Nintendo playing days.

Who didn’t love The Legend of Zelda? I remember walking into the little caves to get the all impressive sword. With final weeks coming up soon (we finish the semester in mid May), I thought this was rather appropriate.

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My Boston shirt came in the mail today. It’s HUGE on me, but I don’t care because all proceeds go to One Fund Boston. It’s also a crazy bright yellow, which means everyone will see me wearing it a mile away.

It’s cotton, so I won’t be wearing it at night when I’m running. But I love this shirt, if only because it represents runners helping runners.

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I went to a spaghetti dinner hosted by my friend’s daughter’s school. It was only $5 a plate and it benefited all the cool things elementary school’s do for children (which essentially means I’m not 100-percent sure what the money is going to, but it’s a good cause I’m sure). The lovely item above is the centerpiece for the tables.

My trip to the small adjacent town next to where I live also included visiting my friend’s severely burned home. She’s not living there currently. But a cedar chest she was partial too was damaged pretty significantly in the fire. She was told to call it a loss.

I saw it and realized it wasn’t. In my ample spare time (ha!), I refinish furniture. Mostly all my own to this point. I told her all I need was some time with it and I could make it as good as new. Maybe better. New stain, new finish. So after we ate a plate of spaghetti each and stayed for a raffle/silent auction (she took away a nice entertainment-based basket for her children) we headed over to casa-de-crisp and picked up the chest.

I backed my Jeep onto her non-existent lawn. My husband got it in the car.

The good news is construction for the rebuild/renovation of her house started this week. The bad news is that it won’t be done until October.

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My husband is back to working normal shifts at his job, which means he has more time on the weekends to do things like cook. And vacuum. And generally not be a zombie.

He’s pretty excited to go back to 9/80 schedules (five days one week, four days the next, making every other weekend a three-day weekend). I’m excited to have him back too.

He made steak and corn on the cob on his grill on Saturday night. It was delicious.

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All that work I was doing Friday? It carried into Saturday. And will carry into today.

One of the things on my to-do list is FEMA-based training for school. In order to continue to be “eligible for employment” in the community college system I work in, I have to finish this mandated training. I’ve put if off a long time. It’s due May 9. I took a test for one of two lessons tonight. I’m waiting for the response in my work email.

I took a photo of this because the first “action” talks about “planned events” such as “First Night festivities” and “Fourth of July celebrations.” Both are really specific. In the middle of that it says “the marathon.” I know it has to be applied to all municipalities (this course focused on the National Incident Management System), but “the marathon” is so vague it’s funny.

Apr 22

Knowing the time is right (and why my husband is a saint)

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I’m going to start this blog post with the truest statement I can: My husband is a saint.

I know a lot of women gush about how amazing and supportive their husbands are, but I know everyday how lucky I am. When I met Thomas 11+ years ago I didn’t know that we’d be sharing our lives together this far down the line. I never envisioned us being at each other’s college graduations. Or getting married. Or buying our first house. Or having three dogs.

I didn’t know. I was only 17, though, not even a high school graduate. He was 20 and still trying to figure out what he wanted to do with his life. He was studying to be a photographer. I think both of us are glad he eventually chose engineering. (Because really, two unemployed journalists in a house? Bad news.)

We don’t have an easy relationship. But relationships are hard. They take work. Both of us aren’t afraid of working hard.

I’m hotheaded even on my best days. I have a sharp tongue that gives me an upper-hand in verbal confrontations, but often leaves my opponent feeling lousy. I’m stubborn as all hell. My voice, even when I’m not mad, has a way of moving past “indoor conversation” volume. And I can hold a grudge forever without it bothering me too much.

I’m the one who calls our insurance company when they over bill. I’m the one who negotiated with the car dealer last fall when we purchased our Jeep. I’m assertive, much to the dismay of some.

So when I emotionally “broke” last fall, my husband was left picking up the pieces for a woman he’d never seen fall apart so badly in more than a decade together. It scared him. Probably more than anything else in his life or our relationship had ever scared him. He lost the essence of who I was. He lost me.

