The Fish Pond

That Uncultured Swine

Would you believe we still don't have all the sickness out of the house? Sunny is still sick, suffering from what the doctor believes is a secondary viral infection. She's still running a fever at night and she's still coughing. We get one more day for the fever to resolve itself before they start running bloodwork and other unpleasantries.

Okay, all that was true yesterday two days ago when I started this post, and you see how much I managed to get written before I got sucked away again. Her fever stayed down last night, so today yesterday, two and a half weeks after we started this whole mess, Sunny went back to school to join her sister and brother, Nemo went to the babysitter, and I cleaned up the disgusting disaster area otherwise known as my family room. The mess was so bad that I simply took a big rubbermaid tub, threw everything in it that wasn't laundry, trash, or a book, and told the big three that they have until tomorrow tonight to clean everything they wanted out of it, and whatever is left is going to charity or in the trash. It was foul. It feels so good to have that room, the main room in our house and where we all spend the most time, clean and clear.

I want to thank everyone for their well wishes, prayers, kind words and thoughts. Before the antibiotics took effect, Trout just laid on the couch and stared into the back of it, not having the energy to face forward and stare at the tv instead, and she loves her some tv. I had to sit next to her with a cup with a straw to get her to drink anything. She was so weak and grisly pale, like Ruth in Fried Green Tomatoes just before she died. The last time she scared me that bad she was nearly washed out to sea. My nerves could really do without all that, but I guess that's just one of those things about being a mom. If my kids didn't scare the crap out of me all the time something would be wrong. At any rate, after two doses of the antibiotic she woke up the next day yelling at Sunny, so I knew then she'd be okay. Augmentin rocks.

If you have the unfortunate luck to have any member of your family get H1N1, please, please make sure you monitor them for several days after you think they are all better. Our experience with Sunny has taught us this. She got sick first, coughing and running a moderate fever but not the scary 104 that Nemo hit or even the 103 that Little Man had. The fever lasted five days and broke on a Friday. It stayed down all weekend, so I sent her to school on Monday. By Wednesday she was running a fever again, and due to the experience with Trout I suspected pneumonia and took her in to the doctor on Thursday morning. The doctor confirmed it was either bronchitis or early pneumonia, commended me for bringing her in so quickly, and put her on antibiotics. Once again the fever broke on Friday so we sent her to school Monday. Monday night she started to run a fever AGAIN. So thinking that the antibiotics weren't appropriate and we needed a different one I took her back to the doctor and said WTF why can't we get rid of this stinking thing? The doctor said her lungs were clear and that she thought Sunny had a secondary virus, that her body/immune system were so weak from fighting off the H1N1 and the bronchitis/pneumonia that it has made her susceptible to everything else out there. It cleared in a couple of days, but if it hadn't they would have started running bloodwork etc. looking for something much worse.

Please, if you get this, err on the side of caution and keep your child home an extra day, if you can, to give their little bodies time to strengthen so they won't succumb to something else. They need that time. Sunny may be back at school now, but she's tired and doesn't have the energy she usually does. She even told her teacher that she was tired. So we'll be doing early bedtimes for another week, I think, til she starts feeling like herself again.

Somehow, in the midst of all this, I managed to not get sick. I was exhausted, profoundly, like first-trimester-of-pregnancy tired, but I never got a cough or sniffles or a fever or aches or anything. BigDaddyFish missed almost a week of work running fevers and coughing and aching. That actually ended up being a blessing in disguise, as he was home so I could run my unsick self to the store without having to drag several sick kids with me, so we were able to manage pretty well without having to expose anyone who might have come to help us out. We are still grateful for all of you who offered to bring us food and staples and leave them on our porch for us. We have the best friends in the world.

Here's hoping we got all our sick for the winter out of the way now.

Outtakes

"Hey, why are you pulling away?"

"Your chest hair is tickling my nose."

"So? Come back here!"

"No! I'll sneeze all over you, and no one wants that."

"No, it'd be okay. All spasms caused by me are good."

-------------------------------------------

Sunny: "Aiggghh! Blech! What's that smell? Who fawted?"

