Run Vickie! Run!

            I’m a runner. That sounds weird to me. I didn’t start running until well into my thirties. I wasn’t a high school or college athlete. The last time I played a team sport was intramural basketball in the 5^th grade. Some of my former teammates read this blog. Maybe they can tell you about the only basket I ever made—into the wrong net. Who knew you changed sides at the half (everyone but me apparently)? If I hadn’t been the shortest girl in school my athletic skills still would have been lacking. One might even say hopeless. Even though sports were a mystery to me I was in pretty decent shape. I danced and did Jane Fonda’s workout daily during high school—sometimes twice a day. I guess that’s why I stayed under 100 pounds. I was a little obsessed. I didn’t even know I was thin. There is no skinny like teenaged skinny and there is no stupid like teenaged stupid (apologies to my nieces of that age who are a thousand times smarter than I was back then).

            This week I realized that the running shoes that I bought right after the kids went back to school in September were still looking really new. I think they had only been on my feet once or twice. Not coincidentally, I noticed that my church clothes were uncomfortably tight around the waist. I try to avoid stepping on scales—it makes me crazy, but I knew I had packed on a few pounds. The holidays are rapidly approaching and this is no time to diet. Who am I kidding? Diet—is there a good time to diet? It’s time to rev up the old metabolism. So on Wednesday, I strapped on those still-shiny Saucony running shoes and headed for the Y.

            I got a lot of “Gee we haven’t seen you in a while” sort of comments from the folks at the gym. I work out in the middle of the day so almost everyone else there is a retiree. They are a chatty bunch and they seem to like me. I think they think I’m funny—watching a tiny girl lift heavy things makes them laugh. Plus, I find it very motivational to see old people running and lifting weights. I figure, if they can get there I have no excuses. One day I ran into my uncle (great uncle actually) when I was on my way out of the Y. He said, “I come here every day and I’m 87 years old.” I said to him, “You’re 87 years old because you come here everyday.”

            So I picked my favorite treadmill—second one from the right and pressed manual. I set the incline on 0.5 and the speed at 3.5 to warm up. I popped in my ear buds and started walking.

            At 3.0 minutes I started getting bored. Was it time to up the speed? Surely I don’t need to warm up that much. But I kept walking until after Darius Rucker finished his first song.

            At 5.14 minutes I upped the speed and started jogging. “Wow,” I thought to myself. “It’s been a while.”

            At 6.14 minutes I thought, “Maybe I should have walked for longer.”

            At 7.32 minutes I thought, “Damn, my knees hurt. Maybe I should walk for a while.”

            At 9.02 minutes I thought, “Okay, I’m almost to ten minutes. When this song is over I’ll let myself walk.” But the next song was “Sin Wagon” by the Dixie Chicks. I can’t walk during that song—it’s a running song if ever there was one.

            At 15.17 minutes I thought, “Hmm… that wasn’t so bad. Too bad this sports bra was designed by someone who had never been the victim of gravity, aging or a nursing child. I think I can make it through one more song.”

            By minute 18 or so I reached that runners high people talk about. Those endorphins start pumping and you feel really good. The trick is to get there. Before I was a runner, other runners had told me the first mile was the hardest. It got easier after that. I didn’t believe them until I pushed myself beyond a mile. Once you get to that mile, you want to get to another one and another one. Something might hurt—but it doesn’t bother you enough to stop.

            So I ran that day for about 40 minutes. I talked myself into sticking with it, one song at a time. Each moment my body made some excuse for me to stop, but I talked myself into running for one more song until I didn’t want to make excuses anymore. I managed to run a little over three miles. It wasn’t my best time, but I did it and I felt great.

            A lot of things are like that in life: starting a new job, cleaning the attic, teaching a child to ride a bike, directing a play. It’s always the beginning that is difficult and scary. Once you make some progress and find your rhythm it all comes together. You just need to ignore those aches and pains (whether they are physical, psychological or emotional) and keep on running. You’ll get there.

My fantastic coach and husband with me at my first race. He graciously agreed to run at my beginners pace.