Now, he’s not a timid type or anything to that nature. He’s a man who handles large-scale projects for a living. He’s a man who really “sees the forest through the trees” in every aspect of what he does. He’s ridiculously intelligent, which he would say about me in return, but in a much different way. I’m a creative type, I can visualize projects, pages, design and code, putting it all together in my head. He’s analytical. He sees numbers and measurements. He’s a “measure four times, then cut” kind of guy.

This may, we’ll be married for five years.

What it means to us? We’ve made it this far in a loving, amazing relationship. We’re doing a good job! Good on us for keeping it together!

What it means to outsiders? We should have had children four years ago.

I’m not even kidding.

I’ve been asked, in recent years, whether there was “something wrong” with me. I’ve been confronted, point blank, by someone inquiring if I was barren.

“All that running you do can’t be good for getting pregnant,” someone once told me.

Even better was when someone told me they could recommend a good specialist in “that area” of concern.

When we got a new dog this year, I nearly died when I got this text message: “So you’re going to keep getting dogs instead of having children?”

My reply to all these things isn’t exactly holding my mouth:

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Instead, I’ve become accustom to using a phrase I heard from a once-friend: “Ladies and gentleman, please get out of my uterus!”

My grandmother, who I love dearly, even pulled a guilt trip on me last summer when I turned 28. She told me that women my age have two or three children by now. “I’d like to see your children before I die,” she implored. Thanks grandma. THAT’S exactly what I needed.

When I called her up saying I had “good news” recently, she responded: “You’re finally pregnant!”

No grandma. No. I had signed up for another marathon. She wasn’t impressed.

My husband once told me he wanted children by the time he turned 30. He was also 20. A lot changes in ten years.

He’ll be 32 this year. In a month, I’ll be 29.

And you know what? We’re talking about it now. In detail. We bought a four-bedroom, three-bath house in 2010 with the intention of “growing” into it. But not with 10 dogs. With children. (Want people to REALLY start nagging you again about children? Buy a house that’s too big for you.)

But the conversation started last year, when I still had a full-time job that kept me away from home 60+ hours a week. Then the part-time job that sometimes ate up 30 hours a week. I had tests done last year before my gynecologist skipped town (seriously, she was just gone one week). Soon, everything else got in the way.

This month, we started going through the motions again. That means no more birth control. Period tracking through an iPhone app (ahhh, modern technology and sorry for the TMI, not really sorry though). It also means vitamins and supplements.

We’re not jumping in full boar quite yet.

With my history of diabetes I’m actually not really “allowed” to try until at least three months worth of blood sugar tests. And I’m still hanging onto some weight it’s recommended I drop. I know not everyone gets pregnant immediately. But my new gynecologist has recommended a timeline that includes waiting to really “start trying” in the fall. As in September or October. Not tomorrow. Or Sunday. Or our fifth wedding anniversary, etc.

(Side note: I’m a bridesmaid in a wedding this December and I love the bride so much that I don’t want to be the ridiculously pregnant bridesmaid, so this timeline works out just fine. I go back for blood sugar tests after a couple months of diet watching through the summer.)

We’re also watching my recent history with anxiety and depression carefully.

Which is where the part about my husband being a saint comes back into play.

When everything that happened to me at my previous job reached crescendo and less than 24 hours later I was in a hospital recovery room after having my gallbladder removed, my husband noted the lack of people who even bothered to come see me. People he thought were my friends didn’t even send text messages. People who’d I worked with for years. (To be fair, I would have been more upset if I wasn’t so incredibly drugged up.)

One person came to see me. One person who truly loved me. She’s one of my best friends.

Thomas would have done anything to make me better. Anything.

So he did.

“You aren’t going back there,” he said to me while I was eating strawberry Jello with tears in my eyes. “If they don’t care enough about you to show up or even wish you well, you aren’t going back.”

He made the decision for me. For my health. For my sanity.

