proximity to water

Conscious Endeavors

2012-01-05T18:14:00.000-08:00

To build upon the mememe reflections inspired by the New Year (and given that I am currently laid up on my couch for a few days with ice cream and mashed potatoes, recovering from wisdom teeth removal this morning...), here's some elaboration on the aforementioned notion of projects - specifically, my top three for this year.

The Gratitude Project
I can't think of any situation in my recent experiences that hasn't been instantly and vastly improved by shifting some of my focus to gratitude. Stuck in traffic? It happens a fair amount in this city. Choosing gratitude over frustration goes a long way. With a bit of conscious effort, I can choose to spend that time feeling grateful that I have a car in the first place, that I am on my way to something great - dinner with a friend for whom I'm also grateful, work that I'm grateful to be able to do, a home that I'm grateful to have and share with someone wonderful. Fortunately, too, many of the times I'm stuck in traffic, it's on I-5 with a view of the Seattle skyline, the Olympic mountains, the Cascade mountains, Lake Union, Mt. Rainier...does a day go by that I'm not counting my blessings for this wonderful city that's come to be my home? If you read my blog, you know the answer.

In 2012, I want to spend more of my energy on gratitude, and less on irritation, on frustration, on impatience. Gratitude gives back immediately. It fills me with a sense of owing the world something in return for what I've been given, of making the most of my day, my resources, my talents, my energy, my love. I want to do a better job appreciating the people in my life who make it great, appreciating my health and ability, appreciating the small things as well as the big.

I credit my parents for instilling in me from early on the value of gratitude - and with that, I want to officially introduce my new micro-blog venture for 2012: Thanks, Parents! The plan is to regularly update it with small thank-you notes to my parents for all the time, effort and love they poured into setting me up for an awesome life. Please check it out!

The Gazelle Project
It should also come as no surprise that running will continue to be an area of focus for me...except, more so! Based on lessons in 2011, my priorities will include: being a big part of the running community rather than making it a solo sport, prioritizing injury prevention, running higher overall mileage, learning to embrace elevation and become a stronger uphill runner, and being far more conscientious with my nutrition and fueling.

In a recent article in Trail Runner magazine about 24-year-old ultrarunner Kilian Jornet, he was quoted as saying "Don't think of training is training. Training is going and running because you enjoy it." Indeed, I've begun to think of running not as the thing I have to find time to pack in to my schedule, but as the thing that IS my schedule, which other things need to be packed in around. It feels good.

In celebration of my commitment to train at new levels, I registered for the White River 50-Mile Endurance Run this July...woohoo! This is on top of a couple spring 50K's I've also registered for. Other specific running goals include: a sub-20:00 5K, a sub-6:00 mile, and qualifying for Boston. Above all, though, I'd like to continue running without injury and loving every moment I get to spend out there.

The Energy Project
This is an ongoing one for me, for which I usually have tremendous zest for around New Year's, but often fizzles as I get deeper into the year. However, it's far too important to let slide off my center burner.

Everything we do takes both time and energy. I consistently feel like I don't get to do enough of the things I want/need to, which leads me to feel panicky, stressed, guilty and generally bummed. Since we can't generate more time in our lives - we are all, after all, subject to the same 24-hour days - this project is geared at generating more energy within myself.

It's a broad one, I know, but within it are the seeds of several subsequent goals: establish and maintain a better way of organizing my thoughts and to-do lists, procrastinate less, prioritize sleep, incorporate more fresh juices and green smoothies in my diet, be more conscientious in general of how I nourish my body. I've decided to forgo alcohol altogether in 2012, partly as a personal challenge, partly as a way to do something nice for my body and support my running ambitions, and partly as a way to simply be gentler on my wallet.

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I could go on and on with the project list, many of which include subsequent SMART goals...
- The Reading Project (Read at least two nonfiction books and two novels every month in 2012, and track them on my Goodreads page.)
- The Writing Project> (Build an online portfolio of my writing. Network in the freelance world. Be getting paid to write full-time by the end of the year.)
- The String Band Project (Actually take banjo lessons and practice regularly, instead of thinking that owning one will magically grant me the ability to play it.)
- The Strength Project (Do more yoga. Strength train 3x/week. Be able to do 50 pushups. Be able to do a single darn pullup.)
- The Financial Peace Project (Be diligent again in budgeting and tracking spending through Mint.com. Read more books on personal finance and investing. Learn more from my dad.)
- The Minimalism Project (Get rid of a lot of my unnecessary stuff. Simplify.)
...but as important as these subsequent ones all are, and as much as I will still try to contribute as much of my energy to them as I can this year, the truth is that the first three - Gratitude, Running and Energy - are what I've decided to make my biggest priorities. I'm learning that, hard as I may try, I just can't do it all.

There is a quote that's been attributed at times to Bill Gates and at times to Tony Robbins, and I'm not sure who it's really from, but it goes something like this: "We tend to overestimate what we can accomplish in one year, and underestimate what we can accomplish in 10." With that in mind, I'm trying to accept that there's no way I can possibly expect to accomplish in one year every single goal I've mentioned above. Nevertheless, I believe in vision, I believe in action, and to drop another of my favorite quotes, "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor." (Henry David Thoreau)

The Holiday Between 11 & 12

2011-12-31T15:45:00.000-08:00

Snowboarding at Mt. Baker, January 2011
Today, on my last run of 2011 - rounding out 1,290 miles for the year! - I got to thinking about holidays. After the dutch holiday Sinterklaas on December 5, New Year's is probably my favorite holiday. (Thanksgiving comes in a close third!) New Year's has all the trappings of a good holiday - generally some time off from work or school obligations, the opportunity to spend that time with loved ones, an excuse to make delicious food and enjoy it.

Sunrise Summit of Mt. Si, February
No matter how well-intentioned the original vision, so many holidays have come to revolve around spending copious amounts of money, drinking copious amounts of alcohol, eating copious amounts of candy, etc. I suppose it could be argued that New Year's can, and often does, include any or all three of these aspects, too - but for me, my hallmark end-of-year tradition has always been my annual New Year's Eve journal entry.

Ski Trip with Dad to Salt Lake City, March
In it, I recount my year's most memorable moments, new friends I made, books I read, movies I saw, songs I listened to on repeat far too many times...as well as the standard resolutions list for the coming year.

Whidbey Island Half Marathon with Lauren, April
The last part is always the most exciting to me. This year, I've decided to call them "projects" instead of "resolutions". The word "project" connotes an ongoing process, a journey, as opposed to a simple destination. In a conversation with Elodie several days ago, we were discussing New Year's resolutions, and how common it is to have the same things appear on your list every year - and then to feel discouraged that things reappear year after year. I feel like "project" takes off the pressure for perfectionism. Arrival can be an illusion.

Unleash the Beast Adventure Triathlon with Team ONW, May
While I'll always vouch for the power of "SMART goals" (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely), I think most of what falls into the typical resolutions bin are not of that nature - but that doesn't mean they're not valuable. Last year, among other things, I resolved to "run more regularly", "read more books", "be more financially stable", and "care less what others think, and remember that my life is truly my own" - which are ART goals, at best, but missing the Specific and Measurable parts of the equation.

Ladies' Hike in Olympic National Forest, June
But does that mean that putting energy toward those things didn't yield great results? Heck no! 2011 was a really wonderful year for me, filled with a lot of love, laughter, great meals with great people, memorable travels, amazing runs and races, good reads.

Camping and Fireworks, July
I spent nearly half the year writing full time for a company I love. I also got to pursue my passion for web design in evening classes. I was able to visit both my parents, interview some inspiring people, and cook/host a lot of delicious meals with friends. My writing was published in Outdoors NW magazine, on the REI Blog, and on [what used to be called] Green Smoothie Queen. I read a ton of great books.

Angels Staircase Trail Run in the Methow Valley, August
Alan was home for a good deal of the year, and we got to spend more time together than ever before, cooking together, hiking, road tripping, moving into a much better apartment, exploring Seattle, and plowing through several seasons of Seinfeld, Mad Men and The Wire. I got to play a lot in the mountains, kayak, ride my bike, snowboard, snowshoe, hike, camp in the woods, swim in the river, and run a ton - as near by as around my own neighborhood, and as far away as heather fields in the Netherlands.

Dash Point Half Marathon, September
I was reminded that when I really focus on something (in the case of 2011, running), I can excel. I went from a year of injuries and subsequent low mileage to a year of doing a dozen races, five of which were marathon distance or longer. I shaved a full minute off my mile time, and nearly 20 minutes off my marathon time.

I even ran a 5K in a full-body giraffe costume!

Visiting Mom in Holland, October
One of my close friends got a new heart valve this year. Another moved to Hood River to start building a new life for herself. Another one got engaged to a wonderful guy. Another got his book proposal accepted for publication. Another found the courage to quit a dull desk job and start getting paid to be himself. Another saved enough money to take herself to France for most of 2012. Yes, it was a good year indeed.

Hosting Thanksgiving, November
Arbitrary as the first day of the new calendar year is, I like that rather than centering around consumption, it signifies to me a holiday of calm reflection. It embodies hope, empowerment, and the potential for positive change. It is the chance to imagine your best self, and then go boldly after it.

Snowshoeing on Christmas, December
Here's to 2012!

This won't stay in Vegas

2011-12-08T10:40:00.001-08:00

I am, at heart, an optimist. I prefer the rosy-tinted goggles to dark shades, and I really, really wanted to like my experience in Vegas last weekend. After all, I like to like things!

But I think that in this case, I must apply the old adage my aunt once passed along to me: Everything is either a good time or a good story. I've been dying to sit down and write this story all week long.

The problems began before Lauren and I even arrived in Vegas. This nighttime marathon/half marathon event sold out at a whopping 44,000 participants - which already sounded like far too many. On the other hand, the Competitor group and their Rock 'n Roll events generally have a solid reputation for putting on world class events, so I relaxed. I relaxed even more upon learning that of those 44K, only 6,000 would be doing the full marathon, and we'd get to start an hour and a half earlier than the 38,000 half runners.

However, I noticed a worrisome thing when I looked at the course maps online: we full marathoners would run a 13.1-mile route off the strip before merging with the half marathon - which was run almost entirely up and down the famous Las Vegas Strip. From the outset, this seemed like a terrible lack of planning on Competitor Group's part - only the elite full runners would be fast enough to miss the messy merge with the half runners, whereas the rest of us could fully expect to run into a wall of the back-of-the-pack half runners and walkers. I was not the only full marathoner stressed about this before hand - the event's Facebook page was littered with runners asking whether there would be separate lanes for full and half runners. Competitor Group ignored all these questions, leaving us all in the dark, uncertain of what to plan for or count on.

Competitor Group further ticked me off by not allowing Race Day packet/bib pickup. I understand this rule when the marathon starts at the crack of dawn - but when it doesn't start until 4 p.m., it seems a little unnecessary. Furthermore, it wasn't made clear at registration, so if for some reason your travel plans didn't put you in Vegas in time for the Expo the day before, you had to pay an extra $40 - FORTY DOLLARS!!! - to be able to pick up your packet at all - and even then, you had to be one of the first thousand people to sign up for Race Day pickup, or else you were SOL. All this on top of the $140-170 you already paid - which, for you non-runners still with me at this point, is about twice what a typical marathon costs to run. Talk about a money grab.

Let's jump to the marathon day itself. While the 4 p.m. start was part of the initial draw for me to this event, it actually proved a bit odd - Lauren and I had no idea what to do all day leading up to the marathon. We'd laid out all our clothes and gear the night before, slept in late, then more or less spent the day twiddling our thumbs. We couldn't eat too much, certainly couldn't drink, didn't want to be on our feet too much...so there went an entire day of our Vegas trip, lounging around and doing very little in our hotel room. When the time was finally nigh, we hopped on the monorail to get to the starting area at Mandalay Bay resort/hotel/casino.

Our race start was fairly pleasant. The sun was shining brilliantly, the temperatures cool and the wind tame. Lauren and I hugged and wished each other good luck, found our starting corrals, and soon enough, the race began. I felt great for about two miles, maintaining a good clip right at about 8-minute miles. A talkative Canadian woman fell in step with me at that point, making unpleasant conversation as she ticked off, at no particular prompting, a litany of her race accomplishments, PR's, Ironman times, training philosophies, opinions on GPS devices, etc. In my haste to try and shake her, I made the classic mistake of running the next few miles a little too fast, clocking a 7:45 and a 7:40 mile. Whoops. This being the first day of a certain time of the month, this was also about the point at which abdominal cramps kicked in. The party was just getting started!

Obviously, of course, none of these factors had anything to do with the Competitor Group and their race organization. By all counts, in fact, they were doing great at this point! The weather was ideal, the sunset over the mountains as we all ran toward the desert was lovely, the bands along the course were good.

However: no porta-potties for the first 8 miles of the course. What?! I've never used a bathroom during a marathon, and fortunately didn't need to this time - but there were plenty of people hopping off the course, women squatting in the bushes, because Competitor Group failed to provide any toilets for large stretches. The few porta-potties that appeared later in the course were so few and far between that the lines were outrageous; reports later indicate the average wait time was around 15 minutes if you needed a mid-race bathroom break.

But let's talk about my first real encounter with disaster: nearly getting mowed down by a cop car. At about mile 7 or 8, there was an aid station on the left side of the road, which many of us drifted over from the right side (where we were, in anticipation of a right turn in the course soon) to try to access. Before I made it, though, a few cop cars came down the left side of the road, driving against the marathon traffic, separating us from the aid station we were trying to access, honking their horns with their siren lights swirling in the darkening dusk. This was befuddling indeed.

The cops started yelling at the aid station volunteers not to give us any water. Turns out the marathon course would eventually double back on itself on this road, so they were the aid station for later in the course - not yet. Obviously, none of them had been told this beforehand. The volunteers began frantically yelling at runners not to come over to their tables after all, which all led to a great deal of confusion and weaving and more angry yelling.

So, while I thought running at night would be amazing and peaceful (the way it always is at Ragnar), it was anything but. The race organizers - for good reason, of course - had lined the whole course with massive street lights powered by massive generators. I have a strong personal policy against racing with headphones, but the annoying whirr of these generators made me wish I'd brought some headphones after all to drown out the noise. Like running next to a lawn mower mile after mile!

Meanwhile, my cramps were getting worse. I came close to dropping out at several points, just feeling miserable and generally feeling like I hated running. I knew I'd started out way too fast when the 3:30 pacer group caught and passed me around mile 7 or so, and I already felt too pooped to try and stay with them. But I kept going.

