Don’t Sit on the Heater (and other things I learned in school)

When kids reach high school they start to suspect that much of what they are learning in school is useless. I’m here to agree with that statement, and to offer some simple takeaways on the core subjects.

Math

While studying trigonometry a million years ago I started to think of math as exercises for my brain. I could actually feel muscles in my cranium getting stronger as I made sine and cosine and other funny little squiggly things equate to something that made sense. I thought of them as a foreign language or a secret code. If I cracked the code, I could reduce everything down to the right number and do well on the exam. I must have been okay at it since I got As, but damned if it seemed to have any practical purpose!

Then there was calculus, when everything went off the rails. When the calculus teacher described his beloved subject as “shooting a mouse with an elephant gun” I was out.

Takeaway: Fractions. That’s all you need to remember. When your teachers tell you how important it is to learn fractions – don’t underestimate the seriousness of this statement! If I had a dollar for every time I figured out something using “this over that equals this other thing over what” and cross multiplying, I would be rich. But the rest of it? Pretty much shooting a mouse with an elephant gun.

Language Arts

Do they even call it that anymore? Seemed like a fancy way to say you were teaching English to native English speakers. In high school, it meant reading the “classics.” But forcing kids to read something in order to get something specific out of it seems counterproductive. I’m sure I’m not the only one who felt this way. Otherwise, why would Cliffs Notes exist?

Sometime in the last millennium, teachers must have figured this out. My teens haven’t read the classics, but they are still forced to read. Learn new words. Write and construct proper sentences. All good things. But to what end? With Spell Check and his evil twin Autocorrect, knowing how to spell really isn’t all that necessary … or even helpful.

Takeway: Read. Something. Anything. It doesn’t matter what. Even if it’s just the titles on YouTube videos. But know this… Just like “you are what you eat,” “you are what you read” is also true. You can live on a diet of soda and candy, but you’re going to feel and look like crap. If you read nothing but the directions on the back of your microwaveable mac n cheese container, you better think twice before trying to impress your crush with an eloquent text message.

Science

For those of you still pondering my statement about muscles in my cranium, I’m right there with you. Biology. Yuck. I didn’t want to cut up anything, so I skipped this essential science. In general, I don’t think I’m any dumber for it, and I was spared the trauma of formaldehyde frogs.

I actually loved chemistry. There was something about the periodic table, the order of the elements, common properties, how matter could exist in different states… solid, gas, liquid, and (wait what?) plasma. That was fun. Do I still use it? Hell no.

Takeway: The scientific fact that sticks with me the most I learned in physics: If the earth suddenly stopped rotating, everything that wasn’t rooted to the planet or had something impeding its path would end up six miles to the east. Mind. Blown.

Foreign Language

After five years of French all I really remember these days are simple sentences… “Je joue le tennis” (I play tennis) / “Ou est la bibliotheque?” (Where is the library?). If I find myself in Paris someday I can string together this incredibly useful information. Parisians will hand me a tennis racket and point me to the nearest library.

Takeaway: The one phrase of whatever foreign language you study that you will remember first and foremost is guaranteed to be the least useful thing you could possibly ever utter. For me, that would be “N’essayez pas sur la chaffeuse!” (Don’t sit on the heater!)

Madame Lee, bless her heart, really did not like it when students sat on the ginormous heater that occupied most of one wall in her classroom. However, because it was warm – and the size of a small car  – that’s of course where we all sat. Which is why, today, when someone asks me if I still remember any French, all I can do is implore them to not sit on the heater. (Without even a ‘s’il vous plait’!)

Bonus: If you expose yourself to enough foreign languages, you will also pick up random and questionably useful phrases in a variety of tongues. For example, though I never formally studied Spanish I can successfully tell someone I have a nose (“tango nariz”) and ask the question “cuanta mucha para la puta?” (I’ll let you look that one up.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Playing with the Boys

All females are destined to grapple with self-image. Who are we? Are we good enough? Do we measure up? Do we meet the standard? (Whatever that is.)

I caught myself looking in the mirror tonight. Looking at my legs. My almost 50-year-old legs. While the various aches and pains that follow me around daily now reminded me that I’m beyond middle aged, my reflection reminded me what I really wanted to know: I’m tough.

I’ve tried to explain to those who matter (especially my teenage daughter when I see her struggle with identify) a key fact that has been central to my own self-worth: All females are destined to grapple with self-image. Who are we? Are we good enough? Do we measure up? Do we meet the standard? (Whatever that is.)

Somewhere in those self-defining adolescent years, I realized I wasn’t very good at being a girl. The hair-makeup-nails thing never caught on. I tried, but it was like putting a french terrier in a tutu. I sucked at being feminine.