There was no discussion about money or responsibility or bills. He assured me it would be fine. He was heartbroken when I tried to get my surgeon to clear me as soon as possible so I could send a letter of resignation (the surgeon wouldn’t, he made me wait two weeks before he’d clear me if only because he thought the surgery and painkillers were impacting my decision making: “See how you feel in two weeks, then let’s talk…”).

The Tuesday after my surgery, I received the email informing that I would “not be returned to my position.” My mild-mannered, gentle husband, who isn’t prone to hyperbole, flipped his shit (there’s no lack of a better statement here, that’s what happened) even though we knew I wouldn’t be going back. I didn’t need to be mad. He was mad for me. I’ve never seen him so angry in all the years we’ve been together.

Because to me, it felt like the weight of the world was released from my shoulders. To him, it was the ultimate insult after more than a decade of work.

So you can imagine, at this point, that we don’t come to our discussions lightly about children. We’ve rarely come to any decision together lightly, even five years in to a marriage we hope will last us until we’re old and gray.

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One of my favorite photos of us, from our first dance at our May 2008 wedding.

But I know something now I didn’t know six months ago when the world I knew changed forever: I know that when he said “for better or worse” he didn’t mean it as just a simple recitation.

We’ve been through a lot of “worse” in the past year, from my crying everyday at after work home for months to the initial prescription for Zoloft to my leave from work to what happened in January. All the time, he’s been there. My biggest cheerleader. My best friend. The smiling face I see at the end of every run I do. The person who celebrates my PRs just as much as he celebrates my finishing bad races. The man who made the biggest decision of my life in a moment I couldn’t.

“We’re waiting for the right time,” people say when others ask about having children. It’s a stock reply. It’s the avoidance reply. It’s the polite way of saying “I don’t want to talk to you about that” or “stop asking me that question.”

The reason I’m front loading my race season? The reason I’m running two marathons in the spring/summer and don’t have one scheduled for the fall/winter yet? Because now, we’ve decided together, that it’s getting so close to being the “right time.”

Apr 19

What we take from Boston

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I know there will be a lot of posts about Boston this week. I know that I’m also behind on being relevant with this. It’s amazing what happens when you are no longer tied to the day-to-day life of a journalist. I’m still in the mindset of a journalist, though. When I see a to-do list, I bust through it like there’s no tomorrow. Because in news tomorrow is too late.

This week, I’ve been bogged down in catch-up projects that got pushed aside during my student’s journalism conference.

But I’ve also been watching the news.

A lot of news. It’s basically been on auto play behind me for four days.

On Monday, I told my husband that this hits close to home in more ways that I could even comprehend as I watched the events unfolding in front of me Monday. This was an attack of unspeakable horror. At a public event. At a marathon.

I run marathons.

Once upon a time I was accused, by a newspaper reader, as making a horrific event all about me. The problem with events like what happen in Boston, a lot of people start asking themselves questions about how it could impact them, or if it could.

What I knew before Monday: The start line used to be what caused massive anxiety for runners (especially me).

What I know now: Now the finish line takes on a completely different meaning.

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THE FINISH LINE

The start line has always been a source of fear and trepidation among runners (the photo above is the Oakland Half Marathon start in March). It’s when your heart starts racing. When every doubt you can think of crosses your mind. If you’re anything like me, the moment you get past the start is actually the minute you feel any sort of relief.

The finish? The finish brings mixed emotions, depending on how a runner does. The first marathon? The finish is the goal. The PR run? The finish is the moment to quit the push. The bad run? It’s the moment it’s finally over.

Consider what the Boston Marathon represents to those who run it. It’s the crowing glory for the everyday runner. It’s a tough race to get into. Runners have to qualify. I likely will never qualify for Boston. Many runners won’t. For those who do, it’s not just about those 26.2 miles. It’s not about Heartbreak Hill. It’s about the journey.

Seeing that finish line? It’s the finish line of all finish lines.