BDF, laughing: "I did!" Lots of moans and groans from the rest of the occupants of the van. A short time later, we drove through an area where an animal had clearly died.

Sunny: "Dad, did you fawt again?"

BDF: "Uh, no, Sunny, that's a dead animal. Something died."

Little Man: "Ugh, is it IN the car?"

We're Busy!

It's hard to get alone time with your spouse when you have four small kids needing all manner of care running around the house trying to destroy it. You spend all day chasing them around and putting out fires, then at night you are just too exhausted to even look at each other, much less get a little action. During the crazy daytime hours, it's difficult to even find a few moments when the decibel level is low enough that you can actually discuss a strategy for managing the house, much less to tell each other how you feel. BigDaddyFish and I started about a year ago using our friend, the Locked Door, each and every time we needed it. Need to discuss who is going to drive who to school? Go behind the Locked Door. Feeling lonely because you haven't seen each other all week thanks to the long commute and a crazy activity week for the kids? Go behind the Locked Door for a little smooch. Need to give yourself a timeout before you have a stroke? Go behind the Locked Door. We've been using it for all kinds of things, not just Alone Time, if you get my meaning.

It's funny how each kid reacts differently to the Locked Door. Sometimes we don't even lock it, just close it, just to see what they'll do. Trout will stand outside it and whine (actually quite impressive since she's 9), but if ignored will go away, and usually won't try the door to see if it is actually locked. Little Man sees the door as a challenge and will immediately go try to find something to use to unlock it, but again, often without trying it first to see if it's unlocked. Sunny will try the door and then stand outside it and pound on it and try to engage us in conversation through the door. Nemo will pound on it and yell "Ma! Ma! Da Dee! Doow shut!" They all have trouble with knocking, hence the liberal use of the lock in the first place, and our usual response, no matter what we're doing behind that door, is "We're busy! Go [watch a movie/play in traffic/wait on your bed/ask your sister] away!" so that we have a few minutes to finish our conversation before facing the hordes.

Yesterday Sunny and Nemo successfully breached the closed but not locked door, and we discovered that Nemo needed a diaper change but that we didn't have any diapers. Sunny brought us a bunch from the other floor of the house without us asking, we kissed the top of her head and sent her away so she didn't have to smell her brother's toxic waste, and we shut the door. BDF changed the baby while I finished getting dressed and we both continued our conversation. Sunny decided we were taking too long after a minute or so, so she came and banged on the door. And before either BDF or I could open our mouths, Nemo yelled out "We're Bushzy!"

Good to know we're getting through to somebody.

Family Lost and Found

When I was growing up, when someone would ask about my family and ask how many cousins I have, I'd have to catch myself when I started to say five and change it to seven. For most people, it's probably easy to remember how many cousins they have. But my family was close to my mother's side of the family and pretty much didn't have anything to do with my father's side of the family (his father died before I was born and my grandmother died when I was 7), so I frequently forgot I had two other cousins from my dad's side.

I don't know why we didn't do much with my father's brother's family. Maybe they had some lingering sibling rivalry issues, since my dad and his brother are only 16 months apart. I know my father always felt a bit like the slighted second son. Maybe the families just didn't like each other. I know that we saw each other infrequently at best before my mom died, and after she died we didn't really see each other at all. My father used to talk to his brother on the phone maybe once or twice a month, so I occasionally talked to my uncle, but I never saw or spoke to my cousins.

For a long time this didn't bother me. My next closest cousin on both sides of the family is eight years younger than I am, and growing up I didn't really feel like we had a lot in common. How could we? They were in elementary school when I was in high school. I babysat for some of my cousins on my mom's side, but that was more of the role we had - I was older, into other stuff. As we aged, though, and gained a more similar perspective in life, I was able to cultivate a closer relationship to my cousins. As they have gone to college, married, and had children of their own, I've really begun to cherish our friendships, made deeper by our shared family history.