At 13 or 14, I was aware of having the same feelings most girls did. I liked boys. I wanted to be attractive to them. But I didn’t know how to be attractive. And I was competitive. Even more than getting boys to like me, I wanted to prove myself their equal.

I was physical. I liked being dirty from playing softball, spent from shooting baskets, tired from being outdoors, breathing hard, pushing myself. I competed at anything there was to compete at – any sport or game. I was a decent softball player, but I was strangely phenomenal at ping pong.

In eighth grade I went to my first boy-girl party. I felt out of place among the girls who wore cute clothes and makeup, who smelled good, and knew how to flirt. If I couldn’t get boys to look at me because I was cute, maybe I could get them to admire me because I could hold my own in a sporting contest? That night I made my mark by beating every male classmate in ping pong.

To a certain degree, my plan worked. The boys noticed me and I kind of became one of the guys. Ever since, I have found it easier to forge friendships with males than females. Eventually, I learned how to apply makeup.

Somewhere along the line, I realized that my competitive drive and need for physicality held more value than just getting boys to notice me. It was what defined me; what gave me strength in believing in myself.

I’ve tried to explain this to my daughter. But it’s nature’s sense of humor to give us offspring who don’t see eye to eye with us. When my daughter expresses self doubt or questions her abilities, when she’s wracked with anxiety, I want to tell her to go for a run, kick a ball, push herself to physical exhaustion, because that’s what works for me. But I’m realizing (slowly) that’s not what works for her.

So now, at almost 50, I look at who I am and whatever natural forces conspired to give me the personality I have and I’m grateful. Grateful that physical fitness has always been so important to me. Grateful that at some point vanity equated itself with being in good shape. Grateful that whatever my vices, and however destructive my demons, ultimately the pull toward health, vitality, strength, and self-confidence has won.

To that tormented tomboy who was equally bent on getting that boy to like her AND beating him in free throws, my hindsight advice is this: If he’s worth liking, he will dig the fact that you can beat him. And you will never regret proving to yourself that you can.

The Text I Won’t Get Tomorrow

Tomorrow I won’t get a “happy birthday” text from you. People used to ask if you and I were close, and I would joke about how we texted each other once a year, on our birthdays. Then our parents were in that horrible car accident. Texts between us became frequent as we tag-teamed their care in two different hospitals. Insurance information, doctor’s reports, calls to the police station for updates. Eventually mom and dad recovered. You and I went back to annual texts.

There are lifetime moments I recall… Teaching you to spell “superintendent” when you were 5 and I was 10. I had you spell it one word at a time… “super,” then “in,” then “ten,” then “dent”… over and over until you remembered it all together. You were so proud to be able to spell such a long word.

I remember bringing you along on a date when you were 12 and I was 17. We went to the gorge and I got you back late for your paper route. Rushing to get your route done, you crashed your bike and ended up with stitches in your knee. I felt so responsible.

When you were 18 and I was 23, we took our last “family” vacation, traveling with our parents to North Dakota. We sat in the backseat eating McDonald-land cookies as dad drove. One of us bit the head off of Ronald McDonald, put it on Grimace’s body, and joked that it looked like dad. He didn’t find that funny. We thought it was hilarious.

As adults it was clear we had grown up to be very different people. Different lives, different world views, different passions. No, we weren’t close. But we respected each other. We both showed up every time their was a family emergency. We loved each other’s children as if they were our own. We loved each other.

I wish I could have protected you from your bad heart, just as I wished I’d been able to keep you from injuring your knee that day. You’re my little brother. I’m supposed to take care of you. It doesn’t make sense to me that I’m still here and you’re not. It doesn’t seem fair. The sibling relationship is supposed to be the longest on earth. We didn’t get that. I’m once again an only child.

Tomorrow I will again be 6 years older than you, rather than the 5 I am most of the year, and it hit me that I will only continue to get older than you, frozen in time as you are at 43. And more than anything, tomorrow I will miss that text from you.

 

 

 

 

Worn Parts

The extent of my knowledge about cars.

In a randomness of circumstance involving the loan of my “spare” car to a coworker, it was stranded at a rest stop partway between Chehalis and Castle Rock. There are about 30 miles between Chehalis and Castle Rock, and about 3 freeway exits. If you know anything about the area, you know that Chehalis is a metropolis compared to Castle Rock. You also know that if you have a car that’s on the verge of failing, you sure as hell better get it off the roadway wherever you have the opportunity, as the options for exiting are few and far between. So though the car was about 27 miles closer to Castle Rock than to Chehalis, it was unfortunately pointed the other way, making for an interesting logistical challenge.