Now it means something completely different. Joy and accomplishment have been replaced with sorrow.

‘LARGE PUBLIC GATHERINGS’ A CONCERN?

On Monday, one of the talking points that kept coming up was that of how to make “large public gatherings” safe.

Have you ever considered any marathon you run a “large public gathering?”

Think about it. Because until this week, I never did. Instead, I lumped running events into “you either have to be crazy enough to do this or love someone who is” to be here. I think about the smaller races I’ve run, where people not involved were annoyed at our presence when streets were closed down. The bigger races? Well, even those didn’t really seem all that big.

Then I think about the Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego Marathon. I ran the full 26.2 last year (it sucked, I cried, I’m over it).

According to Active.com, the “Epic Summer Run” is one of the top 10 runs, according to finishers, in the United States.

The ING New York Marathon (43,660), Bank of America Chicago Marathon (33,701), Boston Marathon (22,843) and the Marine Corps Marathon (21,405) are the top four. Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego includes 13,361 finishers. I was among those finishers last year.

This year I’m signed up for the half marathon with my friend Sam. She’s running all the Rock ‘n’ Roll events she can this year.

Yes, the suspects were apprehended (one died, the other was taken into custody earlier this evening). But there are so many twisted people in this world (what you learn from 10 years in the news industry is that humanity, while there are good moments, is full of bad people), that I wonder if this could happen somewhere else.

I’m running San Diego before I run the San Francisco Marathon this summer. Both are large events.

I’d be lying if I said thinking like this didn’t trigger my anxiety.

TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIAL MEDIA ARE EVER PRESENT

This is kind of a given, but you don’t see it really, truly in action until something like this happens. On Sept. 11, 2001, very few people had their smart phones out. Facebook wasn’t invented. Those initial images we received on the attacks? More often than not, they were from news photographers. Not a lot of people were pulling out their smart phones.

Today? The finish line at the Boston Marathon was literally the most photographed public place that day. From the moments before (captured by a Boston Globe videographer), to the moment of (captured by an Instagrammer flanking the race path) to the aftereffects (including the YouTube video of people pilfering the Adidas booth).

I ask my students in my first lecture of every semester the same question: Where do you get your news?

Where did you find out about Boston?

I was knee deep in code and curriculum writing on Monday. A Facebook status post alerted me to Boston. It was from another runner friend. That’s when I turned on the television. I tell my students all the time that the best ideas for stories come from Facebook. I can name about 10 ideas that I’ve found on Facebook in the past year.

Twitter is also good for that. This obviously was a breaking news event. Still, social media played a huge role in conveying messages to the masses. I teach mass communication. Unfortunately a really bad headache kept me from my class and more talk of the Boston Marathon on Thursday, but believe me, we’ll be digesting this story for weeks to come.

Why? There is just so much more now out there. We are seeing every side of this story, good, bad and indifferent. Consider, too, that the photos also played a huge role in the identifying of the suspects. The FBI was asking for photos and video.

Say what you want about being in a wired society, in this case it helped crack the case.

RUNNERS ARE STRONGER THAN THIS

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This may be the most obvious lesson from watching the bomb blasts in Boston. The videos show the dazed reality runners were heading into after the blasts. And 468 just kept running. That’s right, nearly 500 people finished the 26.2 mile journey AFTER the bombs blew.

“They had no idea what was happening,” one of my Facebook friends wrote.

True. But if you’ve ever run a marathon you know that in those last few miles, you are basically on autopilot. Your legs feel like they are going to collapse under you. You can’t remember exactly why you signed up. You are tired.

The moment you see the finish line, you just run. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve missed seeing my husband at the finish line because I’m just running and not thinking about anything else.

Runners are a tough bunch.

Runners are also part of a tight-knit community.

And we come to the aid of other runners in times of need. Members of my running club were posting links on how to help, whether it be racking up charity miles or donating to campaigns.