As I developed those deeper friendships with my cousins on my mother's side, I thought often of my cousins on the other side, and wondered where they were, what they were doing, what paths their lives had taken. I often wanted to contact them, but I couldn't do that without going through my father, and that would have entailed delving into his issues in a way that I didn't want to get into. He can have his issues, fine, but I wanted the respect of being able to form my own opinions free of his bias, and that wouldn't have happened.

I saw the younger of my cousins on my father's side at my wedding 15 years ago, but she was still in high school then, and we didn't stay connected after the wedding. I continued to wonder about her and her sister though.

This past October, my sister got married. And I have no idea why, but I was completely flummoxed when my uncle and aunt walked up to the house (the wedding was outside), followed by both of my cousins and their significant others. I guess I always assumed that since my sister lived with my father she was privy to and subscribed to his particular issues regarding his brother and his family. I got to see both of my cousins, both of whom have grown into beautiful (seriously, they're hot - this frumpy old lady is quite jealous), smart, capable women. I got to see my aunt and uncle and cousins and interact with them on my own terms, sit with them and have my own conversations and get to know them myself. And it was wonderful. They are warm, kind, wonderful people.

I exchanged a few emails with my cousins, and they have now learned just how terrible I am about returning emails. But I recently joined Facebook (I'm continuing to rail against them, but from within the system - I got on to find an ex of my husband's, but that's another story entirely) and both of them are on it, and I friended both of them. I'm looking forward to attending the wedding of one of them in the spring, and to cultivating relationships with them like I have with my other cousins. I didn't really expect to get any gifts at my sister's wedding, but in my cousins I have.

_{Seriously, look, aren't they gorgeous?}

Olympic Blubbering

Friday evening I was looking at one of the many sites for the Olympics to find out when the opening ceremonies were on and what the schedule was for the other events I was interested in, and as my eye scanned down the page it found and zeroed in on something I had completely forgotten about: the sport that my grandfather judged for over 40 years. I had somehow totally forgotten it was an olympic sport, and when my eye saw it listed there I was unprepared for the waves of grief that washed over me. Within seconds I was sobbing, head cradled in my arms, sitting at my dining room table with my laptop in front of me.

How on earth had I forgotten? For forty years it had taken my grandfather, and later my grandmother, all over the world for meets, to two other continents and to almost every state in the US. It had taken them to two Olympics. They missed my birthday more years than not because the annual convention is always held in late July. Even when my grandfather wasn't judging, which was rare, they followed the sport intently. They used to call us up every time it was on TV, which was a rare occurence, even though most often, especially in our teenage years, we just weren't that interested. They would talk on and on about seeing this person or that person at meets, and after my grandfather died and I had to track down their contact information to notify them, it was as if I knew those people, even though I hadn't "met" them since I was a baby.

I have always watched the Olympics with great enthusiasm. I remember sitting on the floor in the family room at my parents' old house when I was about six, caught up in the excitement and emotion of the games. I remember being upset and angry when we boycotted the summer games in 1980, not clearly understanding why. I have always looked forward to Olympic time, and did so this time with more anticipation than usual, because this is the first Olympics that my older two kids "get" it, understand that they, too, have the potential to do great things in representation of our country if they so have the desire and are willing to put in the hard work to do it.

I guess this demonstrates the lengths to which the mind will go to protect the heart when necessary. I was already missing my grandfather tremendously, and this is the first Olympics where he isn't calling me to tell me that his sport is on and to watch it. I am grateful to my brain for doing what it had to do so that I could look forward to watching with anticipation and not too much pain.

Once again, though he is gone, he is here.

This year, I watch the Olympics with great enthusiasm. I cheer for our team, and revel in the achievement of all the athletes, Americans, allies, or not. Doesn't matter - I just love to watch the amazing things those fit people do with their bodies. I think about the hard work and dedication they all have, that their families all have, and wonder if I could make that kind of commitment, to achieving something like that myself, to helping my kids achieve that. I don't know the answer; my gut says no, I give up too easily, I search for moderation and balance in all aspects of my life. Trout is a daredevil, and I can readily imagine the day she comes to me begging to make the commitment with her to swimming, or ballet, or volleyball, or gymnastics, or fencing, or something or other. I know my grandfather would have said yes, immediately, with no hesitation. I hope that when the time comes, he will give me the courage to say yes.