The car is a 2004 – the same age as my daughter. Maybe because of this parallel I’d felt a reluctance to get rid of it, though it’s been slowly failing for years. A 12-year-old isn’t worn out and ready for the junkyard; it’s a middle-schooler with acne and an attitude.

As we sat having Easter brunch, I explained the situation to my parents and of course my dad was determined to figure out what was wrong with the car. We devised a plan that he and I would drive down and assess the situation. My mom balked at this, as driving two miles to the supermarket was leaving my dad in pain due to arthritis and a neck injury. But Dad won and soon we were on our way.

I’ve never had an interest in learning how a car worked, or much about the things under the hood, because the person who knew absolutely everything in the world about automobiles was my father. From a young age I knew he could fix virtually any car problem or diagnose any issue with only the vaguest of descriptions. Buying a vehicle with him took longer than most doctors spend in medical school, but once it was finally over there was no doubt you received the best deal.

Dad thought we should drive to Castle Rock and see about getting a tow truck. I knew better than to suggest we search the internet for options. Dad doesn’t live in the 21st century. He had a cell phone once, but never really learned how to use it.

There were no tow trucks in Castle Rock. There was, however, an open auto parts store, with a young guy behind the counter who offered to sell us a hitch and rent us a car dolly. He also offered to buy the car sight unseen for $100. Figuring we hadn’t seen the last of this guy, I asked how long the store was open. As Dad searched for a scrap of paper and pen to take down his phone number, I entered it into my phone.

When we reached the stranded car, I watched my dad climb stiffly into the driver’s seat and fumble to pull the seat back. I fought the urge to help. When he opened the hood, I felt useless. His arthritic fingers pried clumsily at the battery case. If I’d known what he was trying to do, I would have offered to assist, but I had no idea what I was even looking at. Dad hobbled to his truck and got a bottle of water. “Shit,” he exclaimed as the bottle cap slipped through his fingers and into the dark recesses of the engine compartment.

My feeling of uselessness grew as he got out his tools. He used a wrench to unscrew a bolt and a screwdriver to lift the battery casing. (Are these standard tools for car repair?) Still unclear as to what exactly we were doing, I watched as he poured water into the holes on top of the battery. The bolt, screwdriver, wrench, and plastic case were perched precariously on the engine. Like a surgery technician, I wanted to offer to hold the tools and extra pieces for him, though the thought of a surgeon with dexterity so limited was frightening.

With the car started, we agreed getting it to Castle Rock was the best idea. “Maybe we drive the back roads,” I suggested. “It’s only 11 miles as long as we can make it to Jackson Highway and then head south.”

Dad gave me a questioning look. “How did you know that?”

I held up my phone. “Google maps.”

“I think it’s quite a ways to the exit,” he said skeptically.

“Only a half mile,” I said holding up the phone as proof.

With Dad driving the limping car and me following in his truck, we started out. Cautiously, he pulled the car onto the freeway but within yards was back on the shoulder creeping along. Somehow we actually made it the half mile to the exit before Dad finally slowed to a stop. “Well, I know what’s wrong with it,” he announced. “The transmission is dead.”

As we drove back to Castle Rock in his truck, Dad gave me his advice. “Sell it to the kid at the auto place. I bet I can get him to $200. A new transmission is $1200 at least.”

“Fine with me,” I said, and realized I meant it. For a year I’d hesitated to sell the car though I rarely drove it. It was difficult to let it go because it felt like family and it still ran – albeit roughly at times. But here, miles from home, after not having not driven it in a month, the time seemed right to say goodbye.

Back in Castle Rock, Dad briefed the auto shop guy on the situation as I texted to find answers to questions I knew were coming.

“She’s not sure if it’s the original transmission,” Dad said.

“It is,” I confirm.

“I can probably bring the title down tomorrow,” Dad tells him.

“Mom says Wednesday is better,” I advise.

“She has to get back to her kids, so could you pay us now?”

“They’re fine until later this evening.”

Dad raised an eyebrow at me. I held up my phone.

We stood outside drinking sodas as we waited for the auto shop guy to get off work.

“I really do think this is the best thing to do,” Dad says.

“I agree, Dad. I totally trust your judgment.”

“You could put more money into it, but it’s probably best to sell it and be done.”

“Yep,” I nod.

“Sometimes you just tweak something under the hood and then it’s running good as new again.”

As he says this, the bottle cap from his soda slips from his fingers and onto the ground. I pick it up and hand it to him.