The Perils of Shopping

            I’m going shopping today—clothes shopping. I hate clothes shopping. I know. I’m weird and un-American and not a real girl. Let me be clear—I love nice clothes. I love having something that looks good and is stylish and fits great. Try finding that when you’ve never quite reached the five-foot mark. My father likes to joke that in men’s clothing stores there are departments for “men” and “young men” but not “old men”. That’s funny, because they have an old women’s department. They call it “petites”.  I can find clothes that fit, but only if I need something to wear to bingo on Friday nights.

            My other alternative is to shop in the junior’s department. I have really good luck buying jeans there. I’m not exactly skinny, but I have no ass (pardon the vulgarity). Seriously, none. One sleepy morning a few years back, I was getting dressed for work and my skirt  fit much better than usual (this was back in my corporate days—no skirts at work for me anymore). Were all my workouts paying off? Nope. The skirt was on backwards. But shopping in the Junior’s department must be done carefully. There are few things more pathetic than a soccer mom trying to dress like Hannah Montana.

            I have a party to go to Sunday night to celebrate my store’s fifth anniversary. It’s casual. What does that mean exactly? How casual? Bus stop casual? Nah, paint splattered sweat pants are probably out of the question. Saturday afternoon mass casual? Nah, too “churchy”. I know, it’s more like going to a bar with friends casual. I’m not good at that. I like to go out. But it just doesn’t happen often enough for it to be effortless for me.

There are a number of women from India where I work. Last year they all wore saris to our “casual” holiday party. They looked awesome—our work uniform is jeans and unflattering mustard-colored shirts. It was cool to see them in these gorgeous fabrics. I wonder what the Irish-Italian-American version of the sari is? A denim skirt and a Guinness? A glass of Chianti? I don’t know, but I’m on a quest to find it. Wish me luck!

Party Hardy

(...or as we say in New England "Pahty Hahdy")

I come from a BIG family that loves to celebrate. “Eat, drink and be merry” is a motto we take very seriously. Whether it was a family picnic or a first communion or a graduation party, all of the festivities I can remember from my childhood featured tables ready to collapse from the results of many hours of labor in everyone’s kitchens. The food was wonderful and so was the company. At some point in growing up and owning a home and starting a family I forgot that it was the social part that was important. Yes, the food was amazing. But hanging out with my cousins and other relatives was a blast. We left every occasion thinking that we ought to do this more often.  

When my son Owen was born I pulled together a party to celebrate the day of his Christening. There were sandwich platters, pasta salad, potato salad, cole slaw, and all kinds of sweets made from scratch. All this while I had a newborn who nursed every two to three hours—he was born late (2 weeks), huge (9.8 lbs.), and hungry. I’m not telling you this to brag about my catering-while-sleep-deprived skills. I’m telling you this to illustrate how stupid I was. I never actually asked for help. And when I accepted the help that was offered I was less than gracious about it. Thank God my mother has thick skin and understands how psychotic a new mother can be. She would have been more than happy to help—she’s an amazing cook, a former caterer, and a retired Home Ec teacher. Did I ask her for help? Nope. See? Stupid.

This was the Christmas I decide to keep it simple by just having dessert. Psycho.

While clearing away the debris of our pre-trick-or-treating Halloween party this morning I reflected on how much more fun I have when I throw parties these days. It’s been eight (fast moving) years since Owen’s Christening and I’ve gotten much smarter—about entertaining anyway. It all started last spring. One of my fantastic neighbors held an Easter egg hunt for all the kids. They ordered a couple of big sheet pizzas and some calzones from a local take-out place. Someone made cupcakes and a few people brought beverages. No one stressed and everyone had a great time.

Owen’s First Communion was a few weeks off and I hadn’t planned a menu yet. While we were walking home from the egg hunt I said to him, “Hey Owen. How would

 you feel if we had pizza for your First Communion party?”

            “Great! From where?”

            “It’s your party. You get to choose.”

            “Yay! Papa Gino’s” he yelled.

            I ordered pizza and calzones and a cake. I made a huge salad and a few appetizers. I asked my mother to make up a fruit platter (she claims she isn’t creative but her fruit displays are works of art). I didn’t break my back or stress everyone out.

It isn't as fancy, but a call to the bakery is better than Valium!

            Something cool happened. No one missed my psychotic display of homemade goodness. Owen was excited we were having the food of his choosing for his party. We still ate, drank and were merry. I thoroughly enjoyed my little bear’s big day. I relaxed, drank wine and ate food that someone else made. Most of all, I got to enjoy the company of some of my favorite people—my family.