In the mean time, I'll just continue to be a blubbering mess with every medal ceremony. Michael Phelps just hasn't been good for my emotional state. But he sure is fun to watch.

The Oriole

My mother was a huge sports fan. She liked ACC basketball, the Olympics, and Redskins football, but her big love was baseball, Baltimore Orioles baseball specifically. She learned how to score baseball games as a child when my grandfather coached my uncle's little league games, and she had a steno notebook that she spent a huge investment of time with a pencil and ruler creating grids where she could score the games. We were one of the first families to get cable in our neighborhood, not because of my dad or to let us watch MTV (because we weren't allowed to watch it at first, no matter how much we whined), but to subscribe to the Home Team Sports channel that broadcast Orioles games. Mom would watch the games and score them in her notebook. When she died we found something like five or six full steno notebooks of scoring of Orioles games. We tossed them. I wish now that I'd kept  at least one of them.

About a month ago I stopped riding the exercise bike very much (not that I didn't like it or that it wasn't working, but I get bored easily), opting instead to go a few times a week, or however often I can get someone to watch the kids, to the Soccerplex and walk the trails there. They have what they call the "Heartsmart" trail that is .8 miles long and loops through the grounds around a small pond. I like that they have the distances marked out in .1 mile sections, so I know how far I've gone, it includes some challenging hills (hey, this is Maryland), and it's a peaceful way for me to both get a break from the kids and clear my head and take care of my body, too.

The pond itself is teeming with wildlife. Not so much the wildlife I have at home, but with several species of frogs, especially some very vocal bullfrogs, and birds. Ducks, geese, some sort of egret or small heron, all sorts of things. It was here, on a walk a few weeks ago, that I saw my very first actual non-mascot Baltimore Oriole. There is a small stand of river birches about 15 feet or so from the edge of the pond, and this little oriole has been following me on my walks, hopping from tree to tree and back each time I pass by on another lap around the pond. It doesn't seem to matter what time of day I come, morning, afternoon, or evening, that little bird is there to greet me with a chirp and a bob of his head. I've come to look forward to seeing him each time I walk.

This year marks 23 years since my mother died. This year marks the first birthday where my life passed the length of my mother's life. And this year has been the very first year when I've felt at peace. I think the little bird has something to do with it, reminding me that she's here, everywhere, if I only take the time to look around and see.

With Apologies to Judith Viorst

I went to bed at 12am and the baby woke me up at one to nurse and BigDaddyFish still wasn't in bed because he was having an existential crisis and I had to talk him out of it and we didn't go to sleep until 2:30 and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

I didn't get to sleep in like I wanted and the baby woke me up by poking me in the eye and when it stopped hurting and I could open it I discovered his eyelids were pink and puffy and swollen. The doctor couldn't get him in until 2:15 and my babysitter didn't come until 3 and I had to take all 4 kids with me.

I think I'll run away from home.

The girls came into our bed and were loud, loud, LOUD and it made my ears bleed. The baby sat on my head and jumped and it hurt. BigDaddyFish asked me why I didn't go down and get breakfast for everyone while he took a shower. I gave him "The Look." And not the good one, either.

As BDF was leaving the house I asked if there was any way he could leave a little early so that we could go out to dinner before Deadliest Catch and he looked at me blankly and I said "You know, for my birthday?" because obviously everyone forgot and I was certain I was having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

At breakfast Nemo dumped all of his cereal and milk in his lap and on the floor. Little Man asked for cinnamon toast so I made cinnamon toast and he shouted at me "You BURNED it in the middle! It's dark! This is NOT the WAY to MAKE CINNAMON TOAST! YOU RUINED IT! I AM NOT GOING TO EAT IT! I AM GOING TO THROW IT!" without even tasting it and the toast wasn't even burned. I had to get in his face and tell him he could not talk to me that way even IF the toast was burned which it wasn't and it was my birthday and everyone forgot and my feelings were hurt and I was having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

Trout ate all the chocolate pudding. Little Man ate all his cinnamon toast and then ate all the marshmallows and made Sunny scream because she wanted marshmallows but he gave Nemo a marshmallow and he put it in his hair and got all sticky. I had to bake my own birthday cake. The next day.