Dad gives me a wry smile. “And sometimes you just have to accept that the parts are wearing out and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”

 

Desiderata

Sometimes we read aloud not because our words matter to anyone, but because we need to matter.

If you want a guidebook for life, you’d be hard pressed to find one more suitable than this poem. The first time I recall reading it was on the back of the program when my brother graduated from high school in 1993. The words were gold. Every line rang true. And to this day, nearly every day, I recall one phrase or another from it.

Desiderata seemed to take the 23-year-old me apart. Max Ehrmann’s words exposed me for what I was, and also comforted me to let me know I wasn’t alone.

“Listen to others, even the dull and ignorant. They too have their story.”

When I was a teenager, my great grandmother stayed with us for a few days. Every morning she sat at the breakfast table and read the newspaper out loud to us. Out loud! As if we couldn’t read it ourselves. As if we cared.

Today, I’ll read a Facebook post about someone’s lunch or pet or job or whatever and my first thought can often be “who the eff cares?” And then Max’s words come to me. We all need to be heard. Sometimes we have nothing better to talk about than what we had for lunch. We share that info not because it’s earth-shattering, but because we feel the very human desire to connect. We read aloud not because our words matter to anyone, but because we need to matter.

“If you compare yourself with others you may become vain and bitter. For always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.”

At 23 I had vanity and ego to spare. Probably partly because I was still trying to figure out who I was. Did I look better than her? Was I smarter? Prettier? Funnier? In my mid-forties, the vanity has diminished and the ego has mellowed. I see people — myself included — as a sum of their parts, not as something defined by them.

I have a competitive and athletic child, so this is something I try to tell him as well: Whatever he excels at, or whatever he fails at, there will always be someone better; there will always be someone worse. I think of it constantly when I race. I’m not going to win, and I’m not going to come in last. And if for some weird reason I did, next time I won’t.

“Do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.”

As a chronic worrier, these words have been a balm of comfort. At 23, it was just nice to know that someone else had “dark imaginings.” Now, I see the fear in others more clearly. I see that I am not the only one afraid or unsure. And I’m not the only one who skidded to middle-age only to be smacked in the face with the reality that there are no grownups. No one has the answers.

But to realize that fears are born of the fatigue of imagining them … that loneliness perpetuates these fears and magnifies them … that helps. I encourage my kids to talk about what scares them and about what makes them sad. Suppressing bad feelings only intensifies them, and only makes those things darkly imagined seem more real.

“As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.”

Get along, people! It’s that simple. Be kind. Treat others kindly. Put yourself in the other person’s shoes and try to think like them. Try to understand why they think like they do. And then cut them some slack for it.

Being on good terms with people isn’t rocket science. Being on good terms is what we are all taught in kindergarten. Share. Be respectful. And (I’ll say it again) be kind.

“Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune… Be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be.”

Those two lines aren’t next to one another in the poem, but when I recall them, I recall them together. What I see as strength of spirit, some may label God. And God, as Ehrmann so aptly puts it, should be comforting to you “whatever you conceive Him to be.”

I love the way this is worded. The reverence for God is there in the capitalization of Him, but the acknowledgement that for anyone to have peace with God, he or she must be at peace with his or her own concept of God, respects a mature theological perspective.

Without going off on a tangent about comparable religions, I think that about sums it up. If God is who we deem Him to be … love and light, everlasting life, creator of all we know and understand … then God ought also to be something we can agree people conceive of differently. If He’s not, then He’s not God.

“In the noisy confusion of life… with all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.”

It is a beautiful world, isn’t it? It may be a world where Americans are hell-bent on disagreeing with one another, where fanatical groups are hell-bent on killing Americans, and where Donald Trump might actually be elected president (God forbid), but it still is beautiful.

The natural world shows us this daily. The seasons still change and wild birds and animals still roam. Think about that next time you see a crow. Nobody put him there. That crow is proof that the natural world still exists. And it’s beautiful.

“Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.”

Some days striving is the best we can do. I love that Ehrmann recognized this. But even when happiness is elusive, cheerfulness is only a human touch away. Don’t be afraid to reach for people when you need to.

——————————————-

To sum it all up, I think it’s helpful to consider the definition of the poem’s title:

Desiderata (def) noun: plural of “desideratum” – something that is needed or wanted.

Desiderata are those things we need and want. Those things that we all need and want.

 

 

Falling – an art form

The only reason I know that’s not me? I’ve never run in high heels.

Falls. They’re one of the hazards of running. Everyone who runs frequently has fallen. Or at least had a near miss. Some people develop falling into an art form. I’ve watched friends contort their bodies like Olympic gymnasts to either fall with panache, or catch themselves in the nick of time. And some, like me, know that the next fall is not a matter of if, but when.