As we approached the Strip again around the halfway point, the crowd energy was fantastic. There was music, cheering spectators, lights...all of this was great. I strung together a few more sub-8-minute miles and felt like a rockstar. But then...then came the true plummet into race-organization disaster.

I hit the halfway point in a new half-marathon PR of 1:45:18, on pace to finish in under 3:31 - a more generous Boston Qualifying margin than I'd even thought myself capable of - and I was proud of myself for gutting it out through what had already been a pretty tough race, mentally. The merge with the half marathon, however, was every bit as disastrous as my worst imagining.

The "separate lane" for the marathoners, a tiny chute along the left side of the Strip, was delineated with small orange cones, spaced hundreds of yards apart. Every tenth cone or so had an 8.5 X 11" piece of paper with size 16 font on it explaining that full marathoners should stay to the left, half marathoners to the right. In the dark, among the stampeding of tens of thousands of feet, you can imagine that the cones went entirely unnoticed. Most had been tripped over or kicked aside by the time I ran by them.

Full marathoners were yelling at half marathoners to stay to the right. This fell entirely on deaf ears. A few bike marshals tried in vain to ride through the crowd and keep half and full runners separate, but they were screamed at, spat on, and ignored as well. I don't blame the half marathoners; they were "running" in the biggest clusterf--- of their lives, too, and just trying to find space to be able to move - but to be on pace to Boston qualify and then be literally running into the backs of half marathon walkers, arms linked and chatting on their cell phones in the middle of our 10-foot-wide lane, was beyond acceptable. The ugliness that emerged between runners was the most depressing and deflating part of it all - the yelling, the name-calling, the pushing and shoving. Maintaining a positive mindset was harder than trying to maintain my physical pace at this point.

Over the next 13 miles, I pulled my calf muscles more times than I could count, dodging between runners and walkers, jumping on and off of curbs just to be able to run at all, much like try to maintain any semblance of my pace.

The aid stations were some of the worst on-course messes of all. There were no flags or lights indicating ahead of time where they were, and in the dark, you'd be even with the aid stations before you even realized they were there. This created horizontal movement across the course, resulting in tremendous traffic jams with tripping and more pushing and shoving. I missed a couple aid stations altogether because it was too late to "merge" horizontally across fifty people to get myself water. Moreover, there weren't separate cups for water and Cytomax, so you had to stop and have a conversation with the volunteers to find out what you were drinking. Lastly, there was ICE in some of the Cytomax cups - can you say choking hazard? Christ! I still have no idea what ice cubes were doing in Dixie cups when the temperature had already dropped to 40 degrees.

From mile 16 through the end, I only ran one more sub-8-minute mile. My calves cramped up horribly from all the curb-jumping and course-weaving. The half-marathon stampede never thinned out, so until the very end, I couldn't run in a straight line. And don't get me started about the horrible screamo-angry-metal band we had to listen to twice along the Strip. I was not in a good mood when I crossed that finish line in a chip time of 3:36:36.

Which is really a bummer, since it was a new personal record for me, and a full six minutes faster than when I ran Amsterdam less than two months ago!

Traffic was completely backed up at the finish line, thanks to Competitor Group's brilliant idea that all runners needed to funnel through a photo line before going anywhere. No room to walk, no room to sit down, no room to even put your hands above your head without whacking someone else's face with your elbow. I felt nauseous in the crowd.

The finishers' "food" provided at the finish line consisted of bagels hard as hockey pucks and bananas green as grapes. I walked by a woman with a banana who was complaining to her husband, "I can't even break into this thing!"

At this point, I got the hell out of there and went to stuff my face at the Bellagio buffet with Lauren and her parents - and so concludes my own list of relatively mild complaints about the race. Not awful, but certainly not great either. Unfortunately, I learned later, I had one of the better experiences at the Vegas Rock 'n Roll marathon of anyone. The stories that have emerged since are downright ugly.

Eventually, the aid stations ran out of water and Cytomax. The half marathoners out on the course for three or four hours had nothing. Then they ran out of medals. Half finishers were initially given full marathon medals (as if anyone could feel excited to wear a medal for a race they didn't complete!), then when they ran out of those, had nothing to give the finishers. I don't know how that happens in an event that's been sold out for two months, but it did.

The sparse medical tents were not given even basic supplies like blankets - so when runners began pouring in with the beginning stages of hypothermia (the temperature drop once the sun went down and winds picked up was substantial), RN volunteers were offering their own jackets and clothes to help warm runners back up. Totally unacceptable.

All runners were funneled, after the finish line, through a single set of doors into the Mandalay Bay casino - nothing like being swarmed in mobs of people, cigarette smoke and flashing lights after running a marathon! The Michael Jackson Cirque de Soleil show, also in the Mandalay Bay, let out at about the same time that many of the slower half runners were finishing - so another 35,000 (mostly drunk) people joined the already massive mob inside the casino. This is where crowd control utterly failed. People began throwing up, passing out, and getting trampled - but the mob was so dense inside that medical assistance was nearly impossible. The Strip was so clogged with ambulances and taxis afterward that most people reported being able to run the entire race in less time than it took to get back to their hotel at the end. Although the Competitor Group had promised free shuttles at the end of the race, there were none in sight, and so most of us wound up walking (limping?) for miles after running to get where we needed to go.

After running out of water, some of the aid stations started using hydrant water for runners. Hoses from hydrants filled trash cans, then volunteers scooped cups in the trash cans to fill them up - talk about unsanitary! On top of Las Vegas having one of the highest levels of pollutants in their water supply, it's no shock that handfuls of runners reported violent sickness after this whole fiasco.

The Competitor Group had reported in pre-race materials that parking for runners would be free and available at many of the major casinos. Unfortunately, this turned out not to be the case, and many runners were turned away at the casinos that had been specified and forced to find parking elsewhere, resulting in them missing the starting line or just being unable to reach their starting corrals. The corrals in the half marathon failed entirely, so most half marathoners couldn't start actually running until 8 or 9 miles into the race, due to all the walkers in the early, unenforced corrals.

Another minor, but nevertheless notable, Fail on Competitor Group's part was the pre-race "medical information" in our swag bags. There were two different pamphlets with race day tips - one which recommended all runners take a baby aspirin the morning of their race, and another that warned that aspirin has been shown to reduce kidney function and should be avoided for 24 hours leading up to any race. Way to be consistent, Competitor Group.

But the ultimate Fail of all is that for 36 hours after the race, the Competitor Group failed to comment on the deluge of stories and complaints. Instead, they went to the local news channel and filmed a segment on what an "economic success" the event was, and that they plan to open it up to 60,000 runners next year.

Three days later, finally, there was a formal acknowledgment of "difficulties", and a commitment to hearing runners' feedback and using it to improve next year's event, plus a generous $10 off our next Competitor Group event - but I'm afraid, it was too little, too late. There are too many amazing race directors and organizations who do an incredible job and value the runners that keep them in business. This was nothing but a giant money grab, and I have no interest in ever being a part of it again. I'm sorry calves, I'm sorry wallet, I'm sorry first time runners who may never be interested in doing a race again because their experience in Vegas was so atrocious, I'm sorry half marathoners who trained for months for this and didn't even get a medal at the end.

Some of these issues would be forgivable - except that this organization puts on dozens of these races every single year, and have a huge full-time staff devoted to race organization. They collected over $7 million in race fees for this. From race spokesperson Dan Cruz, "We certainly learned a number of things that will be planned better in the future" is simply not enough to make up for what happened this year in Vegas.

Haven't had enough? Read on. Four days later, the horror stories are still pouring in by the hour: Rock 'n' Roll Las Vegas Marathon Facebook page.

Figuring out this life

2011-11-17T17:53:00.000-08:00

Fall in Seattle is nice.
I don't often share things online that I write in my own journal, but I wrote the this a couple weeks ago, and I think it's worth a share (if you can stand the long-winded navel-gazing that these self-indulgent entries inevitably feature).

Nov. 4 - I don't have enough time and energy to tackle everything in my life that I want, to pursue all the paths that entice me. Every time I meet or read about someone on one of those paths, I think, "Yes! That's the thing I want to devote myself to!" I read a great novel, I want to be a novelist. I read Sedaris, I want to tell stories about my life that make people laugh. I stumble on an interesting blog that generates revenue, I'm sure that's what I'm cut out to do. I run a trail race, and suddenly running is all I care about excelling at. I go to a good bluegrass show and I'm obsessed with picking my banjo. I read an interview with a successful young entrepreneur and I'm sure I want to start my own business.

My parents can attest to the fact that this extreme enthusiasm for mimicry started early in my life. A visit to the circus inevitably inspired a homespun version in our basement in Kansas when we got home in the evening. I'd rope in my stuffed animals, my dog Sasha, my hula hoops. I taught myself to juggle plastic bowling pins, practiced enough gymnastics to pull off one-handed cartwheels and front handsprings. The rodeo, the Olympics, the carnival...anywhere fun and exciting my parents took me, I took home with me and recreated in the basement for an audience of two.

If I watched a game show, I'd make up my own version at home; pretending to ask my parents questions for a school project, I'd interview them individually about their favorite and least favorite things, then challenge them against each other later in game show format to see who knew whom best. If I visited my dad at his office at the Kansas City Star and he took me down to see the massive, noisy, ink-stained printing presses, I'd draw up my own family newspaper by the end of the week. I kept up the W Family Gazette for an impressive number of issues, flying down the stairs in excitement to deliver my product to the hands of my parents, crying out "Hot off the press!" and charging them a quarter apiece for their issues.

Believe me, I treasure this quality in myself. Creativity and a constant hunger for learning and trying new things certainly keep life interesting, and usually pretty darn fun. But it's not without its frustrations, too. My journal entry from two weeks ago continues:

I exhaust myself! I can't decide. Not that my decision needs to last forever, of course, but nothing's ever going to happen in my life if I spread myself too thin. I can't do the New York Times crossword every day, prepare great meals, read at least a book a week, keep up on current events, maintain my blog, have enough time for all the people I love, volunteer regularly, make time to write in my own journal, continue working on my Dutch, take web design classes, teach myself a half dozen programming languages, run 50 miles a week, keep the apartment clean, work on transitioning to a high-raw diet, do yoga, lift weights, ride my bike, meditate and develop a stronger spiritual core, build a photography portfolio, travel regularly, submit more of my writing for freelance publication, hike, snowboard in the winter, write letters to friends, maintain a social life that involves going out at least a few nights a week, stay in touch on Facebook, work and earn enough money to afford living in Seattle...and still get enough sleep! It's ridiculous, now that I've written all that down, how much I actually expect myself to do in my day-to-day life. Obviously, I have to make some choices.

And those aren't even the BIG goals. Those are just the average daily life goals, the stepping stones to the big goals. Big goals are things like: summiting Mt. Rainier, running a 100-mile race, publishing a book, making the world a better place in a really big way...

So, where does that leave me? The two weeks in Holland gave me the incredible gift of time for reflection on what passions continue to stoke my fire the most - and (surprise!) running and writing both emerged high. I've been looking into volunteering with local chapters of several nonprofits (you know, in my copious amounts of free time!), and I've been torn between 826 Seattle, a center that offers youth after-school mentoring, tutoring and writing workshops - and Girls on the Run, a program that helps young girls feel empowered and develop healthy habits and self esteem through running.

I use my deliberation over the volunteering choice as a metaphor for the greater internal debate - whether, at this point in my life, to make running or writing my bigger priority. Neither passion, obviously, will ever fall completely out of my daily life - but I've been doing a little of both for many years, and I'm ready to do a lot of one of them for awhile to see what happens. I'm fortunate, of course, that I've been able to do a good amount of writing in my working life so far - this debate is really about what my "after-work" hours will look like (until, of course, I can figure out how to get paid to run all day and then write about it!)

With this question nagging at me since I've been back in the states, it's no wonder that the following quote jumped out at me from a book I've been reading, Matt Fitzgerald's RUN: The Mind-Body Method of Running by Feel. Deena Kastor, America's fastest and most accomplished female marathoner, said to Matt in an interview that in 1995,"I didn't feel like I had done everything for my running. I felt I had much more potential and I didn't want to walk away from it. I could open up a bakery or write a book at any time in my life, but I wanted to make sure that I got that running fever out while I was still young and energetic enough to do it."

And guess what? That spoke to me. I met Deena at the 2008 Chicago Marathon, after taking an impromptu solo road trip and obtaining a press pass to chat it up with the elite runners. She was softspoken, kind and every bit as inspiring in person as when I'd read about her in articles.

Deena, right before my starstruck-fan ambush.
So I'm doing it. I'm taking advantage of my youth and energy, and making running my top priority for 2012. My plans include: (hopefully) snagging a coaching spot with Girls on the Run, volunteering at as many trail runs as I can fit into my schedule, running higher mileage than ever before, training for my first 50-miler, qualifying for Boston, and above all, logging my second totally injury-free year in a row! Cheers for finding both form and footwear that work for me.

Three beautiful fall runs, three different pairs of shoes...can you tell I'm turning into a junkie?

Amsterdam Marathon Race Report

2011-10-20T08:12:00.000-07:00

Well, the morning of the marathon began with a minor disaster - biking all the way to the starting line at the Olympic Stadium, only to realize that I'd left my waist belt with my water bottle and all my energy gels (hauled all the way from Seattle!) on the floor of our apartment. Jeetje! Fortunately, because I'm a Nervous Nelly when it comes to time, we had about an hour to hop back on our bikes, ride furiously back to the apartment, gather my gear, and ride our bikes back to the stadium in time for the official race start. We made it back in plenty of time, but I got a little more of a warmup than I was anticipating!

Ready to ride to the starting line, smiling because I haven't yet realized I've forgotten my hydration belt.
Nevertheless, with 13,000 some runners, there was a huge bottleneck getting into the stadium for the start. I, along with thousands of others (including Cinta, who ran as a pacer for runners gunning for a 3:45 time) were still outside of the stadium in a huge mass of people trying to get in when the gun went off and the elite runners took off. My mom snapped the following photo of me right before I joined the crowd and made my way to the start.

I didn't cross the starting line for a full 11 minutes (and then some) after the official start of the race, but of course, chip timing assures you still get an accurate time. The start, then, was quick - out through the stadium and into the streets of Amsterdam, every bit as crisp and sleepy as Sunday mornings in Seattle, save the pattering of thousands of footsteps on the pavement.

The first few kilometers were really an exercise in strategic stepping, weaving between other runners to find the space among the crowd to be able to run a steady pace. Cinta and the two other 3:45 pacers, who ran with purple helium balloons above their heads, set a steady clip at the beginning, so I fought the running crowd to be able to stay even with them.