On Thursday, Adidas introduced Boston: Stand as One shirts. The first ones listed, including the yellow one above for women, sold out. I was able to grab up a yellow one before they were all gone. The $26.20 goes to One Fund Boston to support the victims of the attack.

Runs have been scheduled across the country for people to show support. This is an amazing community to belong to.

“You will run again,” President Barack Obama said to attendees of a prayer service on Thursday. The truth, though, is that runners never stop running. Those 468 marathoners kept running. There were people running for Boston that evening. There have been all week. This weekend, the London Marathon will go on as planned, though with more security precautions.

SO WHAT DO WE TAKE FROM BOSTON?

Hours after the second suspect was apprehended alive, what we take, at least right now, is the realization that it only took law enforcement four days, less than 100 hours, to catch the the two allegedly responsible. That’s fast.

We also take away a sense that we may not be as safe on the marathon route, that once exposed in those 13.1 or 26.2 miles, the finish line is not a guarantee.There’s no promise we’ll make it to the end. As runners we know that going in.

But we also take a sense of community, of knowing that we are not alone because there are people out there who want the good to outweigh the bad. And that’s the real lesson in this week.

Apr 15

There are no words

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I’ve been watching the live coverage of the Boston Marathon explosions since I received the first update on my phone earlier today.

My television is surrounded by my California International Marathon poster and a Nike Women’s Half Marathon picture frame. Marathons are part of my life. I watched the live coverage of the winners this morning online.

Then I shut off my television.

I’ve been watching the replay of the explosion at the 4:09 mark.

The photos are horrible and dramatic. An emergency room doctor earlier said there were several “traumatic amputations” of the victims. NBC is quoting that two are dead. The number injured is still in dispute, but it’s somewhere around 100. A former soldier, who finished before the explosion, compared the explosions to an IED blast.

It’s chilling to watch the videos over and over again.

These are details you can’t forget.

It’s painful to watch. The Boston Marathon is the top event in marathon running for mere mortals. There are stringent qualifying times and rules to get it. It’s heartbreaking to see what’s happening there.

It’s heartbreaking to know that the marathoners there will never come to the start line of a marathon feeling the same way again. It’s also heartbreaking to know that some of the rest of us, me included, won’t feel the same either. This event changes everything.

My prayers are with those in Boston right now.

Apr 15

Jumping back in

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There was a bit of a joke in my house last week about my ample amount of extra time since I usually take a week off of running after a marathon. It’s less about recovery, more about me giving myself a treat. One week without running.

That said, I really didn’t have “ample” free time last week. I spent Monday recovering from the run while coding some websites, specifically mocking up a text-only version of a site I’d been working on for some time. Then my students had full-day labs both Wednesday and Thursday for the newspaper. Then, as I was hoping for a wind down, I left with six students for a three-day, two-night journalism conference.

Once there, it was literally one thing after another for the entire time.

I’m not ashamed to say I slept most of Sunday.

So today is finally my “back to running” day. But I’m buried in projects. So I’m not 100 percent sure that’s going to happen either.I’m also behind on grading. So far behind.

Yikes.

That joke about free time? It’s really just a joke.

But since I’m home more now than I was six months ago, my husband constantly reminds me that I can’t just walk past the dishes and laundry anymore without doing anything.

I was peeling potatoes last week and he offered to buy me an apron.

“You’ll probably need one now,” he laughed.

My husband, the comedian.

I need to jump back into running. But I’m still a little tired from the crazy week I’ve had.

Part of that means writing down a plan for the San Francisco Marathon. Right now, I have my 18-miler in place (thanks to the Mermaid Series Sirena 18), and a half marathon planned out (Rock ‘n’ Roll Portland).

The quick turnaround between runs means I go back to mid-length runs this weekend, maybe even a 10-miler. In fact, I have a feeling that I’ll be doing at least two 15-milers during this training cycle. San Francisco is big on hills. I need to be ready.

So here’s to jumping back into it, or at least trying to, this week.