One of my most spectacular falls happened on a nighttime run with Sophia. We were moving along at a good pace in the home stretch of an out-and-back on Pacific Avenue when Sophia decided to cross against the light. I followed her but turned to make sure there wasn’t a car coming. Taking my eyes off the ground for a split second was all it took to trip over the curb.

Sophia, already traumatized from me taking a few falls on previous runs, hears the sound of my body hitting the pavement. “$h*t! Not again!”

I lay there for a few seconds taking stock of my injuries. I hit hard enough that my cheekbone grazed the sidewalk, but my right knee and my left palm seemed to take the brunt of it. In fact my palm was bleeding rather impressively.

Getting up, I hold up my bloody hand for Sophia to see. She makes a face that combines concern and disgust.

“Are you OK?” says a voice from the curb. A man and woman had pulled over.

Holding my bloody hand like a severed limb in front of me, I walk over to their car window. “I think so.”

Mr. and Mrs. Good Samaritan make faces similar to Sophia’s. The man says, “Don’t we have a first aid kit in here?”

The woman looks around half-heartedly. “I don’t think so.”

“Sorry,” says the man. “I thought we did. Uh, is there anything we can do to help?”

Sophia and I look at each other. We have three more miles before we’re back to our car. Me bleeding to death before we get there is a thought that seems to cross both our minds.

Sophia takes the initiative. “Do you think you could give us a ride to Ruston Way?”

The man and woman look at each other skeptically. Like maybe we are ax murderers, or at least carjackers.

“Uh…,” the hesitation makes it clear they are not OK with this plan. “I don’t know,” says the man. “Could we call someone for you?”

We could call someone. But there’s no one to call who could help any quicker than we could cover the three miles ourselves. Even if we walked.

The man and woman look at me. Sophia looks at me.

“Thanks, but no,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”

Sophia looks pissed. Mr. and Mrs. Samaritan look relieved. “OK, then. Good luck.” And they drive off.

“Well that was rude!” says Sophia.

“Eh, it’s fine,” I say, taking off my headband and wrapping it around my wrist tourniquet-style. “Obviously we look sketchy.”

As we jog slowly down the hill, me with my arm raised in front of me, we joke about the situation.

“Did they think it was some kind of a scam or something?” I ask.

“Right? You fall and then when someone stops to help, I convince them to give us a ride and we steal their car,” says Sophia.

“Could we switch roles next time?” I ask. “I’m getting a little beat up doing this.”

—

Another impressive fall happened with Kai. And I wasn’t even running.

We were biking on the Interurban Trail on a nice summer evening. We were counting birds, bunnies, and potholes as we rode an easy eight miles.

I had Kai ride slightly in front of me and worked on teaching him trail etiquette – stay to the right when someone passes, listen for cyclists coming from behind to call, “on your left,” as they approach.

About a mile from the finish, Kai sped up and started riding with abandon, weaving right and left across the trail.

I admonished him to stay to one side, so he moved right.

I had nearly caught him when I saw (a half-second too late) that he’d started weaving again. Kai weaved right and, even though I braked hard, as he veered left my front wheel caught his rear one. Kai fell to the right but caught himself. I fell to the left and went down hard.

“Owie, ow, ow!” There was a large gash on my left shin and an even larger one on my forearm.

“Geez, mom, watch out!” Kai exclaimed.

From the ground, I glared up at him.

“Oh,” Kai said as he noticed the blood. “Sorry.”

Getting up, I assessed the damage. “Get on your bike, start riding, and stay behind me,” I barked at Kai.

I rode as quickly as possible back to the car, not caring too much whether or not Kai was still back there. By the time I got arrived, I’d decided what to do. I heaved my bike onto the car rack.

Kai pulled up behind me.

“Get off,” I commanded.

Kai did as he was told. I lifted his bike up behind mine, secured them both, and started walking across the street.

“Where are we going?” Kai asked, following me.

“To Oddfellas.”

“Why?”

“Because Andrea’s there and I need her help.”

The last thing Kai wanted to do was hang out with my friends, but he knew better than to argue.

I found Andrea sitting in a booth with Jenn and Sophia.

Sophia looked me up and down taking note of the blood. She rolled her eyes. “You’ve got to be effing kidding me!”

Sitting down, I gesture for Kai to join me. I explain what happened, careful not to make Kai feel too bad. “Can you help me out in the bathroom for a minute?” I ask Andrea.

Andrea has a degree in speech pathology and her de facto medical knowledge serves us well. We consult her on everything from injuries to illnesses and drug interactions.

