The Fish Pond

Two Inches

What would you do if you found out that there was a way to correct a problem, a physical problem you have with your body that isn't just a cosmetic issue, but pertains to your quality of life? Would you do it, even if it was incredibly painful? And risky? Would you do it? And knowing what you do about yourself right now, would you have trusted your teenage self with making the right decision for you?

These are questions that have been weighing heavily on my mind this past week two weeks.

As those of you who know me in real life know, I am Short. Note the capital S. Really short. Like, not much taller standing up than sitting down short. I'm 4'10" tall, technically qualifying me as a Little Person, though I do not have dwarfism and have never considered myself as LP. I certainly identify with some of the challenges they face every day, and I've been ridiculed and treated poorly because of my height. Most of it is merely annoying rather than destructive, but there was a time in my life when I was first working when people wouldn't take me seriously because my height combined with my youthful appearance gave the impression people were dealing with a twelve year old, rather than someone older, and certainly they never believed me when I was in a position of authority.

My height has, once or twice, been an issue of safety. When I was pregnant with Trout, I couldn't drive from about five months on, because my belly was too big for me to safely get behind the wheel and still reach the pedals, and at the time I had a car without airbags. It was miserable to have to be schlepped around every single place I had to go. I couldn't just run out to the store. I couldn't get to my doctor appointments. I didn't really feel like I could go anywhere at all for fun, because I felt so guilty having to ask people to drive me around for the things I HAD to do.

We wised up when I was pregnant with Little Man, and with the purchase of pedal extenders I was able to continue to drive throughout my pregnancy, though I was still closer to the wheel than would have been safe had I had an airbag in the car (it was a stick-shift jeep, no less). Getting those showed me what a crazy thing it had been that I was driving for so long without them, so we kept them until we got rid of that car. It's not so much an issue now with next-generation airbags and cars with available adjustable pedals built in, and I fit in my Toyota just fine, but those pedal extenders were a life-saver back then.

All this has been on my mind because of this article from the Washington Post, about a 13 year old girl with dwarfism who decided to have surgery to lengthen her legs. This wasn't an option for me, as it wasn't available back when I was young. I often said, still sometimes say, that I would give anything to have at least two inches, just two little precious inches, to get me to five feet, the land where I wouldn't have to have even petite length pants hemmed, where I could reach things from the top shelves in the grocery store without having to ask someone, where I can sit back the recommended ten to twelve inches from the airbag. Where finding clothes that fit would be simple, and wouldn't sometimes require a trip to the children's section. Where my feet will be able to touch the floor when I sit, instead of dangling two inches above the floor, so I self-consciously tuck them under me, destroying my knees in the process. Where I can ditch my stools that I have all over the house so that I can reach the things I need to get to. The article talks about lengthening legs up to sixteen total inches for some people. That would make me a giant!

Now, at this point in my life, I wouldn't have the surgery. I like how I am. I also think that we all face challenges in this life, and this really isn't a bad one to face. I can't say I would have made the same decision when I was 13, however, or 15 or 17 or even 27. Because I wouldn't have made the decision based on what was right for ME, but rather more about being convenient to other people, or what other people thought of me. I have always prided myself on my independence and self-sufficiency, and I never want to be thought of as a burden or as someone who makes other people uncomfortable. My younger self would have been much more concerned with what other people think, driven by "fitting in" rather than being different in any way. Now, as I approach 40, I'm secure in my own skin, in my own height. I don't care what others think; it is not necessary for me to subscribe to what others think I should be in order for me to be valuable. I hope that I am setting an example for my children, who are likely to be shorter than average, and certainly Sunny who is well on her way to being as short as I am, that it is better to change the way people think than it is to change yourself to fit the average. I particularly like the quote from the article from Sylvia Boorstein:

"There are only two responses to every challenge -- balanced acceptance or embittered resistance. Acceptance is freedom. Resistance is suffering. We all know this."

Even if my feet do dangle when I sit.

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

New post up at DC Metro Moms about my quest to find that elusive thing called sleep.

