It Must Be Christmas

When I was a kid I was typically sick around Christmas. Yes, yes, the social workers in the crowd are exclaiming deep-seeded issues around "family of origin" this and "inner child" that.

Whatever.

I have never been a big fan of Christmas.

I totally dig Thanksgiving. That's my holiday. :) It's not the food - although that's a great benefit. It's more about the sentiment: gratitude. Those having grown up and sticking with Christian denominations will point to the celebration of Jesus' birthday on December 25th (which in and of itself is embroiled with the whole birthday/Winter Solstice debate).

This holiday has long seemed to be about getting and tallying: "What did you get for Christmas?" Sure, many ask "how was your Christmas?" But that is typically followed by the "get" question. I know, my Buddhism is showing - but for me it's still not about getting. And I was really shown that this year.

So I'm home. I'm sick. Because it's Christmas - and for many years I was sick at Christmas - I think a lot of it was stress as a college kid taking finals (and I get sick when I'm stressed). Then there was holiday travel, blah, blah, blah... so I got sick at Christmas. In the past few years I wasn't - eh - but this year I am.

Anyway, back to my couch and Kleenex box (and it IS Kleenex btw), I was sick this year. Christmas Eve I was to have plans. I was sick - and so is my car (don't get me started on that). I missed out on dinner with the best family ever... so on Christmas day I am feeling a bit better and make dinner. As I am cleaning up - I hear my house phone ringing. Two people have my home phone and I've talked to one of them today...

And the number I see on the ID isn't the other guy's. It is Em: mommy in the best family ever. She comes over and delivers the best Christmas I can remember. I didn't ask for Christmas - but she brought it to me. It literally brought tears to my eyes - and it takes a lot to make me cry.

The moral of the story: it's about giving, and sometimes the gifts come when you least expect them and from the most unlikely of places. This has been my family-away-from-family for a long time, but I was absolutely blown away and speechless by the love they showed me. No - gave me.

I don't know that Christmas will ever edge out Thanksgiving as my favorite holiday, but this year it beat the hell out of it in terms of gratitude.

On the Road Again

Two days in a row this weekend I was outside and it's awesome. Well - it's awesome right now, here on my couch, under a blanket with a nice hot cup of coffee by my side.

Yesterday morning I had to do another field test. This is a form of torture where one find out if or to what extent fitness has improved since the last time the test was run. In the case of a cyclist it's a 3-mile time trial. The course I picked it out in Montgomery County on a road that I thought had low traffic. I was wrong. It's not high traffic, but it's not low. And by no means are those motorists cyclists-friendly as I was reminded yesterday.

On my way to the course I continually noted the snow on the side of the road. That's right: snow. It was 30 degrees and we had flurries the night before. As I warmed up I found there was really nowhere for me to go if someone really wanted to ride close to me - once I hit the white stripe it was all snow. I say all this to preface the fact that I ran the course 30 seconds slower than I did the first time I did the course. Oddly enough even though it was slower overall, other factors (heart rate) indicate my fitness has improved.

I'm really happy with that. I loaded the field tests as well as my warm up and I can see how it's improved. Although I did freak out about going slower at first - calls from my coach and some text messages put things into perspective. I was also really happy that I got up and out of the house and outside for the workout. Not that watching movies inside on the trainer is a bad thing, but I don't ride to watch movies.

So this morning I knew I had a shorter run - 30 minutes. With a slight drizzle and cold many runners would have opted for the treadmill - but not me. I decided to run outside. Earlier this week I had run outside and it had worked really well. Because I've figured out I need to hear my stride, running outside is really helpful. So, I walked the dog and headed back out.

The beginning of the run is uphill - a great warm up (note: sarcasm). By the time I got to the main road I was warmed up and ready for the strides. In the middle of the first stride, I ran by the local McDonalds. That's not the best smell first thing in the morning when you're running, let me tell ya. Anyway, the run felt fantastic. My form felt easy, effortless really. I didn't feel like my breathing was labored - it wasn't a struggle. I felt like my feet were landing right where they needed to - in the midfoot. The foot-roll felt great. There wasn't a noticeable difference between the two feet, I didn't feel a stomping on the right versus a light landing on the left. Whereas I've been hesitant to run on asphalt and sidewalks it seems to have been what I needed. The other thing is I ran in different shoes... who knows what made the difference. Does it matter? I'm on the road again... and really happy. :)