Eventually, the crowd thinned and spread out a bit, and I fell into a comfortable - albeit challenging - pace. Having run a 3:45:16 in Eugene last May, but having done about the same mileage in training this time around, I had no hopes for this race other than to thoroughly enjoy the course and hopefully come in under 3:45.

For the vast majority of the race, I stayed within range of the 3:45 pacers, occasionally dropping in next to Cinta to say hi. Despite my best efforts to pick up my pace a notch and put some distance between myself and the 3:45 pacers, inevitably the phrase I heard most from spectators along the sidelines was, "Ohh, hier komen de drie uur, vijfenviertig lopers!" - here come the 3:45 runners! Almost invariably, when I pulled over a few seconds at the aid stations to chug some water or AA drink, the pacing group would pass me again.

Meanwhile, the course was beautiful! In many ways, it was very similar to the Eugene course - a virtually flat course, starting in the stadium, running a small initial loop that lapped by the stadium again before taking off for the outskirts of the city, and running a long out-and-back up and down a scenic river...

...and eventually winding through a bit more urban scenery before finishing at the stadium. The weather was also reminiscent of Eugene - cloudless blue skies, pure sunlight, and cool, crisp morning air. In other words, ideal running weather.

My mom was an amazing supporter and cheerleader, hopping on and off her bike all morning to see me pass at several points along the course - at the ready with a bag of BodyGlide, alternate running shoes (because the ones I planned to run in mysteriously developed a little hole two days before the marathon!), and other gear...none of which I wound up needing, happily. It was wonderful to be able to see my mom along the way, hear her yell excitedly, and give her quick hugs before running on.

With that said, I learned that my mom's trademark whooping and cheers are not so trademark after all...I can't tell you how many whooping Dutch people along the course sidelines I mistook to be her all morning long! On another note, this really was an international marathon - runners not only from Holland, but from France, Israel, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Japan, England, Scotland, Portugal, Kenya, Ethiopia, Brazil, Italy...apparently there was a small handful of other Americans, too, but I didn't meet any of them.

Because I couldn't find my Garmin before leaving for Europe, I ran only with a stopwatch - and because all the signs were in kilometers instead of miles, I never had the moment when I ran by a 20-mile marker and felt obligated to get nervous about hitting the wall. Whether the common 20-mile bonk is a placebo problem or not, who knows - but somehow, for me, not having that sign or marker seemed to help. Though I could definitely feel my legs tiring after the first couple hours - I've only done two running workouts in the past 8 weeks that could really classify as "speedwork" or training "at race pace" - the remainder of the miles felt challenging but not increasingly so, and there was enough left in the tank to sprint out the final 200m on the track. I crossed the finishing mats a full two and a half minutes faster than my last (and previously best) marathon.

Cinta and I at the finish line!

My mom steals my medal and space blanket, and strikes a pose.
RACE RECAP! (mostly for my future reference, and for the curious running geeks amongst my blog readers, too...)

Average weekly mileage in 8 weeks leading up to marathon day: 29 miles + 2-4 cross-training sessions

Longest single run in training: 23 miles

Race Day Breakfast: Raw Revolution Spirulina & Cashew bar, glass of water with a generous spoonful of chia seeds, a few pieces of dark chocolate

During the run: 2 packs of (non-caffeinated) Clif ShotBloks (1/3 of a pack every 35-40 minutes), ample water and a bit of AA Drink (Dutch Gatorade)

By The Numbers:
1st Half-marathon split: 1:51:39 (8:31 pace)
2nd Half-marathon split: 1:51:02 (8:28 pace)
Overall time: 3:42:41 (8:29 pace)
Slowest 5K: The first one (27:19, 8:47 pace)
Fastest 5K: The second and fifth ones (26:00, 8:22 pace)

Weeks Until My Next Marathon: 6

Living it up on the other side of the world

2011-10-18T13:02:00.000-07:00

Oh, what a trip this has been already! One full week here now, and happily, it feels as though I've been able to pack in a lot of great adventures, without completely overwhelming myself. Still plenty of time to relax, read, catch up with my mom and catch up on sleep.

With the exception of a few cold, rainy days at the beginning, we've had great fall weather here. Loads of sunshine, crisp air, picturesque clouds. I arrived via a 9-hour direct flight (the first time I've ever been able to fly nonstop from home to Amsterdam! Thank you, Seattle!) last Tuesday. I made a futile attempt to ward off jetlag by sleeping only 3.5 hours the night before my flight, thinking I'd be able to just pass out on the plane and wake up refreshed and ready to roll when I arrived in Amsterdam at 8:20 a.m. local Dutch time. Unfortunately, I decided to finally take the fancy-phone plunge and purchase an iPhone for myself right before leaving - and the thrills of being able to play with a new mobile toy in airplane mode on my flight, combined with chatting it up with a sweet German woman whom I sat next to, prevented me from sleeping much at all on the flight.

Almost full moon! Trippy to watch a sunset, moonrise, and sunrise all in the course of one flight.
My mom came to meet me at the airport, and we immediately hopped on the train back to Nijverdal, the small town in the east where she lives. Upon arrival in Nijverdal, I barely made it through the tour of her cozy, new little house before collapsing in bed for an all-day nap. Woke up for dinner and passed back out again shortly thereafter, for a total of 17 hours of sleep. Oi vey!

The next few days, we had a relaxing few days at home in Nijverdal. I got to know her daily environs a bit more - the neighbors (who fielded a few complaints about our rowdy storytelling and laughing into the wee hours of my first few jetlagged nights here!), the local thrift shops, the newly renovated town square, and what I remember best about my last visit to Nijverdal...the beautiful woods and heather fields on the edge of town. For my last few training runs before the Amsterdam marathon, my mom and I set out for the woods, and she walked one loop on various routes while I ran the same loop twice. We really lucked out with the blue skies and sun-spackled trails.

On Saturday morning, we set out for Amsterdam again by train - arriving to slightly warmer weather, and a sunny, glorious weekend day in the city. A longtime friend of my mom's is vacationing in Uzbekistan for a few weeks; generously, he left us the keys to his centrally-located Amsterdam apartment, as well as two ratty old bikes for us to ride around the city. Truly a blessing - I can't imagine being in A'dam without a bike!

Saturday afternoon, my mom and I biked to the marathon expo in the south of the city to pick up my marathon bib and t-shirt, then on to the house of Cinta - my host during my semester abroad in Amsterdam. Cinta, a longtime marathon runner herself, prepared a delicious, vegetarian pre-race meal for me (and herself! She ran as an official Runner's World pacer for runners trying to get a time of 3:45) of pasta with fennel, mushrooms, walnuts and cheese. Her girlfriend Tanja joined us, and the four of us had a wonderful time making up for lost time.

Me with Cinta and Tanja
We biked home at the end of the night, through the lovely Vondelpark, of which I have many fond memories of nighttime biking with Taryn (my fellow housemate at Cinta's from study abroad). It's really peaceful there at night, the darkness punctuated only by other bike lights, the silence broken by the steady whirr of your bike light on your front wheel...on many Dutch bikes, your bike light at night is powered by the energy of your actual pedaling - innovative indeed! I fell into bed at Gustaaf's flat, stayed up awhile reading the latest Jeffrey Eugenides novel on my iPhone before dropping off to sleep. Amazing, technology. (On a total sidenote, I'm halfway through it now and really enjoying the read, contrary to many of the early negative reviews.)

Sunday was the big day - Marathon Day! I think I'll save most of my ramblings about the marathon itself for a separate entry (because we've all witnessed how capable of rambling about running I am!), but suffice to say that it was a gorgeous day with a beautiful, flat course, and I ran about as fast as I hoped to.

Sunday evening, we celebrated by getting together for tea, and later dinner, with one of my mom's close friends from 40+ years ago when they shared their first apartment in Amsterdam together, and her husband and daughter Sabrina. A good evening, full of many stories and laughs too! My mom and Sabrina worked on devising a plan to keep me in Holland longterm :)

Monday, my mom and I hopped on our bikes and headed for the "Amsterdamse Bos" - perhaps my favorite, most cherished part of the city, and one of which few people, even lifelong Amsterdam residents, seem to be aware.

It's a big wooded area just a kilometer or two outside of the city, with an expansive trail system (both semi-paved bike trails and unpaved walking/running trails), lots of lakes and creeks, scenic farmland, and even - as I learned with surprise on a solo run there four years ago - wild boar-ish animals called "Schotse Hooglanders".

One such mellow fellow, just hanging out next to the trail.
The intention was to bike to my favorite restaurant in all of Amsterdam, a Dutch pannenkoekenhuis (pancake house!) with a pancake menu reminiscent of the indulgent breadth of options available at the Cheesecake Factory. Dutch pancakes can be sweet or savory, and include a wealth of ingredients we Americans typically only thing of putting in omelets or crepes...but we're talking full-blown, thick, bigger-than-your-face pancakes here, with any ingredient or combination you desire cooked right into the middle of the batter.

The Boerderij Meerzicht (roughly translated: Farm with a Lake View) is situated in the middle of the forest. Though we found it without trouble, we were disappointed to discover that it's not open on Mondays. Talk about a bummer! Happily, though, we biked back to the city and found ourselves some solid Dutch pancakes there instead.

Sunday evening I was able to get together with a fellow marathoner and friend from my semester abroad, whom I'd originally gotten to know through interviewing for my thesis paper. Over a pot of tea, a few glasses of port, and a block of aged Dutch cheese, we had quite the time catching up, too!

Today, my mom and I spent a relaxed morning wandering around the famous, outdoor Albert Cuyp market, enjoying some traditional Dutch "patat met" (fat french fries doused in mayonnaise and served in a paper funnel with a fork) before making our way back to Amsterdam's Central Station and on the train back to Nijverdal...

...which brings me to tonight! More updates to follow. Namely, the marathon report :)

Europe-bound

2011-10-10T02:38:00.000-07:00

My life in passports! The very farthest left one is the Dutch passport I got as a baby, from the glory days of dual citizenship in my youth.
In exactly 11 hours, one Delta plane will take off from the tarmac at Sea-Tac and I will officially be en route to the Netherlands - my first trip abroad in 4 years, and my first time getting to see my mom since moving to Seattle 2+ years ago! My anti-jetlag plan is to get as little sleep as possible tonight (hence my starting a blog entry at 2:45 a.m.) so I'll pass out when I board my nonstop Seattle-Amsterdam flight and wake up totally refreshed upon arrival at 8:20 a.m. local NL time. We'll see how it goes ;)

As always, there are a thousand things to write about - and unfortunately, in my somewhat sleep-deprived stupor, I keep starting paragraphs and then not liking the way they turn out. So perhaps I'll skip any sort of meaningful writing this evening. The short of it all is that I do hope to have some more time to write in the coming weeks, to catch my blog up on my life - as well as write about my visit to the Netherlands and upcoming marathon.

In the meantime, a few images of the beautiful skies here during the past few weeks:

Sunset over the Olympic Mountains.

Sunrise over Lake Union (as seen from our balcony!)

This one's a sunrise too! Gorgeous.
Well, it's 3 a.m...I'm pushing 20 waking hours now, and not likely to last much longer. Toto, we're not in college anymore.

Student loan debt: My first political rant

2011-09-15T21:11:00.000-07:00

(Tried to cram this into a Facebook status update, and it didn't quite fit.)

I've never considered myself a particularly political person. I don't aspire to be so, either, as I find politics generally dirty and upsetting to my otherwise (and preferred) rosy view of humanity. I've only tagged one post with "politics" in my blog before, ever. By nature, I err on the side of conflict avoidance, so political sparring just hasn't ever held much appeal for me. With that said, I finally feel too intensely about something to keep my mouth shut about it - and I look forward to hearing your ideas in response, especially if you disagree with me.

So. Michigan congressman Hansen Clarke is proposing a bill to forgive all student loan debt in our country.

...

As the initial spark of "WOW, THAT WOULD BE AWESOME!" fades, I'm left feeling appalled that anyone, let alone the 160,000+ people and counting who signed this petition today, can think this is a decent idea. (On a sidenote, I find it curious that this petition website ups its number of signatures it "needs" every time it hits its goal...at the moment, it "needs 165,000", but I'm sure by the time most of you read this, it will undoubtedly be higher.)

So yes, the proposal sounds great in theory, at first glance. I have student loan debts I'd surely enjoy seeing magically erased as much as the next person. If the government bailed out Wall Street, why not "College Street" too? After all, isn't it better to invest in the bright, innovative, hard-working minds of tomorrow than in greedy, corporate, bureaucratic schmucks?

This idea was proposed two years ago, too, and with it came a barrage of supporters. Genuinely depressing stories emerged, of people who felt they'd worked incredibly hard to earn their college educations, only to be faced with a dismal job market and the inability to keep up with soaring interest rates on their loans. Yes, the interest rates are often outrageous, and much like with the housing/mortgage crisis, not enough understanding conveyed of the risks involved in saddling oneself with five- or even six-digit debt. I have great sympathy for those who have studied and worked hard for their degrees, yet are now struggling to stay afloat because of their debt burden.

However. What about the thousands of others who aren't in the same situation, for better or worse? What about parents, or even young students themselves, who worked extraordinarily hard to put money in a college fund to avoid having to ever go in debt to fund their education? What message does universal-debt-forgiveness send them? "Haha, suckers, way to work your ass off for 20 years for nothing!"

It's a bit like telling all the Ferrari and Lamborghini owners in the world, "Hey, we realized that what we charged you for these cars was unreasonable, so we're going to refund all your money to you. Oh, where are we finding the money? So glad you asked! Well, since the Honda and Toyota owners didn't spend as much as you did, we feel they can all pitch in for your fancy-car-reimbursement plan."

What about people who didn't even go to college because they opted to enter the workforce after high school instead? The educated elite can argue all they want for labeling such a situation a tragedy, but to do so by default steals agency from anyone who made that decision with intention. Steve Jobs, for one, understood that college is not necessarily the ticket to success, and didn't feel the exorbitant tuition rates were worth his while. While college is undoubtedly a tremendous privilege and life-changing experience, it is not the end all, be all - and is certainly even less so at the tune of $200,000 of debt, which a mere bachelor's degree these days offers no guarantee of allaying.

So what about people, you ask, for whom not being able to afford college was a disappointing reality, and not a choice? By which I mean, those who were qualified - who perhaps were even accepted at elite schools - but didn't have the financial means to go at the time. Yes, this is sad. But isn't suddenly making free the education of those of us who DID have the privilege to go a slap in the face to those who didn't? "Oh, if only you'd been born into a family with the wherewithal to take on mounds of debt on your behalf, you too could have had an elite education, for free eventually...but, too late now."