Apr 13

Working, but not working out

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You know when you go on a work trip and take your running clothes because you are convinced you are going to run? And then your scheduled becomes so packed that you can’t?

I’ve been in Sacramento since Thursday afternoon for a community college journalism conference. I have six students with me. We leave late tonight, after a fancy dinner where I’ll be wearing a dress and heels.

My students have been scheduled with back to back breakout sessions.  I’ve been running around trying to keep track of money, hotel reservations and making sure everyone gets fed.

And now we’ve checked out of our hotel rooms and deactivated our room keys, right when I could have had a chance to check out the hotel treadmill. I don’t know the area well enough to not get lost on a run.

It’s a good thing I ran a marathon last weekend. I’m just going to call this “recovery” time.

Apr 3

Healing up, slow and steady

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For reasons I likely can’t remember, I decided to only work on one project during my week of spring break. That meant that when I came back to school on Tuesday, I was buried in work. There were invoices to send. I worked four hours with colleagues writing a proposal for funding that would provide some excellent opportunities to our students. Plus, I was running around trying to figure out where a check went.

I got on campus at 7:30 a.m. I didn’t leave until a little after 5 p.m. Then I realized the rest of my week looked just as hectic (according to my antiquated day planner),  with appointments all week. Today that meant a 9:30 a.m. appointment to renew my driver’s license follow by some work at home, then a 1 p.m. appointment with the eye doctor to check out my contacts.

The DMV appointment went quick, if only because I had an appointment. I got in and out, even after they sent me the form with my name wrong (totally missing the hyphen, incredibly necessary for it to be there since my license is the one piece of identification I care about it being right on).

The eye appointment didn’t go as well. I lost one of my contacts last week after I rubbed my eye too hard. It disappeared somewhere in the produce department at Safeway. I wasn’t even going to try and find it. And I couldn’t see well enough out of that eye to bother looking. Know what’s fun? Driving home (less than a mile) with your left eye closed because your right eye is the only one you can see out of.

Tomorrow, I have a day full of work rewriting CSS and adding accessibility features to a website. On Friday, I go back to the sports medicine doctor to see how my arm is doing.

I’m a little iffy on how to really characterize it.

I’m still in pain. But it’s not that bad. The biggest thing is mobility. I’m still having some issues moving the left arm completely.

This is my right arm:

armupdate3

This photo is the best I can do, but you’ll notice a couple things right off. My arm can extend straight. My wrist is aligned with the arm. I can fully extend, essentially 180 degrees.

This is my good arm. This is the arm I’ve been relying on for everything lately. I can’t lift myself up without it. At the Oakland Half Marathon my husband had to pull me up off the ground with this arm because I still couldn’t bare too much weight on my left arm. I’m calling this my “strong arm” lately.

Then there’s my T-Rex style left arm:

armupdate2

That’s not a huge dust bunny down there. That’s Cassie. She’s taken up Beau’s love of photo bombing my blog shots.

Notice a couple things here different? My wrist is slightly askew. I can’t align it properly with the rest of my arm without getting a bit of shooting pain up my inner wrist. My elbow is also more bent than on my right arm. It still feels vastly uncomfortable to bend it. It also feels uncomfortable to try to force it into a straight position.

I’ve been trying to get it more mobile than it was three weeks ago when I initially went in to see the doctor. He mentioned ordering physical therapy the last time I was in. I’m hoping to avoid that. I think it’s past the threshold set by the doctor initially. Then, I could barely bring it out in front of me. That’s part of the reason I went to see the doctor. I knew something was wrong.

The biggest problem is still the elbow-area, where the radial head is located. I still can’t put a lot of pressure on it. I’m also having some issues with lifting or moving things, even small items.

armupdate4

I figured a visual would be better for an explanation of what type of pain I’m dealing with.

The red lines indicate the areas where I’m still getting shooting pain, which is essentially up my entire radius bone on both sides. The pain comes when I usually try to grab something or forget that my radial head is broken. The pain is just enough to shock me, but it doesn’t stick around. I’d like to think it’s just a reminder to me that I broke a bone and I need to slow down.