The Mother of All Poop Stories

Motherhood is not for the weak stomached. I've caught puke in my bare hands as the kids threw up and couldn't get to the bathroom. I've been peed on and pooped on, and cleaned up a spectacular mess made by Little Man when he had projectile poop across the NICU. I've been spit up all over and been puked on in my hair and down my shirt. Nothing I couldn't handle. I've never had a kid get into poop artwork, and I've only had one incidence of poop in the tub. The worst poop problem we've had here is Sunny taking off her poopy diaper and throwing it at me. It was bound to happen sooner or later. So really, I shouldn't have been surprised (NOTE: If you have a weak stomach, read no further. You have been warned).

Sunny attends preschool in the next town south of here, a distance of about 10 miles that takes about a 20 minute drive. I like to leave a bit early to pick her up at her 1pm dismissal, because Nemo falls asleep in the car and that's the best way to ensure he gets a decent nap before we go meet BigDaddyFish for lunch. I usually leave about 12:15, after Nemo has had a chance to watch his favorite Noggin show, Oswald.

This morning, I was in the kitchen looking at porn reading blogs doing the dishes, and Nemo came up to our kitchen gate, crying and spitting and saying something about "Chock-lit." He held something in his hand, and I figured he picked up a piece of stray chocolate from the floor or in the couch cushions that I hadn't found on my cleaning binge and was trying to eat it.

"No! Dirty, Nemo, dirty, don't eat that! Spit it out!" I told him as I ran from the sink to the kitchen gate. He continued sputtering and coughing and gagged and threw up a bit. I reached him and the stench was unbearable.

"Nemo! What did you do? Are you okay? What did you eat?!?" I shrieked as he shoved his hand down the front of his pants again, muttering about the chocklit and "messy". That's when it hit me.

Nemo has developed a habit lately of putting his hand down his diaper and playing with himself. Today, he apparently grabbed a turd and pulled it out of his diaper, and thought it looked an awful lot like chocolate. He learned the folly in that pretty quick.

Choking down my own puke, I grabbed the wipes and stripped him. He had apparently been squishing around in there and in an effort to clean the mess off his hands, he'd wiped them on his sweatshirt. I went at him with about eleventy million wipes (and I pride myself on my two-wipe diaper changes, so that's saying something) and finally decided it was just too much of a mess and made a dash for the tub.

One emergency bath later, I crammed him in clean clothes at 12:35, anxiously watching the clock. Although he was clean he still had poopbreath, so I grabbed a couple of Grasshopper cookies to deal with that. BDF had said he would pick up Sunny and meet me in the parking lot, so I wasn't too worried, but still wanted to make it. I got in the car at 12:43 and BDF texted me that he had a meeting and couldn't make it to pick up Sunny. So I skedaddled. I pulled into the parking lot at 12:58.

And that is why I will be having tequila tonight. The end.

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.

Now With More Color! And Indignation!

First, I told you it would darken fabulously. It's still got a way to go, but here's the current pastel version:

I personally like the lovely olivey green color. Note also the lovely mosquito bite on the left there. Fun!

Two days ago the mailman knocked on our door to deliver a couple of packages. He likes to do this rather than just leave them in the door, mostly because 3/4 of the time they are legos for Little Man who gets all excited about the mail, so the mailman likes to give him a little fun. Anyway, he handed the packages to Little Man and said "Guess what I just saw? A black bear." No surprise there.

What was a surprise was that the mailman was filling the mailboxes one row of townhouses away (for those who don't know, there's a big box at the start of every other row of townhouses that has all the boxes for the houses in both those rows. We all have to walk down a row to the box to get our mail. Kinda like the lobby of an apartment building, but with more weather.) and he said the bear came out of the woods, walked RIGHT BEHIND HIM DOWN THE MIDDLE OF THE STREET and went into the small wooded area in front of the houses WHERE OUR PLAYGROUND IS. The bear was completely unconcerned that the mailman was standing there watching him as he waddled down the road, in broad daylight, right in the middle of a townhouse development.

This concerned me. Most wildlife doesn't bother me in the slightest; in fact, that's part of the appeal of living here. We've had bear sightings before in the almost 20 years that this neighborhood has existed, but they were just that - sightings. One shot, and the bear was gone. Never have we had one this bold, one who keeps coming back and who obviously isn't perturbed by people. He's obviously well fed, too.