Home Improvement Continued...

…or Why Home Improvement is Like Sharing Baked Goods with Wild Life

Have you read any of the children’s books by Felicia Bond and Laura Numeroff like If You Give a Moose a Muffin or If You Give a Pig a Pancake? Check them out if you haven’t—they’re a lot of fun. The stories follow a formula where one action leads to another and then to another until the characters come full circle to where they started off. You give a pig a pancake, he wants syrup. The syrup makes him sticky, he wants a bath. You give him a bath he wants a toy—and on and on until you give him another pancake and he gets sticky. Home improvement projects are just like that. 

 The brilliant Carol Kane reading "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie"

In my last blog post, I prematurely suggested that my porch project is just about finished. But I’m beginning to believe you’re never really finished. You paint the walls and realize you need new window shades. With the new paint and shades the rug looks really awful so that needs to be replaced. Along the way you run out of primer, your sander bites the dust, the wood screws you have are the wrong size and on and on until the folks at Home Depot know you on sight. If do it yourself projects are supposed to save money, how to people afford to hire folks to do all this stuff?

We are approximately 24 hours away from guests arriving for Halloween. We’ll be ready—more or less (or I’d be doing more working and less writing!). I remember reading an article about entertaining years ago that suggested if you are short on time, just make sure the bathrooms are clean, turn the lights down low and light some candles. Everyone will be having too much fun to notice if the house isn’t pristine. I would add, if all else fails, make sure there is plenty of booze for the grown-ups, sugar for the kids, and pizza for everyone.
Have a spooky and fun Halloween!

Proof that I'm a REALLY good sport.

           

Scrape, sand, repeat...

Forgive me Dear Readers. It’s been nearly a week since my last confession blog post. I’ve been distracted by a home improvement project. I have not only neglected this blog, but my day-to-day chores as well. The contents of my refrigerator has been retired to the compost bin and I have a giant laundry beast to slay (at least the laundry is clean—we have piles & piles of clean laundry).

Every project around here takes longer than I anticipate. I blame the age of the house (it was built in 1904) and the previous owner—Mickey Mouse. At least, I think that’s who did all the maintenance on this house before we bought it. It’s the only thing that could possibly explain his “creative” methods of home improvement. In honor of Halloween, I ought to tell you the horror stories of the electrical system—but it gives me chills just thinking about it. Fortunately, we exorcized those demons early on in our home ownership.

The room I’m working on is the porch. It was more or less winterized by previous owners (meaning it has radiators but no insulation) and the boys use it as a playroom. But since it’s the first room anyone sees it’s more of a playroom-art studio-mudroom-foyer sort of place.

I’ve been scraping, sanding and painting the walls and trim and my husband has had the Herculean task of wrestling in a new front door. Houses of this vintage have very few 90º angles and manufacturers have this silly policy of making all their doors true rectangles. He has done a lot of shaving, sanding and swearing lately. But it really had to be done (and I must say it looks fabulous!). For some reason, when Mickey installed the front door, he used a hollow core door—which is adequate for something like the door of your linen closet. As an exterior door it leaves a little to be desired in the way of insulation and security.

If hubby was Hercules in this adventure, I was merely Sisyphus: rolling the boulder of paint prep up hill for what seemed an eternity (over-dramatic? moi?). I am overjoyed to report we have achieved paint. Now it’s on to the window treatments and moving all the stuff out of my living room and back where it lives.

Back in August in a moment of self-delusion I ordered all toys, games, coat closets, shoe cubbies, etc. off the porch. It was time to paint and I was ready to jump headfirst. But then school started and with it came Cub Scouts, soccer, homework, daytime work hours and all the other shiny things that distract one from a task. Some time in the last few weeks I looked at the living room and looked at the calendar and looked back at the living room and realized that something had to be done.

Halloween is on the way and we’re having a little party. A couple of other families will join us for pre-trick-or-treating pizza and football (the Pat’s kickoff is 4:15 on Halloween afternoon). Suddenly I had a deadline. It turns out it was just what I needed. When I have all the time in the world, I take all the time in the world. If I have a week, I get it done in a week. Now that the porch is almost done, I’ll have to start another project. After all, Christmas sounds like a good deadline. I wonder how long it would take me to paint the dining room…