Who knew running this 5K would be such a big deal

Apparently tomorrow is the end of another Round of Words in 80 Days. At the end of each Round participants are supposed to share how they did on achieving their goals over the past 80 days. My goals were pretty transparent - did I even have goals? I kind of forgot. Oh, yes, the whole writing thing. I have been way out in left field when it comes to that.

I do know of one goal which I blabbed to everyone about (except for my mother), and that is that I was going to run in a 5K. Well, last night I did it! I went the distance. I covered five kilometers of ground. Ok, I didn't run the whole thing - are you nuts? But I was able to hold up enough to run the last tenth of a mile. Will I be ready to do this in public and without my running partner come the Fourth of July? That's only two weeks away!

I got a sudden inspiration. Maybe if I fake some kind of injury in the first mile, and dramatically pull myself together and limp the entire rest of the race, everyone will applaud my efforts no matter how long it takes to cross the finish line.

Nope, won't work. Deep down inside I am a fierce competitor. I don't show it. Mostly because I lose most all of the time and just don't want to be a baby about it.

But you know, I think I can learn a lot from this whole experience. Maybe this whole running thing came up at this time in my life to teach me something about life, and perseverance, and achieving our dreams. Or maybe it is just another way to not get anything done around the house.

See ya at the start of the next round. July 1, I believe it is. And just in time for my run.

My running partner. Perhaps this explains a lot. He and I were each in for our yearly physicals earlier this month. His doctor told him he was overweight, mine did not. I also don't have to stop to pee on every twig and blade of grass along the way. He does keep me distracted though when I start getting short of breath.

Thirty second Post

Ok, so here is my thirty second post.

One of my goals, you know the running the 5K goal? So I had big plans to run - ok mostly walk - five kilometers this morning, to see what it feels like to go that far.

Then yesterday afternoon I started getting this pain on the top of my right foot. By supper time it was so bad I was limping. By bedtime, my foot was swelled up like a watermelon, warm and red, and I could not walk on it at all. I said, oh, crap. The only thing I could think of that it was was gout. But that is caused by eating rich foods and meats and stuff like that. I never eat beef, chicken a couple times a week, no organ meats, I don't know. I just don't eat anything that would cause gout.

So I popped some ibuprofen and crawled in bed with an ice pack.

This morning, the swelling was gone, there was only little redness and pain over that one bone. I took some more ibuprofen and pouted most of the day. There goes that one goal I thought I could master - no, I knew I could never run three miles, but I could run the first mile and force myself to run the last one and do a mean walk the middle mile.

Tonight I sucked it up and ran a mile, whether it was good for my foot or not. No pain right now. And this took four minutes to type. I really am not very fast at anything.

I will survive

I was thinking about how miserably I have been achieving my goals lately. I started thinking of where I was twenty years ago. Hmm? 1993. I got divorced from my first husband, my dad died from Alzheimer’s and my sister was diagnosed with cancer, all while raising two kids (ages three and seven at the time) and working fulltime at a clinic thirty miles away from where I lived.

A long time ago I filled out a survey about stress in your life, you know, the big things that come up in life – good or bad – which take off the years you are expected to live. That year of 1993, it took a few years off of my life.

Here I sit twenty years later with what I feel is just as much stress. Or maybe I am older and all these things going on in my life take more of a toll than they used to.

Besides my feeble attempts to keep writing, to promote my book, to train for running in a 5K and to help my daughter start up a nonprofit organization, there is the stress of having an aging parent. Whenever my mom asks about my writing, she admonishes me, saying that I better not be writing about her. So I won’t expound on that any more than saying, it is more stress than I ever thought it could be.

So as you have guessed I haven’t worked on many goals this week. I’ve posted to my other blog three times, finished my presentation on my trip to Kenya, been reading some of my books (but haven’t finished any of them), gotten up to two miles  towards the 3.1 I need to run on July 4 (but I won’t tell you how much of that I actually ran and how much I walked). I have been dedicating most of my time to the nonprofit organization my daughter wants to start to help the people she is working with in Kenya. It is a lot of work, all made harder by doing it long distance while Val is still in Africa.

I’ll get there though. I’ll make it. I will survive. And thrive. 

Goals, goals, goals, I need to get me some goals!

Ok, let’s seriously write up so doable goals. And go back to that thing I had going in February about reading, writing, reaching, and throwing in “personal goals” as well.

READING

1)      Read two other blog posts a day.

2)      Read the books – I usually have one fiction, one nonfiction and a devotional going at once. So read something in each of those a day. Right now I am reading “Sinners and the Sea” (fiction), “Ordinary People in God’s Hands” (nonfiction), and “His Grace is Sufficient – Decaf is Not” (devotional). I also have two or three things going in the Kindle. That’s the problem with the Kindle – it is too easy to jump from book to book and never finish anything. Speaking of finishing something, I need to finish one of my books this week.

3)      I can’t think of what else I should be reading right now.

WRITING

1)      Continue to post to my two different blogs a total of five times a week.

2)      Work on my novel four times a week, finishing a chapter a week. That would be doable if I would just drag that novel out!

3)      Write one short piece a week.

REACHING

1)      Submit one of those short pieces I wrote to someplace once a month.

2)      Comment on other blogs at least a few times a week.

3)      Check my social networks daily, but don’t go nuts adding to them. It seems that my social networks have grown enough that other people are finding me. Let them do the work.

4)      I have four speaking engagements from now until mid-August. Maybe I can get one more, but then I think I need to be looking into the fall. I need to have a life.

PERSONAL

1)      Continue running. The 5K is 28 days away. I have to have at least gone (run/walk combo) that full distance by next week, so I could work on actually running most of it within another three weeks.

2)      Work on my daughter Val’s nonprofit. This is a huge undertaking, that’s all I can say about that.  

Ok, all that being written, what have I done this week? I don’t know. This is all too new to me! Ack, goals? What was I thinking?

I’m thinking that I need to get my focus on and goals are the only way to do. I promise to present some finished goals my next post. 

What three things does the word Bread remind you of?

Since I still don’t have concrete writing goals, I am going to tell you what I did accomplish this week. Though I still haven’t gotten back to work on my novel, the things that I have been doing still relate to my writing career, even if I have to stretch things a bit. Just using my imagination, so that’s a good thing.

1)      Worked on my August 19 speaking engagement

2)      Sent out posters for my June 14 presentation

3)      Started pricing the items we brought back from Kenya to sell at that presentation

4)      Blogged on my usual schedule

5)      Made plans to get together with a fellow writer to do some brainstorming of how we can help each other out

6)      Continued training for my 5K. Tried to sign up for it, but something went haywire on their website

7)      Started planning our vacation in September. What does that have to do with writing? Really? Any vacation is more fodder for stories.

This week my goals are to:

1)      Work on my novel

2)      Seriously start putting together my June 14 presentation

3)       Practice making the East African foods I plan on taking along for my guests to snack on

4)      Actually walk/run the full three miles to see how far that really is

Have a great week! 

This is in the Amsterdam airport. Isn't it cool? It reminds me of three things. 1)  That I made some chapati today, as practice for making some for June 14. Chapati is considered the "bread" of many East African peoples. 2) The band Bread, so now I have their music in my head 3) You know the city of Bethlehem? That name means city of bread.