So I decided to call the Department of Natural Resources, who usually handles these things. I told the woman about all the bear encounters I know about and asked what they do. Well, in a word, nothing. She told me to lock up the trash, put all birdfeeders away, do whatever we have to do to eliminate the food source. I was silent for a second, then I attempted to explain that this is a townhouse neighborhood. It has 150 houses, lots of kids, lots of pets. The likelihood of getting all those houses to lock up their trash when only maybe 20% have sheds in which to lock them is pretty slim, not to mention that our trash has to be out to the curb by 7am on Mondays and Thursdays and what are we supposed to do then? Not put our trash out until the garbage truck comes? Take every Monday and Thursday off so we can wait for them? Obviously this bear isn't confining his food searches to nighttime. She said he's an adolescent looking for girl bears, and when he figures out there are no girl bears here and the food source is gone, he'll move on. I reminded her that I just explained that the food source is going to be there and it really isn't feasible to remove it. She didn't say anything. I said "You really don't do ANYTHING? We don't want the bear hurt, we want it to have a happy life, but we really don't want a kid or pet to be hurt." She told me again the whole shpiel about locking up the trash and putting away birdfeeders. I angrily thanked her and hung up.

Today I had planned to try the county animal control office, but I talked to my neighbor, also a mother with small kids, and she called them when she first saw the bear months ago. They told her to call the Department of Natural Resources. And we know how that went. So I didn't call, and instead posted to our neighborhood playgroup about the bear and the natural resources call, and asked for input about any other bear sightings in the neighborhood. Only my neighbor called me, and I already knew about her sighting. So far I haven't heard from anyone else. I'll wait until Monday, and then try calling the county again.

I am really concerned about the fact that this bear doesn't appear to be fearful of humans. I am worried it is going to take a kid or animal getting hurt before anyone will do anything about it. It's ridiculous that we need to be worried about letting our kids go play in the front yard or ride their bikes up and down the street because of a bear that is somewhere he doesn't belong. It's not like this is a rural, mountainous area that's his natural habitat; this is the DC metro suburbs. Sexual predators? Sad, but sure. Traffic going too fast? You betcha. Carjackers? Yep. Bears? Not so much.

Anyone got any ideas? I'm all ears.

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

I also worry about how much I yell. Check it out at DC Metro Moms Blog.

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

Believe it or not, I also sometimes find time to scrapbook. Find out how here.

Klutzes Anonymous, Redux

Years ago when we had the water leak in the basement and were trying to figure out where it was coming from, we tore up a couple of boards on our deck. Of course, it turned out the water wasn't coming from outside the house, but rather a cracked pipe inside, but we left the biggest of the boards torn up. We are lazy that way. We recognized that the deck needs to be replaced anyway. We educated all the kids about the hole, and even though it is in a bad location at the top of our steps in front of the gate, no one ever had a problem with it.

About, oh, three? months ago, we got a quote to have the deck redecked, and in the course of doing whatever he did to create his estimate, the guy put the board back in the spot, but of course didn't nail it back down. So since then we've had this loose board that the kids would occasionally step on or loosen slightly, but nobody ever fell through, I guess because they are so light and quick. So we left it like that, and I half hoped that the bear or racoons would fall in, and I also felt it was a cool booby trap in case someone tried to come up on our deck in the dead of night to break into our house - we'd at least hear them coming from all the swearing when they fell in.

BigDaddyFish wasn't feeling well last night, so he didn't take our trash or recycling to the curb last night. This morning he was running late, so he missed the trash truck, but recycling only comes once a week so we wanted to get our bins out. I grabbed a full, wet, dripping bin and headed down the stairs, BDF right behind me with a pile of wet cardboard boxes. We came back up the stairs, me in front and BDF behind me. I am neither light nor quick nor accustomed to carrying trash/recycling down the stairs, and my propensity for klutzy behavior is well documented. Down I went, arms a flailing, landing of course with my left shin hard up against the diagonal edge of the solid part of the deck, catching myself with the middle of my right forearm against the railing. Fortunately, the railing held. Unfortunately, it didn't give very much. BDF told me not to move, but I was pissed and embarrassed, so I yanked my leg out of the deck, shrieking through my closed mouth where I was biting my lip to keep from embarrassing myself even further, and limped to a chair.