What about people who did take out loans to attend school, and have worked hard for 5, 10, 20 or more years to pay their loans off already? Is this not a slap in the face to them as well, for all their efforts to make good on their promises to repay what was once borrowed?

In the meantime, if this bill were to become a reality, would the promise of it on the horizon not diminish incentives to be fiscally responsible for those of us currently saddled with student loan debt? Let's offer a dozen people full-time jobs, but qualify the offer with "Or you can just hang out for a year and not work, and we'll still give you a year's salary at the end of it." I can guess which option most people are likely to opt for in that scenario, and it's not the one most likely to get our economy churning again.

Most of all, where does the money come from to bail out the debt-strapped graduates? Money doesn't just grow on trees, I'm sure you've heard. The government is already trillions of dollars in debt, so if it's the government that's expected to pick up the tab, it's really not forgiving anyone's debt - it's just transferring it. To whom? (1) Taxpayers, who as far as I'm aware, are the exact same people this would supposedly "bail out", and (2) Future generations. Great job, America. So many of my peers who spent their voices in college railing against the irresponsible spending of our predecessors are now pouncing with glee on the notion of doing the very same thing - denying responsibility for incurred debts because they seem unfair - so someone else has to deal with them instead.

Wake up and smell the hypocrisy, please!

Lastly, even if this bill ever passed, then what? Is college just "free" from now on? Or is it just students who graduated in 2011 or earlier that get a retroactively free ride, and from now on, everyone will be expected to pay exorbitant tuition rates again?

I'm not saying that the economy, higher education system and entire institution of student loans aren't broken. I think they are. But the solution is not to absolve young people of financial responsibility in their own lives. The solution is not to teach an entire generation that if, oops, they made the decision to invest in something that didn't pay off the way they thought it would, that the government will take care of everything.

Of course, I'm still enough of a liberal at heart to believe that government, despite its disappointing performance for most of my life so far, can be a positive force in its citizens' lives. I would like to see the government concern itself not with forgiving all debt, but with helping prevent the kind of sky-rocketing interest rates that have indeed destroyed lives - and that goes not only for student loan debts, but for home loans and mortgages, credit card companies, etc. Nevertheless, to blame the banks and loan companies entirely is to ignore underlying, problematic societal attitudes, and the need for a shift in our collective thinking about money, education and the wealth of our society.

I'd like to see the government - society as a whole, really - take more responsibility for the financial education of our youth, particularly as they approach college age and face huge decisions that will affect the rest of their lives. As thousands of petition signers have demonstrated today, the "Go into as much debt as you need to to attend the school you want" model is not working out for most Americans anymore. Families are pouring millions of dollars they don't have into the "investment" of higher education, which simply isn't producing the same ROI that it did for the baby boomer generation. The solution, however, cannot be a soothing Band-Aid for the nation's educated albeit disillusioned twenty-somethings. Rather, I think we need a broader examination of the real problem at hand - our society's misunderstanding of, and subsequently dysfunctional relationship, with debt.

End rant.

Running some numbers (pardon the pun)

2011-09-03T21:43:00.000-07:00

All right, I think it's working. Now that I got the big stuff out of the way in that last updates entry, I feel liberated to devote an entry to some elaboration on the smaller stuff.

Shockingly (I've become so predictable, I worry), the topic I'm drawn to write about is running. In my pre-Seattle life, I'd never raced longer than a half marathon - and only one of those, at that. Since moving here barely two years ago, I've done 10 races longer than the half-marathon distance that once seemed quite daunting indeed.

Not that I really hold a candle to the many, many talented and prolific runners out there who are putting in huge miles way beyond what I do. The great thing about the running world is how simultaneously empowering and humbling it can be. Nevertheless, my move to Seattle clearly marked a turning point in my athletic life. As I head into my most dense period of endurance racing yet, I found myself crunching some numbers tonight - and turned up some interesting results.

Of the four marathons and ultramarathons I've run, there has been a distinct hierarchy in my mind on how I'd rank my performance in each, relative to perceived exertion.

#1: Eugene Marathon, May 2011 (3:45:16)
#2: Vashon Ultra 50K - Trail, June 2010 (5:34:34)
#3: Vashon Ultra 50K - Trail, June 2011 (5:36:24)
#4: Seattle Marathon, August 2009 (3:55:51)

Eugene was just a blast, hands down. I felt strong and relaxed pretty much the whole way. I knew what I was doing. It wasn't the longest distance I'd ever run before. I'd had more racing experience to fuel and hydrate properly on the run.
The 2010 Vashon was also a blast. Nervous about tackling a distance six miles beyond what I'd ever run before - and on trail, to boot - I started very conservatively. I had the wonderful Elodie to pace me the last ten miles. It was challenging, sure, but again, I felt strong and solid the whole way through - and even knocked out a miraculous first place finish.
The 2011 Vashon, though my pace reflected almost identical performance to 2010, was much, much harder for me - physically and thus, mentally. Things just didn't feel as good as the previous year.
The 2009 Seattle marathon was just kind of a mess. It was exciting because it was my first, and I had about 16 or 17 really amazing miles - but I just totally fell apart after that. Rookie mistakes. Got cocky, started too fast, didn't really fuel, and so forth.

Until tonight, I'd never really sat down and taken a hard look at the statistics of my training/preparation for each of these events. During my extremely brief stint working at 24 Hour Fitness when I first moved to Seattle, I remember consulting a personal trainer, Kyle, about marathon training tips. He'd run a bunch of marathons and ultras, and his biggest piece of advice was, "Don't underestimate the importance of running high weekly mileage."

If my general training strategy has a weakness, it is indeed in my weekly mileage. When I meet new people and am preceded by my running reputation, they often assume I must run all the time - every day, at the very least. Nothing could be further from the truth. Anywhere from zero to two runs a week is pretty standard for me, three runs a real accomplishment, and four runs a week a rare miracle.

Tonight, I looked at my training log and added up the average weekly mileage stats for the 8 weeks preceding each major endurance race I've done. I found some astounding and revealing differences that I'd never really noted in comparison before.

#1: 2011 Eugene - 25 miles/week + 1-4 cross-training sessions (max: 43-mile week, longest single run in training: 24 miles)
#2: 2010 Vashon - 32 miles/week + 1-2 X-training (max: 48-mile week, longest in training: 25 miles)
#3: 2011 Vashon - 22 miles/week, no X-training (max: 41-mile week, longest in training: 20 miles)
#4: 2009 Seattle - 19 miles/week + 0-1 X-training (max: 33-mile week, longest in training: 21.5 miles)

See? I don't run as much as most of you think I do. For all the rambling I do about it on my blog, I'm really quite a part time runner.

So what conclusions can I draw from all this? First, that Kyle was right: weekly miles matter. Second, that racing experience also matters - but not so much that it will totally compensate for under-training. Third, that cross-training is generally a good idea. Fourth: given that conventional marathon-training advice states that beginners should aim to run 30-50 miles/week in training, I could probably be a hell of a lot better of an athlete if I just put in few more miles each week.

On a curious sidenote, my overall body weight seems to have little effect at the margin. I don't keep consistently detailed track of my weight, but suffice to say that I was roughly ten pounds heavier when I ran the Eugene marathon than I was when I ran Seattle. In that case, perhaps overall racing experience did compensate after all. Hmm!

Anyway, here's to running higher mileage. I've logged 42 miles and 3 cross-training sessions this week, with six weeks until marathon day - so far, so good. Now, off to bed so I can get up and squeeze in some miles before hitting up the river in the afternoon for string band practice :)

Living my fullest life

2011-09-02T19:16:00.000-07:00

Yowzaz! Pretty sure this is the longest I've gone without blogging since I moved to Seattle. Perhaps if I get some major life updates out of the way, I won't feel as daunted by writing in my blog in the future, because the big things are covered and I can go back to writing about small everyday joys and more mundane musings. Here goes:

1. Alan and I moved into our new place on Lower Queen Anne! We had a successful housewarming BBQ/birthday party at the new digs with friends, our newly minted grill, and the most delicious homemade red velvet cake ever - kudos and thanks to my friend and baker extraordinaire Lauren W.

2. My temp copywriting job at REI Headquarters has been extended a few times, so I'm still commuting down to Kent daily to research, learn about and write about all the sweet gear we sell. Pretty pleased to still be working there! What kinds of things do I write? See here. Straightforward as our writing tasks often are, I am forever inspired by my colleagues' cleverness and creativity.

3. Yours truly has become a running/training/athletic MACHINE! Well, so I like to think. I got in a bit of inspired frenzy to sign myself up for a bunch of races. On the docket for the coming months are two full marathons, one half, and my third official ultra (50K). Oh! And I'm going to run 30+ miles around the perimeter of Mount Saint Helens in a few weeks with my friend and fellow Dutch/Swedish hybrid, Ged. Wish us luck!

4. Speaking of running...in July, a team of 11 friends and I tackled the Ragnar Northwest Passage 190-mile Relay for the second year in a row. Our team, the Alpacas by Day, Ninjas by Night, had a blast. I wrote a story about it for the REI blog here. (Beware: link does not always cooperate in Firefox. Try another browser if it doesn't work.)

I am blessed with good friends in this city.
5. Speaking of more running, I tackled my steepest, most rugged trail run yet last month, with my now-longtime trail running pals, Elodie and Tom - the Angel's Staircase run in the Methow Valley, about four hours east of Seattle on the other side of the mountains. 5000 feet of elevation change over 25 kilometers, peaking at 8000 feet, with stunning views in all directions. 6th place among women, I'll take it!

This ridiculously awesome photo courtesy of Glenn Tachiyama.

Beautiful views courtesy of race director James Varner, whom I interviewed and wrote this story on for Outdoors NW magazine several months ago.

6. Oh, and let's talk about where those marathons are that I've signed up for. I'm going to Vegas, baby! Running the strip at night - a nighttime marathon, how cool is that? Talked into it by my lunchtime running buddy at work, Logan (not that it was a really hard sell...)

7. But what's even better than Vegas? Answer: Flying over the North Pole on a direct flight from Seattle to Amsterdam to visit my mom and run the marathon there next month! Dutch Rosetta Stone lessons are in full throttle again. Can't believe it's taken me four years to get myself back to Holland, but it will great to see my mama and run 26.2 in the city that made me truly fall in love with running in the first place.

I took this photo in 2007. The marathon course runs along this river.
8. Alan took me to see Weezer on my birthday last month. In case you didn't hear the story (I love this story!), Alan and I were walking along a street in Seattle many months ago and passed a billboard advertising Weezer in Seattle on August 19. Knowing that I was once upon a time a big Weez' fan, he asked if I'd like to go. Snootily, I scoffed that the only way I'd go to a Weezer concert today was if they played Blue Album start to finish. We turned a corner and the next billboard we saw was, "WEEZER - Playing Blue Album and Pinkerton, start to finish." Wha?!! So we went! It satisfied in the nostalgia realm in big ways.

Yup, I was quite sure I could dig up an old photo of me in my trusty Weezer tee. Me, at 15, with my parents and Dutch cousins/family I haven't seen in years.
9. Been trying to ride my bike more lately...commuting a lot around on two wheels, including several bike trips up to Green Lake in the north part of this city, to go swimming with Oberlin friends - Ruth, who's happily staying another year in Seattle to continue working for Habitat for Humanity, and Shari, who spent the whole summer here leading kids' nature camps for the Audubon Society. Do I have cool friends or what?

10. So, I've been writing all this while sprawled out on a bunch of pillows and blankets on our balcony, looking at the night profile of the Cascade mountains, the shimmering Lake Union, the Seattle skyline all lit up, and even a good number of stars. Really, really happy in the new apartment! A good friend of mine whom I'll kindly keep anonymous recently paraphrased my blog as "Blah blah blah ohhhh Seattle, blah blah blah I'm so special because I love Seattle soooo much blah blah"...snarky, sure, but that's the nature of our friendship anyway (he's the big brother I never had!) and furthermore, I can't imagine a better summation of my feelings. Thank you, you know who you are, for stating it so eloquently. Indeed, I freakin' love this place!

11. Have we been over the fact that I get to have a reunion next month with this wonderful woman?

It's been a long time coming. Thank you, good world, for giving me the opportunities to work hard, play hard and accomplish so many of the things in 2011 that I hoped I could. And thanks to everyone in my life who's making this one amazing ride! You all are great.

The times, they are a-changin'

2011-07-15T12:42:00.001-07:00

Two weeks ago, Alan and I got a notice on our front door, announcing that our building had been procured by new owners. In 60 days, our rent would jump by over $500 a month. My mood about it, since then, has ranged from stress and anger (stage 1) to delirious amusement (stage 2) to a quiet, tentative sense of excitement (stage 3).

Stage 2 delirious amusement came in considering how NOT worth the new rental rate our building is. Yes, it's been a great place to settle into Seattle - walkable to everything from work to downtown to the stadiums to quaint neighborhood main drags to stunning views and urban parks, close access to highways to the mountains too, a quiet building with mostly good neighbors, etc.

But there are plenty of issues that we've tried to ignore for the last couple years. I won't go into detail here about them, but they're pretty 50/50 with the positives.

The new owners are not really landlords. They're a small investment company who renovate beat up, old buildings into fancy new apartments to make them far more profitable for owners. They don't really expect us to pay the new rent; they just want us out to do their renovations and help along our "rapidly gentrifying neighborhood." (Their phrasing, not mine.)

Learning that caused a brief plummet back into stage 1 (stress and anger), but it was shortly replaced by a leap into stage 3 (!) when I started cruising apartment listings. Although the market for renters is much tougher now than it was two years ago when we were last looking, we managed to land a new place within about a week and a half of initiating the search - and it's a great one!

And so stage 3 continues. Now that I know for sure where we are going, I feel like I'm at the beginning of a new relationship - giddy, distracted, and ultimately obsessed with the concept of something I really don't know at all...but will, very very soon. As I write this, I'm on my lunch break at work, chowing down over my keyboard so I can get some of my infatuated ramblings off my chest before plunging back into work.

We'll be moving to Queen Anne - the other major hill in Seattle that nuzzles downtown. The famous, so-called "Frasier view" is taken from Queen Anne. I took the following photo on my first run up the hill, nearly two years ago.

Hassles of moving week itself aside, we'll get to enjoy all the perks of moving without the hassle of having to find new jobs or new friends. Instead, we'll get to explore new cafes, new restaurants, new bookstores, new libraries, new ice cream shops, new running routes, new evening walks, new hidden public stairways and secret views...all the exciting aspects of going somewhere new!