At the doctor's office everyone climbed on everything and lifted up the venetian blinds and kicked each other and would NOT. STOP. TALKING. And of course we got the doctor who never talks above a whisper and I could barely hear her. She said Nemo doesn't have pinkeye, he's having an allergic reaction. I had to put Trout in the corner and Little Man on the exam table on the opposite side of the room and Sunny in the chair and Nemo had to stand up. She sent his prescription to Target via the internet. No one got a dinosaur but Nemo.

I was having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

I dropped the kids off with the babysitter and I went to Target and they didn't have the prescription and they asked me to wait for 20 minutes while they checked the voice mail so I went and did my shopping and came back. They still didn't have the prescription so I called the doctor's office and they put me on hold for 15 minutes while they looked for the prescription and they talked to the pharmacist and then hung up and didn't even apologize to me. The pharmacist asked if I could wait for 20 minutes. I said in 20 minutes I was running away from home.

After the 30 minute trip to Target that took 2 hours I went to my bedroom to listen to my iPod and fold laundry and my iPod was dead. The kids were yelling and I didn't want to go downstairs to plug it in so I folded laundry in pseudo-silence while Trout listened to Daughtry too loud and Sunny and Little Man fought and the baby woke up and cried and the babysitter tried to contain it all.

I took a shower at 5:30. I cut myself shaving my legs. My hair wouldn't cooperate and I had nothing to wear. I said I'm having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day but no one was there to hear me.

At dinner there was iceberg lettuce in my salad. I hate iceberg lettuce. There was Sportscenter on the big screen and I hate Sportscenter. There wasn't enough alcohol in my margarita and I couldn't finish my chili and didn't get dessert.

The kids were still awake when we got home and they were supposed to be asleep and they got up eleventy million times and Nemo wouldn't nurse to sleep. There was no "After the Catch" after Deadliest Catch and the season is over. There was a thunderstorm and a noise on the deck that sounded like the bear. I told BDF that I had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. He said some days are like that.

Even on your birthday.

---------------------------

Confused? Go here and get my most favoritest children's book ever.

Blame It All on Guitar Hero

So where have I been? Have I been getting my house in sparkling condition to get it put on the market? No. Have I been working out hours each day? No, but I have worked out about 45-60 minutes, three times a week. Have I been spending a whole bunch of time with my kids, loving them up and teaching them and engaging in wonderous creative educational projects? Well, sorta. I AM spending time with the kids.

See, the kids love to play Guitar Hero. Only, they aren't very good at it. Trout can get about halfway through Slow Ride before she fails out. I, on the other hand, am a former musician, and while I never played guitar, I can read music, and that makes it so that I can do pretty well despite my tiny fingers. I completed the easy level a couple of weeks ago, and I've been working my way through the medium level. I only have Raining Blood and the guitar battle at the end to do. That said, I don't think I'll be going any further; I looked at the hard level and just have to say HA to that.

Anyway, they make me play for them. They pick the songs, I play, they sing and dance. We bond.

And few things are cuter than Nemo doing a little booty shake while Sunny sings along with Hit Me With Your Best Shot. Little Man is destined to be some sort of skater rocker dude when he gets older, if his propensity for putting on grungy shorts, a long sleeved t-shirt, a blue flame winter knit hat and his Tony Hawk hoodie over top, and a single glove and jamming air-guitar style with the Guitar Hero controller is any indication. Trout's a bit square, but she loves to bang her head anyway, and metal is her favorite kind of music right now, High School Musical notwithstanding. And she worked and worked and worked and worked so hard to play Slow Ride all the way through, so hard, and she finally made it on Friday. That determination will serve her well.

In spite of all of that, we have actually done something constructive around here. End of the school year activities have kept us all busy. Sunny finished up her gymnastics class, Trout will finish her art class this week. We haven't decided exactly what to do about summer camps; I think most kids tend to be far too overscheduled. We are thinking one camp per kid, preferably all at the same time, and then leaving the rest of the summer open, because we will need to move this summer. I don't want to make the kids change schools during the year.