The pictures above were taken about an hour later. BDF pulled the board back up so that people can see where they have to step so they don't fall in. I'm calling a guy today who gave me a good estimate to re-deck the deck. I'll take a picture later of my leg later - right now it's just a faint mottled purple under my whiter-than-pale skin and slightly swollen, but I can tell by how fraking much it hurts that it's going to be spectacular.

Make me feel better. What klutzy thing have you done recently?

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

I was lucky enough to be one of the featured BlogHer blogs on the ivillage home page over the weekend with this post. Someone else even linked to me from their forum. Thank you, whoever you are, and I'm glad you enjoyed it. It's like that a lot around here.

The Perfect Bathing Suit

When I was in high school, my boyfriend at the time told me on more than one occasion that I would look good in a string bikini. I weighed 85 pounds (and before you freak about my apparent eating disorder, I am only 4'10" tall and was extremely healthy, AND could eat anything I wanted and not gain an ounce - I pay for that now every single day since I never developed healthy habits because I didn't need to), but I wasn't too skinny, and I had a pretty decent rack.

One year my BFFs (identical twins) and I went to Nags Head with my family, and I decided I needed a new bathing suit to wear. Remembering what my boyfriend had been telling me, I picked up a gorgeous navy blue and black string bikini to try on so I could see if I was comfortable enough to pull it off. I put on the suit over my underwear, and since we were the only people in the store, I left the fitting room to show my girlfriends and see what they thought. I stood outside the room and turned this way and that, so that they could see and judge from all angles, and I hear the voice behind me say "Perfect. You should get it."

I whirled around with my heart in my throat only to see five guys, mostly attractive, standing right behind me with huge grins on their faces. I shrieked a little and dashed back into the fitting room, mortified that I had been seen with a string bikini on top of my cotton granny panties proclaiming the day of the week.

But I bought the bikini, and proudly wore it for more than a decade. My boyfriend and those guys were right, my mortification notwithstanding. I did look good.

Then I had kids. Four big babies in seven years, four pregnancies, four c-sections. They took their toll on my body.

My bikini days are over.

Given the size H boobs, the flabby pooch around my middle that the OB says will only go away through the plastic surgery I won't have, the stretch marks and the cellulite, it's a wonder I even venture out in public in a bathing suit at all. That's where my not-so-secret weapon comes in: Land's End. If they don't have a swimsuit that fits you and flatters whatever your shape is, I'd be shocked. I have graduated from the bikini to the little black dress swimsuit. And that's okay.

It's still the perfect bathing suit.

And if I'm successful in my campaign to lose weight and get more fit (maybe with the help of this site)? They have lots of other cool looking suits, and I'll get a new perfect suit.

This post was written for Parent Bloggers Network as part of a sweepstakes sponsored by BOCA. Write a post sometime this weekend talking about your bathing suit and then send the link to Parent Bloggers Network, and you could win prizes! See here for details.

Skin to Skin

Nemo is at such a fun age right now - 18 months. When he nurses (yes, we're still going strong there) he yanks on my shirt to get it out of the way, and he likes to rub his soft pudgy hand all over my tummy. He will also sometimes take my hand and put it on his head, over his ear, or on his side near his tummy to hold and rub him. He loves to have that skin to skin contact, and while it does present a challenge being discreet while nursing in public, I am more than happy to give him all the comfort and caresses he craves while we are at home.

I love his skin, so soft and smooth and mostly unblemished so far. He's got a couple of scars from his rough and tumble lifestyle already, and he currently has a sizeable scrape on the top right part of his forehead, courtesy of yesterday's attempt to use a stack of cases of water bottles to climb on to reach his balloon from Trader Joe's (Boon!) and subsequent tumble onto the jagged part of our hardwood and crash of a three-quarters full 3 gallon water fire extingusher onto the back of his head. (yeah, that was fun.) I'm not allowed to rub that part right now. So now I just concentrate on rubbing his tummy, and when I sleep I rest my hand on the soft velvety smoothness of his belly as we spoon.