Andrea coaches me through cleaning my wounds then offers her professional opinion: “Wash everything again when you get home and put some antibacterial cream on it. In the meantime, take two Advil and have a glass of wine.”

Kai’s penance? Having to sit with four giggling women as they spend the next hour drinking.

I was healing nicely from the bike fall when I decided to do a group trail run ten days later. I re-opened both wounds, but this time I was only barely out of the parking lot. Rather than having to cover miles, I only had to slink mere yards back to the car.

Am I clumsier than the average person? Maybe. But I think it’s mainly the law of averages. Sophia claims she has PTSD from all of the falls she’s seen not only me take, but several other friends as well.

Living in a neighborhood notorious for killer sidewalks, I try to give them the respect they deserve. Kai, for his part, has been a much more conscientious cyclist since our incident, though I still give him a wide berth just in case.

The last time I did a trail run I wore both long pants and long sleeves even though the weather was warm. I considered wearing a helmet and skater pads.

My First-Born Puppy

My son now has bigger feet than me – a fact that I find mind-boggling.  It’s weird when your kid gets bigger than you. Something that you birthed – that grew from an infinitesimally small molecule to the size of a pea, then a can of coke, then comes out like a Christmas ham with perfectly formed digits – can actually outgrow you? Crazy.

I pride myself on having a lot of stamina and I swear Kai came into this world with a goal of challenging that. He’s the only 3-day-old I’ve ever heard of who left the hospital with eyes wide open. We carried him in the infant carrier down the hallway, into the elevator, and out to the car and he didn’t so much as blink. We stopped by my doctor’s office and sat Kai in his carrier in the seat across from me. He stared at me. And I stared back.

When Kai was about a week old, I considered running away from home. Not because I wanted to get away from him, but because I felt so inept as a mother. He was fussy, and constantly awake, and I had lost all sense of independence.

In his first few weeks Kai slept in a tight swaddle in a bassinet alongside our bed. His dad would wrap Kai up like a football so tight we could’ve thrown a 40-yard pass with him. It was only when he was completely immobilized that Kai would sleep. Or when he was held. If he fell asleep on you, you dare not move until he woke.

When he was about one, we left him with a babysitter. We came home to find the babysitter conked out on the couch, Kai across the room from her wide awake. Was this kid ever going to sleep?

Eventually he did. And I learned that Kai’s constant state of wakefulness was due in part to an awareness I very much understand. Like me, Kai’s mind is always processing something, digesting and chewing on bits of stimuli from the outside world. Only training our bodies to overcome the constantly spinning wheels brings peace. For Kai and me both, true relaxation comes only when we’ve completely worn ourselves out.

Because of this, I indulge Kai more than most moms when it comes to physical challenges. We play basketball, soccer, and baseball. We run, hike, bike, paddleboard, and kayak. In our downtime, we compete at ping pong. If we’re feeling really lazy we play chess.

There used to be a pride when he would beat me at these things. But now that he’s a teenager, there are precious few things at which I still dominate. One is distance running. He’s been faster than me for years, but he doesn’t have the stamina to do the distance I do. I struggle to maintain a balance between challenging him to push himself and not pushing so hard that he gives up.

Now that Kai’s taken up wrestling, I sometimes find myself unwittingly in a headlock, my knees plowed from behind, lying on the floor. I’ve had to warn Kai that he’s not allowed to use his wrestling moves on Grandma.

Sometimes having a 13-year-old  boy feels a lot like having a puppy. It needs constant exercise, is rather smelly, and you hope it doesn’t pee on the floor. However, you realize that soon it won’t be a puppy at all, but a full-grown dog, its big feet a harbinger of things to come. So you put up with the smells and the chaos and remember a time when that darling boy stared at you, challenging what you are really made of.

Hiking with the Flying Squirrel

“Hey, Mr. Grumpy Gills! What do you do when life gets you down?”

I don’t like Mother’s Day. As a mother, it’s a holiday I feel compelled to enjoy, and that’s a lot of pressure. Ironically, it’s this frame of mind that caused the accidental start to what’s now tradition – my son and I hiking on Mother’s Day.

Two years ago, bummed that I wasn’t particularly enjoying a day that everyone expected me to enjoy, I decided I wanted to hike. Kai said he would come with me. We did the relatively easy Mt Peak in Enumclaw. Kai was happy he’d “climbed a mountain.” And I was happy, like I always am, to get outside and exercise.

The tradition continued last year when we did the slightly tougher Little Si.