We'll be in a nicer neighborhood overall, and finally have covered off-street parking! We'll have our very own balcony with beautiful views of the Seattle skyline, Mt. Rainier, Lake Union and the Cascade mountains. We'll have enough space to not need a separate storage unit anymore. And all for about the same price we pay now!

Clearly, we should have made this move a long time ago.

In the meantime, as with all goodbyes - however small - I have lists of things I will miss about our current home...lists of things I still haven't ever gotten around to doing in our neighborhood, that are imperative to do before moving next month. Funny how a deadline sometimes is all the push you need to grant yourself the experiences you've been thinking about, if not dreaming of. Nostalgic list entry coming soon to my blog :)

Practicing

2011-06-23T21:42:00.000-07:00

Well, I've done it again - gone and failed to blog for nearly a month - and as usual, I'm far more compelled to write about small moments, small pleasures, than I am all the major, more drastic things that have been taking place.

The fact, for example, that my local Trader Joe's has started carrying kale, and I told my checker tonight how psyched I was about that, and he asked what I would do with it, and I said probably blend it up with all those peaches and bananas and kiwis I was buying too.

Or the fact that Lauren and I hopped on a bus yesterday in the afternoon sun and rode it all the way to Ballard - the complete opposite corner of Seattle, but a really spectacular little neighborhood - to get a couple microbrews during the Noble Fir's "Pints for Parks" night, where they donate a buck from every pint to an environmental nonprofit. This month's cause of choice is my beloved Washington Trails Association.

Doing our part for the environment
We followed that up with tapas and gelato and a nice evening stroll as the sun was going down. What more can you ask from one evening, really?

Or the fact that on Sunday, I discovered that the river is a fantastic place to practice my banjo. I can be there with friends, but also go down by the river on my own to play where the current is loud enough to drown me out, and I can strum my banjo as loudly as I please without offending anyone's ears.

I take lessons from these cats. Future string band, hello.
The big news of the month, of course, is that I'm now three weeks into my temp job with REI Headquarters, that I'm no longer in school, that I flew home to Kansas City for all of 40 hours to surprise my dad for his birthday, that last weekend I ran my second ultramarathon (third place this year, and almost exactly, to the minute, the same time as when I ran the same race last year), that my amazing friend Shari arrived in Seattle for the summer, that I went to a beginner's meditation workshop a couple weekends ago, that I've gone on some spectacular trail runs with friends (Zanna! Ron!), that I've seen some spectacular live music (Sarah Jarosz!), that I've read some spectacular books (more Ann Patchett!), and that despite it being the most hideous few months weather-wise for Seattle, summer is definitely in the air.

The snow has finally melted off Mt. Si! As seen from the airplane window on my way to Kansas.
I went for a long (for me) bike ride after work today. After starting to feel a little stir crazy about not running in five days (trying to let myself recover fully from the 50K; I have that persistent, nagging sore right shin again that I had last year after the ultra), I hopped on my bike and just took off for the lakefront. It felt good - all that wind and fresh, just-rained air, and the glorious sensation of riding my bike over the I-90 floating bridge, my tires so near to the sun-glinting waves of Lake Washington.

Once again, I can thank coworkers at REI for inspiring to challenge myself in new ways. Last week, as part of a "team building" day for the entire Product Information team, we went kayaking together. It was only my second time on a kayak - and what a joy it is!

Paddling on Lake Washington with new friends
One of my coworkers asked if I'd like to ride our bikes down to the kayak launch together, since we live in the same neighborhood and the lake is only a few miles away. We met up for coffee in the morning and then rode to the lake together, and it reminded me how much I like being on my bike - afraid of it as I am much of the time.

See, I have the same problem with biking in Seattle that I had with running when I first moved here: a sad sense of resignation that Seattle will take away from me one of my great passions. How am I supposed to like biking with all these ridiculously steep hills that I'm utterly incapable of going up and down? But, of course, as with running, it's going to just be a matter of building myself up to it. Not being afraid, not being impatient, and not giving up - just steadily climbing the giant metaphorical hill along with the literal ones. And one day I'll enjoy a chuckle at how epic my bike ride out to Mercer Island across bridge and back felt today.

The new job is going really well. It's straightforward work and extremely project-oriented, which is the way I work naturally, so the time flies by. Copywriting has forced me to stop evaluating my language in the big-picture way that I've spent most of my life doing, and start focusing on the minutiae of my words, my sentence constructions. Zinsser's "On Writing Well" has been on my bookshelf most of my life, since my father had the foresight and kindness to give me a copy, but it had been years since I'd cracked it open. I started rereading it, and wow, it has to be one of my favorite books ever written.

Why wasn't it required reading for any of my creative writing classes at Oberlin? We spent so much energy in those classes on big-picture discussions - on plot, on character development - but so rarely did we work on the bare bones of language itself. When did we relish in the many shades of meaning maintained by a single word? When did we discuss the uselessness of most adverbs and of many adjectives, the richness of active verbs? When did we pay homage to the origins of words, express gratitude for the delicious possibilities that the English language puts at our fingertips?

I need more practice with the craft itself of writing, with the art of decluttering, of editing, of sending half my words to the chopping block. There is value in this all, and I am grateful for the opportunity to work on it in my daily life this summer. (I should practice this decluttering business in my blog more often, I realize...but cut me some slack; 40 hours a week of stripping my sentences to their essential parts...getting to ramble a little on my blog is kind of like having a familiar, relaxing drink at the end of a long day.)

Speaking of which, it's well past my bedtime now...

What happens when I don't blog for a month

2011-05-31T22:35:00.000-07:00

This evening, I went for a nice long-ish run through Madison Valley, arguably one of the nicest parts of Seattle, and ultimately down to the shores of Lake Washington. At the end of the road is a dock that pokes out over the lake. I was about 3.5 miles into my run at this point, and decided to sprawl out on the dock beneath the horizon-bound sun for a solid 10 or 15 minutes before continuing my run. To say that I felt grateful to be alive in that moment is an understatement.

This picture was not taken today, but this entry feels like a good excuse to share this shot I took about a month ago after running to Golden Gardens - yet another lovely Seattle park on the water.
The sky felt big today...full of those massive, puffy clouds that didn't mind sharing sky space with the sun - a rare breed here in Seattle. I had the dock to myself, and nothing but the sounds of the water lapping against its legs beneath me. The temperature was perfect lying-on-a-dock-in-a-sweaty-t-shirt-and-shorts weather. I could see to the tops of Cougar and Tiger Mountains both, my running playgrounds, and some of the snowy peaks in the North Cascades as well. Really lovely indeed. I couldn't stop thinking, I live here. I ran from my doorstep to this place. I live here.

I got together with Lu last week for dinner (Thai food, yum!) and dessert (Yogurtland, yum!) and a lot of overdue catching up. At some point, we got to talking about how easy it is to forget that Seattle is a city surrounded (not entirely, obviously) by water. Although a city of hills opens itself to the possibility of amazing vantage points and views in surprising places, there are also plenty of spots in the city that proffer no view of the water at all. My daily walk to work is one of them.

So, in keeping with the lyrics that inspired the name of this blog, I do appreciate the times I'm able to be near the water. It's a rare run I go on that doesn't have me running along, around, or over some body of water. I love it.

It has been a week of quiet, content moments like that, and catching up moments like the one over hot noodles and curry with Lu, and also a week of letting go and embracing change. As many of you know by now, I was offered a full time copywriting gig at REI Headquarters for the summer - an opportunity I am beyond thrilled about, though it has meant a swift departure from many other aspects of my daily life this past year.

In the span of two weeks, I went to my last (for now) web design class, my last (for now) in-office day at the magazine, and on Thursday, my last day (for now) selling shoes at the Seattle REI store. Although the goodbyes said this week are not permanent in the sense that anyone will be out of my life entirely...my day-to-day routine will indeed change drastically, and the faces I see at work every day won't be the same. The "goodbyes" of this week reflect the inevitable groan of change that happens in our lives, and dang, it's never easy, even when the changes are exciting.

Cobbling together part time jobs and classes and the occasional freelance contract project has made for an interesting, wonderful, and full (!) two years in Seattle, but I am hungry to try life on a regular schedule again.

Over a year ago, when I went through my last "Whoops, I have too much on my plate" crisis, I remember a conversation with my friend Tom about how being stressed out not only sucks up your time, but it also deprives you of creative flow. Without the ability to let your mind genuinely wander, unencumbered by the onerous need to constantly monitor your mental to-do list, making art or envisioning anything new at all is difficult. Creativity and innovation flow only once you've decluttered your brain enough to make room for their possibilities.

Happily, since being offered the job this summer and starting to wean myself off my current mosaic schedule, I have felt more balanced and content than I have in a long time. I haven't been stressed. I have read a bunch of books. (Ann Patchett! Toni Morrison! Hello again, world of literature!) I have had time for my friends and for myself, and it's been quite lovely indeed.

With Alan in town for nearly the entire month of May, we got in a lot of nice adventures, including a day of hiking and sunshine and waterfalls and breweries and bookstore browsing up in Bellingham.

Several weekends ago, Alan and Elodie and I spent the better part of our Saturday gorging ourselves on free cheese samples at Seattle's annual Wine and Cheese Festival at the iconic Pike Place Market. Did you catch the part about it being free? Drool. Alan and I came home and filled our fridge with blue cheese, young Gouda, coconut cheese (infused with coconut oil, for real!), smoked cheddar, and acted as temporary hosts to Elodie's trove of soft, stinky French camembert.

Homemade nachos with smoked cheddar. So much for my dairy and gluten avoidance.
I also managed to make it to two of four days of the 40th Annual Northwest Folklife festival - a big old hippie party at the Space Needle every year, that Seyeon took me to for the first time in 2005, and which was a big part of why I thought I'd love living in this city. Voted "Biggest Flower Child" by my peers in my high school yearbook, is it really any surprise I went to Oberlin College and eventually wound up here?

Let's see...what else? Two evenings of dinner parties with good friends in a row - Kate and Jeff's Memorial Day deck warming party, complete with grilled burgers and mini cheesecake tarts, and Megan and David's kitchen warming/anniversary party, complete with spicy Thai soup, chocolate-covered strawberries, and the best homemade bread, made by my favorite Dutch mother currently living in the continental U.S.

Sunset last night from Dave and Megan's living room window.
Speaking of delicious food, Lauren and I hit up the brand new Skillet Diner on Capitol Hill; I'm definitely becoming one of those urban foodie divas that wants to try out all the hot foodie spots. Aiee. Seriously though...plaid shirts on all the wait staff, beer and wine in mason jars, damn good fries, and again, all within walking distance of home.

Earlier in the month, Alan and I trekked up to the small, old navy town of Port Gamble with the Outdoors NW crew for the Beast Adventure Triathlon. 6 miles sea kayaking, 16 miles mountain biking, and an embarrassingly short 5K trail run at the end...Neal, being the rockstar he is, covered the first two legs of the tri, before I took over for the final brief running leg. The weather was miserably characteristic of the Northwest, so we both got wet and cold, but (well, I speak for myself) had a blast nonetheless.

The mountain biking part was very hardcore.

Coming down the finishing chute!

Team ONW!
I've gone for some lovely runs with friends, including exploration of the water tower at Volunteer Park with Zanna (4.5 stars on trusty Yelp; go read about how people give themselves heart attacks climbing the stairs for the best free view of Seattle, then imagine the two of us RUNNING up those flights...heck yes), and my first time cruising around Carkeek Park with Ron - a sweet morning run sandwiched between delicious, raw, Incan-superfood-charged smoothies. Why am I friends with so many men (well, two at least) who eat weirder things than me, run in Vibram Fivefingers, speak with exclamation marks, and have adorable little boys I wish I could hang out with all the time? Life is good.

Summer is in the air, and I am grateful as ever to be alive and here. Hello June!

Weekend in Oregon: Beer, sunshine, and 26.2 miles

2011-05-02T16:21:00.000-07:00

First and foremost, thank you all for your kind words on my last entry here. My blog saw a record number of views the day I posted my entry on Sasha, and many of you took the time to send me messages or call, and I want you all to know how much I appreciated your love, comfort, and support over the past week. The loss of a pet is never easy, but being able celebrate her life with you all meant a lot to me. I'm honored that so many of you took the time to read my words of tribute to my dog, and also that they resonated with you. Thank you, all of you...I am grateful for you in my life.

Second of all...as always, bless running.

And living among mountains.

This past weekend was a wonderful respite from the "real world", as Alan and I made an Oregon road trip out of the weekend and spent our time taking my little Passat for a grand adventure through mountain passes, by lakes, along babbling rivers, into the woods, and through a few new towns. The whole weekend was all in the name of the Eugene Marathon, about which I wrote a story for Outdoors NW last spring and was registered to run in 2010 until I injured myself about a month out. Bummer.

This year, however, my body has held up to the training I've put it through. Maybe it's the new shoes (running in lightweight, neutral shoes for the first time, after a lifetime in stability shoes), maybe it's all the trail running and hills around Seattle strengthening my muscles, maybe it's just getting smarter about my training over the years...but in comparison with my last marathon, this one was a blazing success.

We began the weekend by driving down to Eugene - Tracktown USA, and home to many running greats throughout history including the late and great Steve Prefontaine - for the Expo. We stopped in Portland for lunch that day, finding (as we did for the entirety of the weekend) little hole-in-the-wall, mom-and-pop restaurants along on our way on Yelp. Family-owned Lebanese restaurant? Heck yes; 5 stars for the Nicholas Restaurant.

Guided again by editorial I've done for the magazine, I was really interested in checking out Bend (there will be a little mini-story of mine in the upcoming Outdoors NW about trail running in Bend!), so Friday afternoon, we started driving east in Oregon on the beautiful McKenzie Scenic Highway. The Forest Service campgrounds, sadly, were still closed for the season - the mountain pass along that highway peaks at about 5,000 feet, and the snow was still quite ample up there - so we wound up pitching a tent in an RV Park in the woods.

RV parks...never my first choice, but it was a surprisingly beautiful one, and I felt sufficiently tucked away in the forest in our cozy little REI Half Dome.

The following morning, we slept until the sunshine woke us up, and then made the rest of the drive east to Bend. Bend was a blast. The weather was incredible, and we spent an entire relaxing Saturday exploring town.

Our afternoon included: getting brunch at the lovely CHOW (thank you again, Yelp), strolling along the Deschutes River that winds through town, checking out Bend's REI, stopping by Fleet Feet to meet and chat with the Patagonia-sponsored runner that I interviewed for my story on Bend, and polishing off the afternoon with a couple microbrews on an outdoor terrace downtown. And I have to say, I think Oregon kicks Washington's butt in microbrew-land. Alan's 10 Barrel Brewing Co. S1nist0r Black Ale (Bend) and my Rogue Hazelnut Brown Nectar (Eugene) rocked both of our worlds.