The blue rectangle shows my wrist area where I still have some general weakness. Essentially since I haven’t been using this arm all that much, everything I do with it feels foreign and just kind of wrong. I found my list of exercises from when I strained a thumb tendon shooting video that I’m using to increase the strength in that area. It still hurts, though. My grip isn’t very strong. If I’m carrying something, usually small, I hold it close to me because I’m unsure of myself.

The yellow circle is the worst and most uncomfortable of all of the pain, it indicates the area where the pain comes out once pressure is applied to the area, even slight pressure. It’s really hard not to put your arm down on a table or use it to support yourself when doing activities. Have I mentioned how hard it is to put on my running shoes with limited mobility? That elbow area is where I usually get the pain associated with that. Anytime I put pressure or increase pressure on that bone through activity, it hurts.

That’s the type of pain that actually sticks around for a bit. I’ve actually cancelled runs because the pain has become so bad I’ve taken to take an Ibuprofen, which is what I’m using for breakthrough pain.

What I’m not showing is my general mobility. My arm feels very stiff. I was warned around this. My doctor said normally when medical professionals treat these injuries, they put the arm in a sling for a couple weeks, then take it out so the patient can begin regular movement again. I’ve really struggled with that area.

Three weeks ago, I couldn’t lift my arm above my head. Even putting on a T-shirt was difficult. I couldn’t style my hair. I actually held off on dying my hair (I’m so gray without it, it’s ridiculous), for a couple weeks so my husband didn’t have to figure out how to help me. It’s not that bad now. In fact, I can lift my arm over my head, but it’s not a fluid motion.

So I’m getting better. It’s healing. But it’s happening fairly slow. I have an X-ray with my doctor’s visit on Friday. Then I’ll see just how my arm is doing.

Mar 22

Finishers shirt by mail

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Here’s something I’m not used to: Getting a finishers shirt in the mail. But I found this beauty shoved in my incredibly small, unforgiving mailbox on Thursday.

It’s a pretty nice shirt too. It’s a long-sleeved Dri-Fit. It’s not one of the cotton Dri-Fit shirts I normally wear when running (which I rotate out with my Lululemon shirts), which I’m kind of relieved about. This one picks up the sweat really nicely (yes, I’ve already worn it on a run).

I have to admit, though, I was a little confused when I got it. I didn’t realize it had a place for me to write something on it.

I’ve only seen a few photos of it online so far, though, for inspiration of what to write on it.

Some people write where they ran. I think if I put “We Run Tracy” people might think that’s my name. So I was considering something that was on one of my other shirts. Maybe I could go with something like “We Run Empowered” or something?

The problem then is that I have to write it.

I once won a third-grade penmanship award for my very straight handwriting. If you see my handwriting now, you likely wouldn’t believe that was ever the case. My cursive is much, much worse.

I know part of it has everything to do with a formally strained tendon that hasn’t been the same since I injured it shooting video a couple years ago. So when I sign my signature, it doesn’t really look like the pre-injury signature. Plus I can’t sign my husband’s last name well. I guess that’s the difference between 24 years of practice and five years of practice.

So I’m likely going to never write something on this shirt and have that awkward white area just sitting there waiting for something.

On the plus side, it’s a nice shirt. It’s looser than I’d like at the bottom, but fits snugly at the top.

Plus, it has a pretty nice design on the back too.

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It, obviously, looks like many of the other Nike shirts I had already in my running-clothes collection.

My friend Jennie made a comment about long-sleeved shirts the other day, mentioning that so few races these days give that option. San Francisco has for the last two years, though I know before that they had short-sleeve shirts. California International Marathon gives both options if you sign up early enough. I always pick the long-sleeve version.

The Oakland Half Marathon is one of the few races that does as well. And that’s what I’ll be doing this weekend.