This year there was no question of how we’d be spending the day, and even the hike itself had been selected for some time.  We were going to do the full Mt Si. With almost 4000 feet in elevation gain and 8 miles roundtrip, it’s difficult by anyone’s standards.

I suppose the writing was on the wall when I saw Kai trying to jam his feet into a too-small pair of Converse. “You don’t have any other shoes?”

“Not that don’t have holes in the bottom.”

Sigh.

So with Shilo, the less-lame of our two dogs, along for company, we set out.

Kai’s attitude was pretty much marked by the trail miles. Mile 1 was the ‘Sprint.’ Gung-ho and ready to rock, Kai was climbing at a pace I found difficult. “Dude, I’m carrying a backpack with 15 pounds of water, food, and clothes for YOU… Do you think you could slow it down a little?”

Mile 2, his attitude changed sharply. It was the ‘Whining’ mile. “How far have we gone? Are you sure it’s only four miles to the top? I’m hungry. I’m thirsty.” And my favorite… “These shoes suck!”

Mile 3 was the ‘Blame-Mom’ mile. “You didn’t tell me it would be this hard! You didn’t pack anything but snacks? Why didn’t you get me new shoes before we did this?”

Wanting a reason to quit, Kai did a really good job of trying to blame his shoes. “It’s too bad I only had these shoes. The rocks are poking through the bottom. I hate that we can’t make it to the top. We’re going to have to turn around. My feet are getting trashed.”

“Oh no we’re not!” I threatened to tell his friends that he whimped out. When that didn’t matter, I threatened to leave him and collect him on the way down.

“You wouldn’t do that.”

“I left you in that race, remember?”

It’s true. He was defeated by a hill and I was on pace to PR. I left him struggling and crying 4 miles into a 5-mile race. I felt bad about it though. I still feel bad about it.

Kai remembered, and with the same overt body language he displays when he’s off his game in soccer or baseball (shoulders slumped and head down) he continued up the hill.

I tried to bolster his spirits by quoting Finding Nemo: “Hey, Mr. Grumpy Gills! What do you do when life gets you down? Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming!”

“We’re not swimming. We’re hiking. If we were swimming, my sucky shoes wouldn’t matter.”

I tried education: “Did you know we pass through six different eco-systems on this hike? Your teacher will be impressed if you tell her about eco-systems.”

“I’m pretty sure she already knows about eco-systems.”

As we were beginning the last mile, some angels appeared in the form of two dads and their three daughters. We had passed them during the ‘Sprint’ mile, at which point one of the dads wished me happy mother’s day. “You too,” I said reflexively. We laughed. Yeah, not you too.

But during the ‘Whining’ and ‘Blame-Mom’ miles, they caught up. In fact, they passed us. The youngest girl, who looked to be about nine, was bringing up the rear.

I leaned over to Kai. “Look at her. She’s your sister’s age! You’re not going to let a nine-year-old girl make it to the top while you quit, are you?”

That’s all it took. Kai took off. It was the steepest portion of the mountain and he was flying. He didn’t slow down, he didn’t look back, and poor Shilo – her pack separated– was beside herself trying to keep us together. Mile 4 became the ‘Macho’ mile.

The view from the top was incredible. Birds soared and clouds floated beneath us. Kai forgot all about his shoes. We took photos.

The downhill miles were full of the kind of conversation I love. “Mom, if you could have three superpowers what would they be?”

I decided on flying, mind-reading, and running super fast.

Kai chose flying, time travel, and shape shifting.

As he tired, Kai yearned to be at the car. “If you could time travel, you could be there already,” I said.

“Yeah, or if I shape-shifted into a flying squirrel.”

“Which would be WAY cooler!” we said together.

I told Kai that I thought he had just understood something very fundamental – that life is about the journey, not the destination.

He smiled. I know he got it.

“You were sweaty and you said you were going to puke.”

I hate running! When’s the next race?

I used to be a runner. Until yesterday, when I decided I hate running so much I’m never doing it again. I was at mile 19 of the Tacoma City Marathon. I wanted more than anything to throw up, but there was nothing in my stomach except Gu and sloshing fluids. It was over 70 degrees. At 10 am! In May!! In Tacoma!!!

Fairly certain I’d died and gone to hell, I flashed back to a similar experience when I attempted to jog a doggy fun run while 8-months pregnant. Murphy, the lab, decided that the hill at the end was a good place to stop and relieve herself. I had no bag to pick anything up with, just an empty paper cup. It was 85 degrees, late June.

Let me tell you… Carrying a steaming cup of dog poop uphill? In extreme heat? After 3 miles? With a 30-pound beach ball in your abdomen? Seeing a dude with a pitchfork right then would not have surprised me.