Little Man went on a field trip to go strawberry picking, and somehow managed to pick an entire quart of rotten strawberries, I guess because he doesn't like them. I went through them that night after he went to bed, and managed to find one strawberry that looked like it might be edible, so I washed the crap out of it, cut off three bad spots, and ate it. One single strawberry. Then I put the rest down the the garbage disposal and did my momly duty, namely telling my son that I "ate all the strawberries that were good and they were wonderful." That same afternoon we got the worst storm we've seen in the DC area in years, complete with tornadoes and the most impressive lightening I've seen outside of the deep south. I ended up having to run out the door to go pick up the bigs at the bus stop with the littles tucked under my arms in the pouring rain - we got soaked to the bone just running from the front door to the van right in front. Then we had to sit at the bus stop in the van for over half an hour wondering what was up because the school decided to hold the kids until the storm, which was travelling at over 50 mph, blew through. More than 100K people lost power in our county, including Uncle Orca/Agincourtdb. Our lights only flickered for a minute, though.

Last week I got a letter telling me my grandfather's estate is now closed, and it included a check. This threw me for a bit of a loop. I knew it was coming, but I was surprised at my reaction. I don't want a check, I want my grandfather.

Thanks to that check, though, and the economic stimulus check and my tax refund, we've paid off all of our credit card debt. We now have just the van payment and our house debt. Marvelously freeing.

Friday night I qualified for the gold medal in the Parent Olympics: while I was on the phone with BigDaddyFish, who was working late and was giving me a status update, Trout and Nemo were fooling around on our wood-frame, solid oak couch, and somehow Trout did something such that Nemo flipped up and over the back of the couch, banging his head on the couch, the corner of our toybox hutch, and the wall. I screamed "gotta go" and slammed the phone down while simultaneously leaping, hurdle style, over our kitchen doorway gate, grabbed the baby, clutched him to me and started checking for a concussion in a nanosecond, just in time for him to puke all down the front of me and him, in the living room with the new carpet. But never fear: I CAUGHT ALL THE PUKE with an octopalian combination of my shirt, Nemo's shirt, and my hands, all without dropping him. AWESOME. And then Nemo and I took an emergency shower, but I swear I still smell like puke.

So how many calories do you think I burn playing Guitar Hero for hours on end? Hit Me With Your Best Shot, come on, hit me with your best....

The Journey of 24,901.55 Miles (or 40,075.16 km for my Canadian Friends) Begins With a Single Revolution of a Pedal

My grandfather was probably the most physically fit person I have ever met, at least until the cancer got him. He worked out every day, even until the bitter end, although the definition of "worked out" changed over time depending on what he was capable of doing. When I was a teenager, he would have been in his fifties and early sixties. At that time he ran every day, rain or shine, and then would work out with hand weights or swim or golf or play softball or something else, depending on the weather and what his schedule would permit, as he was still working at that time and also volunteering a huge amount of time as a national judge for an olympic sport (that will remain nameless, as it is esoteric enough that naming it will automatically out me to anyone associated with it).

And he always had his exercise bike.

As the population of his neighborhood deteriorated and it became downright dangerous for him to run, he switched over to riding his exercise bike. It was an ancient thing, with a fan instead of a front wheel and a little knob to turn to increase the resistance. It had no fancy gadgets, just a simple odometer, and it had poles that went back and forth like cross-country skis instead of handlebars. He had a setup in his basement with an old tv and vcr, and he would put travel videos on and ride his bike. He biked to the National Parks and train rides across Canada and sailing across the south pacific. He toured Italy, France, Greece, Peru. He rode and rode and rode, and he took his bike with him when he and my grandmother moved to the retirement community where they spent their last years.

We kids loved to climb on that bike, to play on it and turn it around - we probably put a couple hundred miles just messing with the damn thing. Never one to discourage fitness, he never yelled at us for it, and sometimes he would get on with us on his lap and he would work the arms while we pedalled, or vice versa.