I’m heading over tomorrow to pick up my race packet. I have a really, really low number this year, something in the 2,000 area, which I was surprised about. I’m planning on getting in and getting out quickly, unless I have a friend accompany me. My husband is supposed to work (or so I think, he told me earlier he switched his day off to Saturday, and then I reminded him that we’d only had a conversation about 10 times about Oakland being this weekend).

Oakland was supposed to be my “A” race this season. But with everything else happening (gallbladder removal, fractured arm, blah, blah, blah), I’m just going to happy to get going and finish. Plus, there’s this marathon in less than two weeks I’m really scared about at this point.

Crossing my fingers for a good race.

Feb 25

Protecting prized possessions

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Last fall, in the middle of everything that went south in my life, one of my friends lost most of her home to a fire. It started with a laptop charger. The resulting damage is so much that she’s been forced out of her home for probably as long as a year. She lost nearly everything in the fire.

The little that was salvageable was whatever doesn’t reek of charred remains. We were talking the other day and she mentioned her race mementos: medals and shirts included.

Then she prompted me: Imagine, if everything was suddenly gone. She knows of my vast collection of race bibs adorning my home office walls, right next to my medals and my college and graduate school degrees.

“All your bibs,” she said.

I’d like to think we have protection for that sort of thing, at least to some degree. In 2008, my husband and I purchased a safe after our then rental home was broken into. It happened less than 10 days before Christmas. Our dead-bolt locks were kicked in, as was part of our fence. My dog Sky and I came home to massive footprints on our kicked-in doors, not knowing if someone was in the house.

Because I’m ballsy and a little stupid, I walked in with my husband’s ice ax prepared to greet the intruder.

I called the police.

They told me not to go in. I did anyway. (Again, ballsy and stupid.)

I found all of my jewelry gone. And two bottles of malt liquor. And some cheese. The presents, all wrapped, were still intact. Gone was a backpack, our video camera and every piece of jewelry I’d collected in my adult life.

I was devastated by one piece in particular: my antique engagement ring from my grandmother.

Long story short: Our insurance settled with us for nearly $5,000 in goods. But my high school class ring, numerous necklaces given to me as gifts and my first set of pearls my mom bought me were all gone.

So we bought the safe. And two more dogs. (A couple years ago, burglars were casing houses in my town by knocking on doors. If they heard a dog bark, they’d go on to the next house.)

It gives me solace, but very little when I think about the sense of loss and violation that I felt after our items were taken.

Which brings me to something as simple as a race bib.

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I have them all on a wall in my office. Yesterday, I removed nearly half of them and placed them in a folder for safekeeping. And literally safekeeping. My intention is to put them in our fireproof safe.

It’s made me start to thinking about other memorabilia I have from running (and everything else I consider irreplaceable in my home) and how I wouldn’t be able to replace any of those items.

So I’m trying to figure out what to do with some of these items, specially ones I consider incredibly dear. My first marathon medal? I can’t replace that. Some of my favorite running shirts? Very few race organizers have extras years after it happens. And how would you go about replacing items from races all at once? That seems impossible.

I once saw a runner ask Big Sur International Marathon officials on the organization’s Facebook page if they had any extra medals because one was damages. BSIM is incredibly good about getting back to people. And race officials did, saying they had extras and they’d send one along. But I know other organizations give them away. California International Marathon donates the previous year’s medals to children who participate in a charity run the next year. One race I did ran out of the medal, meaning the organizers likely didn’t order all that many extras the second time around.

A race bib is probably the least of my worries if something like this happens, right?

Yes.

But bibs are one of those things that I’d likely look back on and say: “Wow, I wish I still had that.”

Especially fond memories. Like my first marathon.

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I don’t want to lose any of my mementos from that race. It was a defining experience for me.

So I wonder what to do next with items like this, as opposed to just putting them in a fireproof safe. Is there something more? Should I scour Pinterest and find of what crafty people would do with race bibs and medals?

The ideas I’m found doesn’t include protecting items like this against disasters. Most just show you how to frame or display them, not really how to preserve something so prized.

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