Anyway. We drove back to our campground that night, stopping in Sisters for dinner at an old hotel renovated into a sweet saloon-type restaurant called Bronco Billy's for my official pre-marathon meal (grilled salmon, rice pilaf, and a skewer of grilled veggies = yum!) before cruising through the mountain pass at sunset to return to our campsite. Beautiful drive.

Us with the Sisters mountains in the background.
Sunday morning, the alarm clock went off at 4:30 a.m. By the light of my car headlights, we took down camp in record time (it was freeeezing cold out), hopped in the car and hit the road for Eugene. The weather, again, couldn't have been more ideal - perfect sunshine, and temperatures ranging from 42-55 degrees in the morning (68 later in the day...).

The starting line, outside of historic Hayward Field.
The marathon itself was incredible - beautiful course along rivers and trails and through beautiful wooded areas as well as quaint residential areas, full of energetic spectators, great musicians along the sidelines, and pretty flat and fast overall. And yes, I ran the whole thing with my camera (in a pocket of my hydration pack, but easily accessible while running.) I am that devoted to you all, my blog readers. :)

It was the opposite, in many (good) ways, of my first marathon in Seattle in 2009. I obviously went into this one with a great deal more long distance running experience under my belt; when I ran Seattle, 26.2 miles was the longest I'd ever run before. At mile 20 of Eugene yesterday, I thought, woohoo, only a 10K left; thank goodness I don't have to run 31 miles today!

I fueled much better this time around, taking in gels or shot blocks or squeezable packs of almond butter at 30-40 minute intervals. I stopped at every single aid station for a cup of Gatorade, and sucked down water from my pack on the run. I'm pretty sure I remember only stopping at a couple aid stations in Seattle for water or Gatorade, and only eating one (maybe two?) gels. Whoops. Live and learn.

I also ran the first half much slower. With Seattle, in my excitement, I accidentally clocked a 7:02 mile early on, and crashed and burned with 10:00+ miles and a lot of walking at the end. This time, my slowest mile (9:02) was my first, and my fastest (8:12) was, of all things, the 21st...and my overall pace got faster and faster as the race went on, with the final six miles, despite my muscles starting to burn, my fastest pace of the entire marathon.

I blame (a word I use in jest) my unexpected 3:45:16 clock time on the 3:50 official pacer. I started out the race way behind him and the pack that ran with him, beginning conservatively and really enjoying the first half of the race at a leisurely pace. I honestly had no ambitions with this marathon, except wanting to do the whole thing without walking (like I did during the last 6 miles of Seattle) and secretly hoping I'd beat my time...but not feeling very confident about it. But at some point, I caught the 3:50 pacing group, somewhat to my surprise, and was still feeling very strong; I ran with them for awhile before feeling confident enough to push ahead.

And push ahead I did! I lost the 3:50 pacing group for a few miles, and felt like I was maintaining a good, strong pace. I indulged in the glimmer of hope that I might, in fact, catch the 3:40 pacer - when all of the sudden, there was that darned 3:50 pacer again, right on my heels, and pushing what suddenly felt like a VERY hard pace. This was about mile 19, when my legs were just beginning to really feel it. Seven miles away from the finishing line seemed too soon for me to start really racing (vs. cruising comfortably), but I was determined not to let that darned pacer pass me - and there he was, chasing me down.

That sense of competition pushed me to my max. I felt unsure my legs were going to make it, but I kept reminding myself that I'd trained for this, I'd fueled everything perfectly, and there was no logical reason for me to not be able to finish the race strong - despite my body protesting and trying to convince me otherwise. Fortunately, the scenery along the river for the final 7-mile stretch was beautiful, the crowd support amazing, and before I knew it, there was historic Hayward Field and the finish line, and an unexpected miracle time on the clock before me. I finished strong, at a 7:44 pace for the home stretch into the stadium, but with next to nothing left in the tank: just the way you want to finish a race.

Bliss!

Best quote from my blog entry about my Seattle marathon: "3:45 would have been great, but that's what next time's for, right?"

Next up: qualify for Boston! I was 4 minutes and 17 seconds away from a 2011 Boston qualifying time...but they've just made the standards even more rigorous, so my goal for my next marathon, whenever that may be, is to run a 3:34:59. It's going to be hard to top this experience, though. Eugene for the win.

Goodbye Sasha

2011-04-25T22:45:00.000-07:00

Sasha, 2000-2011
Today, my dog Sasha passed away. She is the only dog I've ever had in my life, and biased as I am, I think it's safe to say she is now up in the creme de la creme of doggie heaven that they reserve for the best of the best pets out there.

There will be no right words to describe the sadness and loss I feel - the sense of yet another chapter of my childhood coming to an end - but I would like to spend this moment dwelling not on sadness, but on celebration of a wonderful animal who blessed my life for ten years.

I spent the better part of my youth wanting a dog. It took a family trip to Arizona and a long weekend spent with my aunt and uncle's wonderful Rhodesian ridgeback, Riley, to convince my mom that not all dogs drool and shed and are otherwise awful. I spent the entire car ride back to Kansas borrowing familiar tunes and rewriting the lyrics to describe why I wanted/needed/deserved a dog, and howling them aloud from the backseat. ("99 reasons I want a dog, 99 reasons that I want a dog..." You get the idea.)

The dog search process was long and arduous, but eventually the three of us - my parents and I - agreed on a breed. After falling in love with a friend's silver standard poodle, we opted for the same. Sasha was born in October 2000, a black ball of fur.

She loved learning tricks, wrestling, tearing stuffed animals to shreds, and playing soccer with me in my kitchen; I'd score by getting a deflated soccer ball into our mud room, and she'd score by grabbing the ball in her teeth and dashing into her kennel with it. After each point, we'd drop the ball again in the middle of the kitchen and start another round.

She was a smarty pants from day one. Eager to have a dog that might someday make it to the bigtime (this was pre-Youtube, but I had such aspirations for my puppy), I worked relentlessly to teach her tricks: the usual repertoire of sit, stay, shake, roll over, all that - but bonus ones, too, like wave, crawl, the infamous "back away" (see video below), and to ring a bell with her paw when she needed to go outside. Bright as she was, she started abusing that last trick in her teenage years...a squirrel outside in the yard, and Sasha would be rushing to go ring her bell.

Here's a couple of my little cousins playing with her at a family reunion years ago.

She was wonderful with kids - patient, friendly. She was a big fan of pulling her own stunts, though. Her favorite trick was with strangers at the dog park, trotting over with her frisbee or tennis ball and dropping it at their feet. "Aww, how sweet!" the stranger would think and bend down to pick up the toy. Just as their fingertips would reach it though, BOOM there was Sasha, pouncing back on the toy in a playful and defiant "Ha, gotcha!" sort of maneuver. She'd shake her toy ferociously back and forth in her mouth, drop it on the ground again, back up several steps, and sit innocently looking up at the stranger with her smiling eyes, waiting to do it all over again.

I've always had backwards pets, in that my cats are the cuddly, needy ones, while Sasha the dog was always an independent soul. She never slept on my bed like I always dreamt a dog would - but she did like to hang out. She always wanted to be in the same room as us, whether in her kennel, on her bean bag, tucked into a cabinet when she could still fit inside one, stalking the cat, or getting into some other kind of mischief.

Sasha saw our family through many transitions in our lives. She came on many road trips and family vacations; she loved traveling in the car. She knew three different cats that graced our family over the years. She's also seen me through three significant relationships; there are home videos of me and Mike playing with her as a young dog still, videos of Daniel doing tricks with her, and videos I made for Alan when I first met him and wanted to share with him from afar my beloved dog. She stuck with my dad when the other two ladies in his life moved out of the house, and carried him through what were probably some of the toughest times in his life.

Check out her mad skills: (okay, the "bow" is pretty half-assed, but cut a girl some slack; she was excited about those treats.)

She was truly an amazing dog. Thank you, Sasha, for a decade of delight, and may you rest in peace. I will love you and cherish your memory always.

Yoga and black bean fudge brownies? Yes please.

2011-04-15T12:57:00.000-07:00

Favorite salad of late: chopped Swiss chard, topped with quinoa, orange slices, mushrooms, and homemade dressing
Ironically, I am writing this blog entry on wellness while battling a bit of a cold. Nevertheless, health and wellness are on my mind, and I've done some fun projects lately I feel like writing about here.

First of all: A little over a week ago, I hosted a "Wellness Wednesday" for a few friends. I invited them over early-ish in the day, and made green smoothies - pineapple, kiwi, mango, spinach, etc. - for all. Then we cleared the furniture out of my living room and rolled out yoga mats for a solid 45 minutes or so of gentle vinyasa yoga.

Back in Kansas City, I had a wonderful yoga teacher named Martha, who led yoga classes several mornings a week, for free (with a recommended $5 donation, but truly a no-obligation, contribute-when-you-can set up, most of which was donated to local charities anyway) in a neighborhood church. I think it was Lu who invited me the first time, and soon after, I brought my mom along, and Martha Yoga became tradition - 90 minutes, three times a week, of blissful stretching, muscle awakening, meditation, and fun, too.

Getting licensed to lead yoga classes costs upwards of $3500. Not in my budget for now, but I do feel pretty knowledgeable about yoga, pose modifications, proper form, and breathing techniques in general - enough to at least reasonably lead sessions for friends. I have always admired and envied what Martha was able to do for a community of people back in Kansas: grant us a space to come together with others, relax, reflect, and rejuvenate. She was able to give so much, and at so little cost. I aspire to do the same in my life...what more can we ask of ourselves but to share with others everything we have to offer?

Martha would always finish our sessions by having us gather in a circle, and by reading to us a passage from a book that had spoken to her that week - often some sort of meditation or anecdote intended to inspire self-reflection. Again, I always admired the effort that I knew she must put in every week to selecting meaningful passages to share with us. I knew I wanted to do the same for my trio of wellness-seekers last week, and I felt surprised the night before at what an incredible pleasure it was to comb through dusty books from my shelves...books on spirituality and wellness that I hadn't really looked at in a long time, but books, nevertheless, with the capacity to inspire truly transformative thoughts. Books are powerful.

I settled on a passage from Seyeon's favorite book, The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen's Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear - an excerpt from Mary Catherine Bateson's "Composing a Life Story." However, there was another passage that I came across in John Heider's "The Tao of Leadership" that I want especially to share here now on my blog. My mom gave me this book of 81 Taoist principles for my 18th birthday. #54 is The Ripple Effect.

Do you want to be a positive influence in the world? First, get your own life in order. Ground yourself in the single principle so that your behavior is wholesome and effective.
If your life works, you influence your family.
If your family works, your family influences the community.
If your community works, your community influences the nation.
If your nation works, your nation influences the world.
If your world works, the ripple effect spreads throughout the cosmos.
Remember that your influence begins with you and ripples outward. All growth spreads outward from a fertile and potent nucleus. You are a nucleus.

Amen. After yoga, we had tea, and I made a giant pot of quinoa porridge (recipe courtesy of Trail Runner magazine!) with diced apple, dried fruits, flax seed, almond milk, walnuts, and more yummy things. All vegan and gluten-free mouthwatering deliciousness.

I also made my favorite raw/vegan/gluten-free energy bar recipe ever, for my guests to take as to-go goodies:

So how, after all my greens and focus on wellness, did I wind up with this minor cold? A few things happened, I guess:
1. The virtual knock on wood must not have been good enough, when I wrote that blog entry on never calling in sick to work. The good thing about being friends with my coworkers, is that word gets out fast when you're sick, and friends come bring you pho at home. Friends are splendid.
2. I was on this pretty clean diet for awhile, but last weekend derailed me: the extravagant sushi and ice cream on Friday night, eating glutenous pasta Saturday night, rewarding myself post-half-marathon with a DQ Blizzard and more dairy over the course of a couple hours than I'd put in my body in the last month altogether, more ice cream (Molly Moon's salted caramel, yum!) after dinner with Ruth on Monday, and finally...late at night on Tuesday, baked deliciously scrumptious browned butter toasted coconut chocolate chip cookies, ala Joy the Baker, to bring to work the next day...

I halved Joy's recipe, and remembered to half everything except the butter. Whoops. Mine look nothing like hers, but an extra stick of butter, shockingly, didn't hurt the taste too much.
...but I popped a couple the night before and felt dizzingly drunk off the butter/sugar rush. Whew.
3. So when Seyeon came over Wednesday night with a bit of a cold, I think it just did me in. My poor immune system was down, from lack of the usual antioxidant-packed goods, and I woke up feeling not so hot.

Today, as I've been snacking away at home while trying to let my health make a recovery, I've been utilizing awesome recipes in my latest issue of Women's Running to pack in as many nutrients as possible. Below: homemade kale chips, a blueberry/chard/almond milk/flaxseed/pinapple smoothie, and an amaaazing fudge brownie made with black beans (!), Dutch cocoa powder, and sweetened purely with agave nectar. No refined sugar whatsoever. Incredible stuff.

Come on, body, work with me. I'd like to be able to run tomorrow.

Life Report + my second half marathon

2011-04-11T11:14:00.000-07:00

This life I lead is a good one.

I worked this weekend some, but all in all, it felt a lot more like heaven than it did work.

Friday: writing projects during the day (work on my trail running stories for Outdoors NW, green smoothie blogging for a website I'm doing some writing for), beaches and sushi and magic with good people in the evening

Work or Heaven?
Saturday: 3rd Annual Running Shoe Expo, i.e. spending the day outside geeking out about running shoes with vendors and customers, then driving up to Deception Pass State Park with Lauren to meet up with friends and camp by the beach

Lauren and me at Deception Pass
Sunday: Running the Whidbey Island Half Marathon, relaxing afternoon back in Seattle, potluck dinner up north with many wonderful people

Today, the sun is out, and I get to spend my day: in my PJ's, eating good food, interviewing trail runners I admire, writing for work, and meeting Ruth for dinner in Wallingford tonight instead of going to class. After much deliberation over the matter, I decided to let go of my web databases classes this semester, and drop down to halftime school, rather than doing another full time quarter.

I'm still taking a few classes I'm pretty pumped about - user experience design (creating e-commerce websites) and writing for the web (would like to teach this in the future!) - but there was no way I could keep my life balanced and thriving with any more schoolwork on my plate. While many people in the web design program I'm in are there to make a 180 career shift and get a full time design job, I will maintain that writing is, and probably always will be, my primary passion. Web design and development, while very exciting to me, are merely hobbies with which I hope to supplement and support a career path of writing and creating.