Our skin is such an amazing organ. It really is. It puts up with so much, and still continues to protect us and help us cool down and cleanse ourselves. And we abuse it. We go out without sunscreen. We let our skin burn. We cut it, we stretch it beyond reason with our excesses or with growing new lives. We let it dry out. We curse it when we see the lines and blemishes and other effects of our lifestyles on it. But it keeps on ticking.

Most of the time. I have very fair skin and a long history of burn/peel/burn summers, and my family has a history of skin cancer. Most of them haven't been a big deal; my grandfather in particular had numerous small cancers taken off of his face, but never had a problem. My aunt, who was a synchronized swimmer, had a melanoma on her leg that was successfully treated almost two decades ago, and she's still doing fine. As a result of this history, I go to have my skin checked for signs of trouble each year.

Nine months ago I went in to the dermatologist to have my annual checkup, and at that time one of my moles was removed from my arm and shipped off to biopsy. TUESDAY morning when I got up I had a message on my cell asking me to call the dermatologist's office because they had my biopsy results in and I have to come back in. When I called back I asked her why it took NINE MONTHS to get the results back and she guessed that someone was looking at the records and noticed there was no follow-up. She wouldn't say what exactly was going on, but she said I have to come back in to have it checked and probably frozen. So next Tuesday I will be going in to have the thing checked and possibly frozen off, and at that time I intend to interrogate the doctor and find out why it took 9 months to get my results, especially since something in the back of my brain says I called and was told it was fine, and to find out what the deal is. I'm pretty scared, actually.

So make sure you have your skin checked each year. Make sure it can do its job without hurting you. And whatever you do, follow up carefully, requiring copies of any test results.

Make sure those little ones get lots and lots of skin to skin contact for as long as they need it. The thing is, you need it, too, even if you don't realize it. I know it's a great comfort to me at the moment.

Insult, Have Some Injury, Please, and a Side of Salt for the Wound, Too

The past week and a half has kicked my ass. Done me in. Rode me hard and put me away wet. Really worked me ... alright enough with the cliches already. It was tough.

First it was the lyme disease. Then Monday, my uncle's wife called to tell me her father died. Her parents live in Delaware and because Trout's First Holy Communion was this weekend and that's not exactly something you can reschedule when you have 90 kids getting first communion (it's a big parish), I couldn't go to the memorial service. This may seem like a bit of a distant relation, but my aunt's parents and my grandparents had a relationship that from my experience is kind of rare - they were friends. They had never met outside of the relationship of my uncle and aunt, and wouldn't have if not for them, but they shared a faith and common values, and my aunt's parents were at most of our family gatherings for holidays, birthdays, and anniversaries. I feel really bad that I couldn't be there for her mother like she was for us so many times.

Tuesday the doctor called to say the lyme test was negative, which isn't as good news as you might think. She said that a lot of times the test will show negative if it's too early, so she wants to repeat bloodwork in 4-6 weeks, and keep him on the nasty antibiotic for the full 21 days. He doesn't have a fever anymore, but he's still sleeping more than usual, and nursing a ton. I had him weaned down to once a day, at bedtime, before he got sick, but I just can't deny him that comfort right now.

I mentioned before that I've been having issues with my left knee and my right ankle. The left knee has been grinding when I go up and down steps, particularly when I'm carrying something with some weight to it, like full baskets of laundry, or Trout when she's in trouble and being defiant. The right ankle has been swollen and painful, especially along the inside of the ankle and down underneath to the arch of my foot. After months of BigDaddyFish badgering me lovingly suggesting I get it looked at, I did the research to find and orthopedist and I saw him Wednesday. It is a huge sports medicine group with a young staff, which isn't clear when you just look up orthos in the insurance company database. The doctor was younger than me, which is a great way to make yourself feel ancient when you're not.

After X-rays and watching me walk and grabbing my feet and torturing me practicing Hulk Hogan moves examining them, the upshot is that he thinks I have some mild arthritis in my knee. He gave me a CORTISONE SHOT in the knee, and oh my holy hell did that hurt. If I hadn't ever had an epidural where the doctor missed and hit a nerve it would have been the most painful thing ever. He wants to follow up in 4-6 weeks and then do an MRI if it isn't cleared up and not grinding by then. He also suggested I trim down as much as I can, and well, duh, but even he acknowledged it's hard to do that when you can't exercise much because of the knee and the ankle.