OK, so maybe the marathon wasn’t that bad. Maybe that’s an exaggeration. But when I was reduced, 20 miles in, to walking a route I frequently run, I was defeated. There is nothing more demoralizing than to tumble down the mountain you usually climb.

My family was waiting for me at mile 21. Cheering, waving signs. I started jogging so I could look stronger than I felt. My husband asked, “How are you feeling?” To which I replied, “I want to puke! This (insert expletive) sucks!”

He gallantly refilled my water bottle with ice cold water. I told him to go to hell for dumping the old water on the ground rather than over my head. Feeling a little guilty about my negative attitude, I bent to give my daughter a kiss before taking off. She backed away like I had Dengue Fever.

My family learned that being on the non-running end of a running event can be a thankless job. Spent runners become selfish fiends who blame you for their self-destruction. (OK, that’s not true. They told me later how many runners thanked them for being out there.) I guess the only selfish fiend was me. Though, in my defense, I do remember thanking people… just not anyone I was related to.

I’d like to tell you things got better after that, but they didn’t. Somewhere earlier in the race, before extreme self-pity set in, I was lifting my spirits by hitting repeat on Elvis’s “A Little Less Conversation” (an underappreciated tune, in my opinion). But not even Elvis… or Bob Seger, or Pink, or AC/DC, or the Stones… could save me now. Besides I was too tired to mess with the music on my iPhone, which was covered in PowerAde gel anyway.

Even though my family got short-shrifted by me, I believe they had moments of enjoyment. No doubt my son reveled in the fact that when I crossed the finish line I had chocolate Gu all over my shirt, the only convenient thing with which to wipe my mouth. How many times have we told him to use a napkin, not his shirt?

My daughter was all about greeting my friends at the finish, helping them get water and food. I asked her, as we staggered to the car, why she wouldn’t kiss me. “You were sweaty and you said you were going to puke.” Fair enough.

And even though I hate running with my whole heart, I’m already debating whether my next race is going to be a half or a full marathon.

Like Sisyphus and his stupid rock. And, not coincidentally, many of my friends.

Some Thoughts About Boston

I guess what’s really bothering me is why do we feel the need to blame? Why do we feel the need to hate?

Like most people, my first response to what happened at the Boston Marathon yesterday was shock. A bombing at a marathon finish line? What???

My second reaction was personal. God, that could have been my family! At 4:09 into the race, that’s exactly where they would have been waiting for me.

Third, I felt a need for comraderie. I reached out to my running friends, and they reached back. We united online and in person to process the tragedy that touched OUR world.

Today, it was learning about the victims and the heros – who were the people, the names and faces, to whom this happened? – and taking notice of all of the outpourings of support and solidarity. The beginning of healing.

But there is also anger – so many angry people who seem bent on blaming someone. Was this a coordinated terror attack from one of our “enemies?” Is it domestic terrorism from another crazy like Timothy McVeigh? You can bet that once it’s determined which of these it is, people who want to hate are going to jump on some type of bandwagon. Just like Sandyhook, which allowed anti-gun people to go on a rampage. I’ve already seen the “rah USA” and the anti-Homeland Security posts. Gag me.

I guess what’s really bothering me is why do we feel the need to blame? Why do we feel the need to hate?  I don’t want to hate. And I refuse to fear.

I’ll be running the Tacoma City Marathon in two weeks. Initially, I felt like telling my family – my kids – don’t come watch me. Stay home. Stay safe. If I did that, a lot of people would say I’m “letting the terrorists win.”

My opinion? That’s a stupid-ass way to think of it. This isn’t a contest. It’s not a win/loss situation. The only people who lost are the families of the victims, the 6,000 runners who didn’t get to finish yesterday’s race, and the people of Boston for whom the marathon and its history mean so much. The rest of us? Well, maybe we lost some of our innocence, just as we do everytime something uncomprehendable happens, but life will go on.

And who won? No one. Not even the individual or group who was behind the bombing. If it were a “win” for them, we’d know who they are by now. They would have been looking for acclaim and notoriety and their identity would already be clear.

No, it’s not about winning and losing. It shouldn’t be about hate and retribution. It’s a tragic, senseless event. Tragic, senseless events happen everywhere, all the time. We can’t, and shouldn’t, modify our lives because of them.

You would be hard-pressed to find a  group of individuals stronger or more determined than marathoners. I’m proud to be one of them. While I’m sad about what happened yesterday, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let it change one single thing about my love affair with running. And, unless there’s a very compelling reason for them not to be, my family will be there to watch. As Dr. Martin Luther King said, “Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.”