But enough of the overarching life reflections I tend to litter my blog with..let's talk about running! (...because that is something I never talk enough about on my blog...) The Whidbey Island Half was my second half marathon I've ever done. The first was the Cleveland Half nearly two years ago, and I thought I'd never be able to beat that race: the weather was perfect, my body was humming, my friend Aseem was a rockin support crew, I ran faster than expected despite it being the longest race I'd ever run, and I loved every moment of it. Whether consciously or subconsciously, I think I've avoided running any more halfs because I was scared I'd never run one as great as the race that day.

Aseem and I enjoying brewskis after my first Half.
But! Yesterday reminded me how much I love the 13.1-mile distance, when it comes to road running. It's long enough to get in a groove, but not so long that the finish line is ever impossibly out of sight. The weather was everything that Washington state is known for this time of year: gray, overcast, icy cold, brutally windy, and on the verge of pouring rain the whole time. On a clear day, the Whidbey course features spectacular mountain views (earning it its title from Lonely Planet as one of the top ten most scenic marathon courses in the WORLD) - but even with the mountains in hiding and the sky resembling a slate blanket, it was an unbelievably gorgeous course.

The ladies at the finish line
It was fun to run it with friends, too. I'd never run a road race with a friend before. We all ran at slightly different paces, but because of certain out and back sections of the course, we passed each other often and were able to exchange cheers and high fives at points. Several boyfriends came along, too, to cheer us on along the course and at the finish line. (Boyfriends were also responsible for helping put together the rockstar carbo-load dinner at camp the night before: grilled salmon with pesto pasta, zucchini squash, and portobello mushrooms...who knew camp food could be so gourmet?)

The course was pretty hilly, and I realized how much I have grown as a runner since coming to Seattle; hills used to terrify me, but these days, I embrace them. They make me feel hardcore. It's admittedly very empowering to cruise up them when others are slowing down, because of all the mountains and hills (thank you, Queen Anne!) that I've run in training; my muscles were all, "Hey now, we know what to do here!" Uphills generally mean downhills, too, which are pretty much like free periods of rest for my legs and heart while clocking sub-7-minute miles: awesome.

Overall, I finished with a chip time of 1:49:23 . I maintained an 8:21 average pace, which was an improvement over my 8:33 pace at Cleveland two years ago, but still with a big window for future improvement and PR's - the best of both worlds. Also placed 7th in my age division, woohoo!

Here's me approaching the finish line at close to a full-out sprint: so much energy still left in the tank!

Lauren also had energy left in the tank...here's her prancing around on rocks a couple hours after running her first half-marathon.
Running is delightful. It is a framework for me to understand, interpret, and process my life. I love trail running for the scenery and laidback nature and solitude and more intense mental challenge...but there's still a place in my heart for a good road race with cheering crowds, camaraderie, and course support. Really looking forward to a solid running schedule in 2011. Also, big thumbs up for camping out the night before at the world's most beautiful campground!

Next up for me: Eugene full marathon in three weeks!

Anatomy of a long (urban) run

2011-03-25T20:15:00.000-07:00

I'm done with my winter quarter of school! Slept in today, awoke to kitty paws and sunlight pouring through the blinds. It didn't seem right not to do a long run today, even though I had plenty of other things on my to-do list nagging at me. I decided to borrow an idea from my friend Alex, whom I met at last year's Orcas Island run (where he totally smoked the men's 50K) and took my camera along for my long run around Seattle today and snap away consistently while in motion.

I found that running with my photographer's eye engaged made for a totally different running experience - first of all, I ran more slowly than usual, which was actually a blessing. I typically don't have the patience for proper "LSD" as it's called among runners - i.e. "Long, Slow Distance", the key component to any decent endurance runner's training schedule - but I took today significantly slower than my normal pace, and it was really enjoyable. I noticed all sorts of new things, found myself smiling pretty much the whole time, and appreciated Seattle so, so very much.

The full album, with captions, in chronological order, can be found here. (Kudos to you if YOU have the endurance to make it through all of the pictures.)

They showcase:
- Cherry blossom trees, skyline views, shimmering lakes, Puget Sound, beaches, bridges, doggies, hula hoops, kites, paper cranes, palm trees, biker butts, the number 33, and me showing some love to a bottle of Gatorade
- Capitol Hill, South Lake Union, Queen Anne, Magnolia, Ballard, Fremont, and more Capitol Hill at the end
- Cal Anderson Park, Lake Union Park, Kerry Park, Discovery Park, Gasworks Park, and Volunteer Park

Woot! This was great. I love, love, love my long runs (three weekends in a row with 3+ hour runs = heaven!) While I treasure their solitude and the quiet space in my head to detox from stress, it's great, too, to be able to share my run with others, in a way. Bless the internet. And Seattle, and my able body, and everything in my life that has led me to where I am right now.

This is a good place.

The evolution of a health nut

2011-03-24T23:46:00.000-07:00

Like my book blog entry, my food blog entry may need to be split into two (or three, or four, or five...) to keep it manageable.

Spaghetti with tomato/cashew sauce and fresh basil
Let's start with a little background, some of which you might be familiar with already: I did not grow up cooking. My dad didn't really cook. My mom did, and while she did involve me in some of the process when I was younger - helping her snap green beans in half to cook, or arranging potatoes in the bottom of a pan of water to boil - I have little memories of such involvement in cooking after such a point. As I grew up and got both pickier and nastier in my adolescence, I imagine some of the joy of cooking was lost in my mother. Our kitchen, to be honest, never really inspired happiness or excitement surrounding the preparation of food. I don't blame anyone; I wouldn't have enjoyed cooking for the 14-year-old me either. My preferred daily lunch at school that year was a slice of pepperoni pizza, a can of Welch's grape soda, and a greasy chocolate chip cookie the size of my face. I didn't appreciate my mom's lentil soup back then.

Joining Harkness co-op in college was my first real experience with cooking sans recipes, utilizing bulk foods and fresh produce and spices to prepare meals for others. I only stayed in the co-op for a semester, but it was enough to dissolve at least some of the fears I had surrounding the kitchen.

Massaged salad with Swiss chard, beets, sunflower seeds, and homemade dressing with fresh ginger
Nevertheless, the reality of my lack of even the most basic fundamentals of cooking was stark - and remained to be so up until about the last year. (Some of y'all remember the EasyMac incident(s). Oi vey.) Through a long series of experiments, recipe trials, triumphs and travesties, I finally am beginning to feel as though I've transcended omelettes and stir-fries, and can now claim some competence in the kitchen - and perhaps even a little bit of pride.

Kitchen appliances have, no doubt, played a big role in this newfound confidence. My Vitamix continues to be a dream - a gentle humming machine of beauty that seems capable of doing no wrong. I have made everything in it from blended kale smoothies to vegan tomato cashew pasta sauce to fresh hummus to butternut squash soup - and seemingly, no matter what ingredients I drop in, something magical comes out. There's no undercooking, no overcooking, no scorching, no drying out, no failure to rise, or any of the other host of maladies that can foil even the most valiant baking or cooking efforts. If your ingredient ratios are a little off, you just add a little more in and blend again. Magic.

But I've been cheating on my blender a little, I must admit. See, I also hauled an old food processor out to Seattle from my childhood home in Kansas. At the time, I couldn't imagine what I'd ever use such a thing for, but I thought, what the heck, why not, and threw it into the moving truck along with a handful of other found objects salvaged from the house in Kansas. Only last month did I finally locate all the component parts of the food processor, reassemble it, and delight in the fact that it's still operational. *Drool.* What a dreamy appliance it is when it goes to work.

My favorite processor creations so far have been (1) homemade pesto, and (2) raw energy bars. Which to begin with? The pesto was unbelievably easy: fresh basil, toasted almonds (pine nuts, I learned, do NOT toast well in the oven), garlic, and olive oil. Pulse. Heaven!

Rotini pasta with pesto

Brown rice pasta with pesto, baked tilapia and mixed veggies
For the raw energy bars...I have to remember where I even got this recipe. If anyone wants the specifics, I'll happily share, because these were hands down the most delicious energy bars, store-bought or homemade included, I've ever tasted. I take no credit for these, as it was pure recipe-heeding that introduced these to my tastebuds, but wow...Food Processor, let me count the ways I adore thee.

Adding honey to the nuts and dried fruits.

Added cranberries, shredded coconut, raisins, and Green Magma (powdered barley greens)

Tell me that doesn't look amazing
My small army of kitchen appliances has boosted my confidence enough that I've branched out in many ways in my life so far in Seattle that never even seemed within the realm of possibility before. I've made my own granola, baked bread, created my own salad dressings, learned how to cook steel cut oats, rolled my own quiche crust from teff flour, made soup from scratch, cooked steaks with a homemade marinade, tried tons of different dark leafy greens in dozens of homespun salad combinations, learned how to make perogies from scratch (a shared learning experience with Alan around Christmas last year), baked fish, made my own guacamole, baked homemade pita chips, and tried more new foods and ingredients than I previously knew existed. What a wonderful world food is!

Grass-fed steak with wild rice and green beans

Homemade toasted pita chips and curried lentil dip

Our perogies masterpiece

I've read a lot of books lately about diet, mostly in relation to holistic health, disease prevention, athletic endurance, and general longevity. Several of them include: Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food", Victoria Boutenko's "Green for Life" and "Raw Family: A True Story of Awakening", Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal Vegetable Miracle", Loren Cordain's "The Paleo Diet", and Erik Marcus' "Vegan: The New Ethics of Eating". All have been great, enlightening reads, and if you'll pardon the embarrassing pun, good food for thought. While there are a lot of different ideas out there - some of which are downright radical by our society's standards - the truth is that there are general overlaps amongst all of them. While the jury might still out on whether eating cows is a good idea, or if a food's glycemic index matters, or whether microwaving food introduces carcinogens, or if a cup of coffee a day is good or bad or you, etc etc...
Pretty much everyone across the board agrees:

1. Processed food bad.
2. Refined sugar bad.
3. Too much food bad.
4. Nuts and seeds good.
5. Fruits, vegetables, dark leafy greens really good.

That's not so hard, is it? Am I absolutely 100% avoiding any foods right now? Nope. I am generally trying to consume minimal: caffeine, processed foods, refined sugar, refined grains, gluten, cheese and alcohol, while trying to emphasize: greens, vegetables, fruits, healthy fats, lean protein, seafood, herbal teas, and nutritional superfoods in general. I'm going on several months now without coffee, even more months with a daily fresh green juice or smoothie, and a year and a half now without missing a single day of work due to being sick. *Knock on wood.* I like this being-healthy business. Food is medicine.

Anyone want to have a dinner party soon?

So what does one eat on long run days, anyway?

2011-03-19T22:40:00.000-07:00

My running route this morning: 19 miles roundtrip.
The book I mentioned in my last entry, Racing Weight, has a fun little section that interviews a bunch of elite endurance athletes about their typical daily diet. It's inspiring - to be reminded that food is indeed fuel (as well as medicine), and the better I eat, the better I run. Without intentionally doing so, I managed to get in 9 out of 10 superfoods today! Yum.

Here's the breakdown of my food today:

Breakfast:
Smoothie with lots of fruit, dark leafy greens, almonds, and chia seeds

During run:
1 pack of Clif Shot Bloks, handful of raisins (usually I eat more on my runs, but I had limited supplies since I didn't intend to go so long...)

Post run:
Bowl of lowfat vanilla yogurt with cranberries and walnuts
Electrolyte replenishment (Nuun)

Lunch:
Almond butter, coconut, and honey sandwich on sprouted seed bread
A bunch of carrots
A few squares dark chocolate
Glass of milk

Afternoon snack:
Raspberry oat bar

Dinner:
Big bowl of quinoa with stir-fried broccoli, red peppers, cauliflower, onion, chickpeas, a fried egg on top
Baked sweet potato
Apple

Dessert:
Trader Joe's gluten-free ginger snap cookies

Book Blog: My Reading List, Pt I

2011-03-19T00:37:00.000-07:00

First of all, thank you again Nicholas Carr, for your wonderful wake up call with The Shallows, which reminded me that reading books is, and always will be, a valuable use of my time.

I went through a long, not-reading-so-much lull. It started in college, when of course, I was reading plenty of books and other materials for my classes - and it was wonderful reading indeed: international novels, political treatises, historically resonant works, compelling nonfiction, poetry, translations, essays about translations, translations of essays about translations...the world of academia was indeed a rich one.

At the same time, it left me little time to peruse books on my own. I'm pleased to say that even though I objectively still don't have the time for huge swaths of leisure reading, I'm carving out the moments for it nonetheless, and it's heavenly. Last night, I went out for drinks with a couple women in my javascript class to celebrate the end of our quarter (or, in my case, mourn...I will miss that javascript class dearly). One of the women mentioned that she has a weakness for high heels, and treats herself with a new pair every month - many of which she admitted just sit in her closet untouched, but the process of buying them is so exciting and rewarding that she can't help herself. I guess I'm like that with books; I buy books and check them out from the library at a rate that far exceeds my ability to read them - and yet I indulge in the pleasure of acquiring them, and am comforted by their presence in my home.

So what exactly have I been reading lately?

ChiRunning, by Danny Dreyer

I've recommended this one to tons of customers at REI looking for a more technical manual on how to adapt their form to more of a midfoot strike (vs. the traditional heavy heel strike), which often helps runners cut down on their injuries...and yet I've never read it myself until now! Man, what a tremendously insightful and valuable read this one's turning out to be. It draws on principles from Tai Chi, and encourages runners to derive their power from their core, rather than their legs. Just keeping some simple principles described in the first few chapters of this book in mind while running has already allowed me to have some tremendously enjoyable and surprisingly effortless-feeling runs lately, including a 17-miler one way run to Kenmore, a 20-miler out-and-back along Lake Washington last weekend, and a few powerful sprint workouts as well. So far, so good...none of those pesky old shin splints flaring up this time around! I'm excited about the possibilities here, and would absolutely recommend this to all runners.

The Sparrow, by Mary Doria Russell

Rachel's mom loaned this one to me when I was 17, and I just couldn't get myself to read it...sci fi? I thought skeptically. So the loaned copy sat on my bookshelf until I graduated and gave it back untouched. Then a couple months ago, I saw the same book on my friend Lauren's bookshelf, recognized it, inquired about it. Once again, the book was pressed into my hands, and it was demanded I read it. What a gem of a novel! In and out of chronological order, it tells the story of a Jesuit mission from Earth to explore an inhabited planet 17 light years away. The characters are spectacularly developed, and the story wonderfully told. Don't wait as long as I did to read it.