About two years before he died, my grandfather turned over mile 24,902. He had ridden his bike around the Earth at the equator. It was one of his proudest accomplishments. His retirement community came and took his picture, and put an article about his achievement in their little newsletter.

One of the saddest experiences of my life was when, after his first couple of hospitalizations for the cancer, he kept talking about getting on his bike and riding. When he could no longer get on the bike without pain, he still talked about riding it, about doing what he had to do to recover so he could ride his bike again. It broke my heart every time he brought it up.

For the last couple of weeks, my body has been crying out for some exercise. My abs screamed at me to do a crunch or two, or at least roll around in plank position on my exercise ball. I'd huff and puff going up one of the three flights of stairs in my house. My arms have ached to have some weights flung around lifted and lowered slowly. It was an odd feeling for me, once I've never experienced.

I once asked my grandfather why he worked out all the time, as that legacy hadn't been passed down to my mother, or to me. I've always hated all forms of physical activity except sex, and you can't really do that for hours every day (unless you're Sting). My PE credits in HS came from marching band, in college from a semester each of swimming, aerobics, ballet, and bowling. My grandfather told me that since he'd grown up on a farm, he ran everywhere, and he played sports in college because it was fun. After college he stopped working out for a while, but one day he climbed the stairs and his lungs were burning, and he hated how that felt. He swore then and there that he would never stop exercising, and he stayed true to that promise.

Friday, I decided I had to respond to my body somehow, and I climbed up on this thing:

Obviously it's not my grandfather's bike. That was donated to his retirement community for use in their exercise room. I sometimes wonder how many more miles have been added to it. This bike was bought by my husband a couple of years ago and brought home where it has sat, accumulating maybe 10 miles total, and half of those are from the kids playing with it. He thought that spending $$$$ would make him more likely to use it. I told him what I thought of that idea, but he bought it anyway. I hate when I'm right sometimes.

I didn't have great expectations of what I would do - it's been ages since I worked out in any way. But I got on it and figured I'd do ten or fifteen minutes, gently, just doing what I felt like my body could handle. I've had some type of injury in my right foot/ankle and my left knee has been grinding when I go up and down stairs, so I didn't want to push too hard and make it worse. (yes, I know I need to do something about those. I don't have a doctor right now, and haven't wanted to do the research to find a new one)

First I did ten minutes. Then fifteen. I have a thing for round numbers, so then I wanted to push for an even number of miles. Then calories. By then it was 20 minutes. I was sweating and my butt hurt. I kept pushing. I did a full 30 minutes plus 5 minute cooldown. It wasn't a major deal. I went a whopping 4.4 miles. I burned something like 120 calories. I didn't drink any water because I hadn't planned on doing anything that might actually be considered a workout, so I was thirsty. Turns out my butt is so big I chapped it from riding. That night my legs ached beyond reason; I had to take tylenol and a hot shower to get to sleep.

Today I did it again, and I went a little further in the same time, burned a handfull more calories. I wore different clothes and didn't chap my ass. I wore shoes. This time my legs ached, felt like they would fall off seven minutes in. But I pushed on for the full 30 minutes.

I don't know that I'm bound for an equatorial ride, but it feels good to move. I think my grandfather would approve.

Sweetness and Love

Yesterday I had a couple of hours without all of the kids - the bigs were at school, Sunny was at preschool, and Nemo was at a sitter. I picked Sunny up, and about halfway up the highway I hear a little voice from the back seat.

"Mommy, thanks for picking me up." I smiled at her in the rearview mirror, all the while wondering if she thinks I won't pick her up for some reason.

When I picked Nemo up, Sunny waited in the car while I ran up to the door to get him. As I started to put Nemo in his carseat, he looked over and noticed Sunny sitting there in her seat.

"Aaaaiiieee!" he said gleefully as he reached his pudgy hand out to take Sunny's. And they sat that way, sitting side by side but apart, happily holding hands between their seats, until I finished doing his straps and tightened him up, when he can't reach her anymore. He continued to smile, until he succumbed to sleep, half a block from our house.