Ah, yes, the ankle. The state of my knee was the good news. The short version with my ankle is that I have a tendon that is degenerating for some reason. Frankly I think that they're ALL degenerating to some degree; I've always had loose joints and could hyperextend pretty easily, and I think all the loosening up that you do during pregnancy has just done a number on them. At any rate, I've got a brace for the ankle that I have to wear pretty much all the time, I have to get prescription orthodics made and wear them in a pair of high-end running shoes like New Balance or Asics which I have yet to purchase, and I get to look forward to some sort of full reconstructive surgery sometime in the future. It isn't bad enough to go there yet, though, in part because it's a mite inconvenient at the moment to be down for the count for months, what with the 4 kids and a move and all.

As if all of that wasn't enough, we've been having issues with Little Man being...well, sad and angry and violent. I've been reluctant to blog about it, and I won't discuss most of it here, but we are quite concerned about him and working on getting him what he needs to feel better. In the course of his acting out recently, he threw himself backwards into our woodframe couch, giving himself an enormous goose egg on his head. Later in the week he started to thrash about as BDF picked him up to take him upstairs to time out, causing BDF to drop him onto the edge of the baby jail playyard where Nemo was. Nemo wasn't hurt but Little Man has a huge bruise on his leg, and somehow in his efforts to not drop Little Man, BDF ended up breaking a toe.

The week hasn't been all bad, but it's been wearying. Trout had her First Holy Communion this past weekend, and we had a lovely day with my best friends and three of their children (they have seven total), including my godson. I even had the presence of mind to ask one of them to take a picture of our family, so we have a rare family photo. BDF's been tweaking his work schedule here and there and we've been spending a lot more time together, both as a family and one-on-one, which has been helping Little Man with his issues. We fishsat for our neighbors this weekend, and it reminded us how much we loved having fish around, so we just might get some more before we move, instead of waiting which was the old plan. The weather has been glorious, and I've been able to work out despite the state of my knee and ankle (he said biking and swimming are great, but don't do much else, NO running - I asked him if he realized the impossibility of running when you have four little kids but he told me not to do it anyway) and I've actually enjoyed it, and I am dropping weight slowly. The brace makes it so it doesn't hurt. This past weekend we were able to dig through eight more rubbermaid bins in the basement and get rid of more stuff and stage more stuff to go into storage.

Man, am I tired.

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

The Barenaked Ladies have made a cd for kids called Snacktime due to be released tomorrow, and I had the privilege of reviewing it. See what I thought about it over on Props and Pans.

Tick Tock

Last Saturday we went for a picnic lunch at the park that is adjacent to our property, even though it is a 20 minute drive to get to the park entrance (it's across the water, so we have to drive around the lake). The weather was just glorious, middle seventies, and we had a wonderful lunch and the kids got to run around like maniacs in a big wide open field and we didn't care as long as they didn't get close to the road. The weather had been quite chilly during the preceding week, though, so there weren't many bugs to bother us. It was a glorious day. Of course, I have no pictures - I was too busy just be-ing.

Tuesday morning Little Man was refusing to get up and get ready for school, saying he didn't want to go. So I used my tried and true method of stripping the kid completely naked so he gets cold and has to get up to get dressed, and after I pulled his pants off I noticed a spot in a most uncomfortable place.

"Aw, dude, you really need to wipe better. You got something on your nuts. Go clean it off." He reached down and tried to take it off, and started howling that it hurt. I steeled myself and looked a little closer through one eye, while trying to turn my head away, and saw that it was a bug.

To make a long story very very short, it was a deer tick. On the side of his testicles. I nearly fainted.

BigDaddyFish put vaseline on it to suffocate it. Then, because we can't find the tweezers, we handed Little Man a piece of chocolate and distracted him by talking about the weather and a vacation while I reached down with my fingernails and yanked the damn thing out. I got the whole thing, I am sure.

So now we are watching for the bullseye rash while I google lyme disease obsessively. Silly us thought it was too early for bugs. We're Einsteins that way.

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.