Racing Weight, by Matt Fitzgerald

This one's a bit of a guilty admittance, since it is essentially a weight loss book, and weight loss has such a strange stigma in our society. Every doctor I've ever had until now has either (1) told me I'm borderline overweight (because of that silly BMI nonsense, like that number matters more than the fact that I maintain a ridiculously healthy diet and lead a very active lifestyle), or (2) worried that I'm anorexic (because of my obsession with running...surely that level of enthusiasm for exercise must indicate mental illness, right?!) My doctor in Seattle is a triathlete, and for the first time ever, I have a doctor who isn't trying to diagnose imaginary problems with my body. She gets it! (It's kind of a coincidence, but not really, that of the hundreds if not thousands of doctors in this city, my trail running friend Elodie settled on the exact same one as me - both of us entirely independently of one another.) Anyway. With all that said, I do worry about my knees with all the running I do, and I also admit I have a secret pipe dream of being a semi-professional sponsored ultrarunner someday- and dropping a few pounds could certainly help on both those fronts. I am way, way over worrying about what I look like in a bikini or fitting into a certain size of pants...but I AM interested in being the best, most-injury-free runner I can be. This book is for me! Guidelines for weight loss and maintenance for endurance athletes just looking to perform at their best. Vashon 50K, here I come again.

Why We Run: A Natural History, by Bernd Heinrich

This is an interesting one. It used to be called "Racing the Antelope", which always caught my eye in the bookstore, because Seyeon and I have always nicknamed ourselves the Cheetah and the Antelope, respectively, when it comes to our running styles. Seyeon has these crazy muscles when she runs, and she can get into this powerful jet-sprinting mode that's almost scary intense (in an awesome way!) to watch. I tend to prance more, I suppose :P, when I run, light and happy and free like an antelope. Anyway, apparently the author got sued by some Phish fan turned author for supposedly ripping off the Antelope title, so he changed his book's title to "Why We Run." Bernd is both a biologist and an ultrarunner, so he tackles the subject of endurance from a biology standpoint, discussing all the unique qualities of various animals that allow them to be endurance athletes in their own ways - everything from camels to hummingbirds to frogs. It's kind of a meandering narrative, interspersed, too, with the author's own running anecdotes - but overall an enjoyable and educational read, if not a sometimes seemingly aimless one. Not done with it yet, so not sure yet whether I recommend it for sure - but certainly a fun, quirky read.

Poke the Box, by Seth Godin

This is a short read - for me, an impulsive Kindle buy that lasted about the duration of my light rail ride to the airport when I went to Salt Lake City a couple weeks ago - but a great one! I've become a big fan of Seth Godin's blog for daily common sense and business musings about the new information age economy. This book is just the latest in his prodigious list of published writings, but it's a good one - short, to the point, and totally motivating. How do programmers create things, Godin asks? They just write the code and see what happens, and keep tweaking it until it finally works; they poke the box. The world needs more people who start things, not just people who follow directions. We need innovators. We need people who aren't afraid to fail at things. And boy does Seth make me want to be one of them. Highly recommended, too. I shelled out the bucks to buy a print copy of it, too, to give as a gift, because if I've got one big complaint about the Kindle, it's that I can't turn around and immediately share with others what I've just read. Loaning my books to friends is on par pleasure-wise with procuring new ones for myself.

Well, I'm only 50% of the way through the list of books I wanted to write about, and it's definitely sleepytime now. Stay tuned for the other five soon. (And don't worry, they're not all running books...)

Getting my priorities straight

2011-03-08T23:31:00.000-08:00

Things I love: kitchens and bookcases.

Do I spend (much) money on clothes or cars or jewelry or beauty products or movies or music or TV or a fancy phone? Nope. But after a year of tracking my finances on Mint, I've noticed that the budget I'm willing to justify for books and kitchen supplies (appliances, groceries, and dishes all included) seems to be relatively sprawling.

I've also noticed that kitchens and bookcases are inevitably the places I gravitate toward when I'm in other people's homes - the nooks I find myself nosing around in to learn about other people. And when I notice the same book on the bookshelves of several different people I admire and respect, it's not long before I'm tracking it down at the library/Elliott Bay Books/Half Price/Amazon (my book distributors of choice, in no particular order; I think I do equal parts business at all four.)

So I've been reading David Allen's Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity (thanks, Tom and Brant.)

Me and Tom atop Mt. Si two weeks ago, having left Seattle at 5 a.m. with headlamps and snacks in tow to make it to the summit for sunrise!
Overall, the book is more corporate-jobby than is 100% relevant in my life right now - organizing my home office, ha! - but I've picked up a couple priceless concepts from it so far:

1. Stress comes from having "open loops" in your head. Getting them down on paper - every last one of them - clears up space in your head to relax and focus better, because you're not trying to juggle a hundred to-do's in the back of your mind at all times. I'm harnessing the power of the yellow notepad.

2. If anything on your to-do list will take less than two minutes to do, do it immediately. Amazing what a difference this simple change has already made for me!

I made a list of all the ongoing projects in my life - everything from specific work-related projects (the ONW website redesign, helping coordinate REI's annual running shoe expo) to school-related projects (designing a website for my comedian friend Quinn Patterson, applying for scholarships for next year) to ongoing self-education crusades (learning banjo, learning Dutch, learning PHP, learning about investments, learning about holistic wellness and alternative medicine, learning about social media and guerilla marketing) to strengthening personal relationships to training for ultramarathons to my ongoing book reading list to apartment maintenance to developing a freelance portfolio.

My Vision Board from a couple weeks ago.
It felt amazingly good to write it all down on paper. The process also reminded me of the five thousand or so blog entries that I haven't managed to write here yet but really want to! I know I tend to write disproportionately about running, the great outdoors in Washington state, and general life musings - and that makes sense, since those are largely the things that sustain my soul - but there are other unwritten entries itching to get out, too. In the works are: a serious food/cooking blog entry, a what I've been reading blog entry, a reflections on the Kindle blog entry, a music I've been listening to blog entry, a snowboarding in Salt Lake City blog entry, a 2011 bucket list entry, a gratitude blog entry, a tribute to good people in my life blog entry, an ode to my food processor blog entry, a tribute to my cat blog entry, a video blog featuring me on a snowboard and me playing banjo (not at the same time), and a likely-to-be-long-and-rambly blog entry reflecting on Sid, the lawyer I worked for one summer five years ago - a work experience that had a pretty profound effect in shaping the Me of today.

Beautiful footprints leading into the unknown.
Good God, it's a fascinating world we live in. Stay tuned.

Postscript: The following quote is painted in the employee stairwell at REI.

"Oh, let us always have a mountain within our soul with a peak so high that we never quite reach the top…for then we always strive for greater things and will not be content with merely climbing hills." - Ardath Rodale

She was and continues to be an inspiration to me. Indeed, let there always be a mountain within my soul!

Logic, linguistics, and long distance running: A professional vision

2011-02-17T21:23:00.000-08:00

Warning: Really meandering blog entry. Proceed with caution.

One month ago, I wrote about the concept of urgency, on feeling a deep sense of it in my own life and everything I want to accomplish.

Sometimes my enthusiasm and big thoughts tip that scale from a healthy, productive sense of urgency into full blown panic. That's kind of where I've been today...or maybe this week altogether. I've run-commuted (vs. walk-commuted) nearly everywhere because I've just felt excited about going places, about this idea of movement, of a life lived in motion.

Motion is powerful.

As some of you know (but probably most of you don't), I am part of a networking group in Seattle of professional women working in the outdoors industry. It is precisely my kind of networking group - i.e. the kind that I can show up to in jeans and running shoes, and where conversations center on the relationship between business and our natural environment, rather than the soulless crushing of one by the other. Tonight, we had an event that focused on creating Vision Boards, a fancy term for homemade inspiration collages. Yup, scissors and gluesticks and magazine cutouts were all included this evening (with blueberries and candied pecans and fancy cheeses to boot!)...definitely my kind of networking group.

I have probably made at least a dozen of these so-called Vision Boards in my life thus far. I made them in high school. I made mini-ones for my high school graduation announcements to get myself psyched up for college. Seyeon and I made one together for our door when we first roomed together at Oberlin.

It was really interesting making one again (photo forthcoming in a future entry, when I can get my camera and the giant poster board collage in the same place at once...), this time with a "professional" vision for myself, rather than just a personal one. Are they really so different, after all? Do they have to be?

Me atop Mt. Si yesterday, again, just a couple hours before class. It was snowy and wonderful!
The Vision Board I made tonight, predictably, had a lot of mountain and running imagery. The dominant word that others used to describe when looking at my finished collage was "calm". In contrast, the woman sitting next to me had phrases on hers about multitasking and squeezing into skinny jeans; I judge not, for I very nearly glued the phrase "tea-sipping hippie" on my own poster, so certainly, to each her own! We are all individuals, and appreciating the strength in our differences is what keeps this world turning.

So, while my current jobs do not pay me to run in the mountains (yet :P ), they do so indirectly; I get to talk to customers at REI about that passion when they're shopping for footwear to help them get out in the mountains more, and I get to turn around and write about it all, as well as my enduring love for the Pacific Northwest, for Outdoors NW. That's why, I suppose, when enrolling in school forced me to drop one of my three jobs, SAT tutoring (despite being the best-paying of all!) had to be the one to go. I've just met too many burnt-out, regret-ridden middle-aged folks to consider selling myself short in this life when it comes to choosing my career path.

Orcas Island: Foggy and beautiful as ever!
The trail work party and 25K run on Orcas Island earlier this month revved up my soul again in much-needed ways. Perhaps I'm adjusting to the Northwesterner-hibernation cycle, and thus am feeling especially motivated to get moving again after a long dreary winter (and yes, the cherry blossom trees are already blooming here!)...but truly, there are no more inspiring people to be around than trail runners. They're down-to-Earth, fun-loving people who appreciate the value of hard work, of giving their all for the sake of a greater goal...people with a hint of masochism in their determination to pull off what once seemed impossible, people who like to spend hours on end in the mountains, people who have come from all over the globe to be in the Pacific Northwest because a great trail run is never more than a few miles' dash from your doorstep. Friends I made at last year's race have run 100-milers in the meantime - while holding down full time jobs! There are no excuses in this life to not start getting to work on your dreams tomorrow - and not the Ephemeral Tomorrow, but the real life, starting-in-a-few-more-hours Tomorrow.

Anyway. Ultimately, no, my "professional" vision is not that different from my personal one. I keep going back to the Howard Thurman quote I included on my blog a few months ago: "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive."

You know what's crazy? Of all the classes I've been taking for my web design program, my absolute favorite, hands down, has been my Javascript programming class. I love it. Like really, really, really LOVE it. Way, way more than my artsy design-based courses, and - well, that was unexpected. Seriously, you couldn't pay me enough right now to work on my upcoming "visual design studies" assignment - essentially, a layout design in Photoshop or Illustrator with color, images, typography, etc. Stuff I thought I'd really enjoy, but instead, have felt myself surprisingly bored and restless with. But you know what I just might do when I'm done writing this blog entry? Put on a pot of tea, turn up some Alexi Murdoch, and get cracking on my programming homework from class just a few hours ago. Why? Because I'm still riding out the feverish high I get twice a week from the learning and discovery that happens in that classroom. I love it.

Last month, I officially completed (and was paid for, woohoo!) my first web development project - a small contract project for someone I met in school, to code a website for a small business analytics company, for whom visual design prototypes had already been created. Essentially, I was given a PDF file with 10 pages or so to turn into a working website. I had a blast with the nitty-gritty of troubleshooting code, and not having to worry about visual design at all.

Hence the panic. Here I have invested five months already in school, on track in a program I'm no longer confident is the perfect one for me. Earlier today, I was drooling over curriculum descriptions in both the Web Development (more back-end programming for the web) and the Computer Programming certificate programs. Five months, of course, is only a drop in the hat of a lifetime - and 23 is still plenty young enough to be "figuring out what I want to do with my life." I know, I know; people are still doing this at 30, 40, 65...and I probably still will be then, too!

The loyal Lion that I am (and remain to be, thank you very much!), I still plan to finish the web design program - but it doesn't mean I'm not sneaking chapters at night in the PHP book I bought on the side for my own personal interest, or considering extending my current educational plan to encompass more programming. I feel as though I've been blind to the fact that in addition to my obvious love for words, I also have a powerful affinity for math and logic. The fact that when I was still tutoring for Kaplan, I enjoyed teaching the math sections more than the verbal should have been a tip-off, I suppose.

Mmm, warm fuzzies...
Our society draws this huge line between math and creative writing, like they're polar opposites, but...they're not. They're both left-brained pursuits. They're both problem-solving, in their own ways; either I'm staring at my mess of code on Aptana, trying to find the solution to make my webpage act the way I want it to, or I'm staring at my mess of words on WriteRoom, trying to find the solution to make an article or blog entry convey the meaning and emotions the way I want them to. Either way, I'm working on a jigsaw puzzle of words and characters, trying to arrange them in some meaningful way. Both are languages, to which you can devote a lifetime trying to harness and master the power of; both involve the translation of an idea or image in my head into something tangible to present to the world.

I can even still retain my Grammar Nazi ways in the world of code...in fact, the importance of differentiating between semicolons and commas, between capital letters and lowercase ones, is 10X more important in code than it is in creative writing! At least in English, people still understand the gist of what you were trying to communicate; computers do not. Browsers crash completely on you, sometimes, if you forget a semicolon. It's beautiful.

Of course, I have other passions, too, that must be fed, must someday be combined in an ultimately fulfilling mix of work and hobby:
(...and on that note, why that phrase "work/life balance"? Must those two be at odds with one another? I should hope not...)
- Creative nonfiction
- New media journalism
- Photography
- Meeting new people
- Trail running
- Snowboarding
- Endurance sports
- Clean eating
- Holistic health
- Yoga
- Universalizing financial education
- Leadership
- Coaching and empowerment
- Entrepreneurship
- Web app development
- Business psychology
- World travel
- Macroeconomics
- Small scale agriculture
- Helping others
- Changing the world

Haven't quite stumbled on all those lumped together in one job description yet, but I'll keep my eye out... ;) *

*Obligatory footnote to my bosses: Jamie, Carolyn, Greg...the wink is for y'all. Don't worry; if it wasn't already clear from the rest of this entry, I am content with my current work situation!

Who needs a car to get around anyway?

2011-02-11T00:34:00.000-08:00

A life in the day (a.k.a. evidence of the Crazy.)

6:00 a.m. Alarm clock
6:15 a.m. Cook/enjoy breakfast (blueberry/banana oatmeal on the stove, yummy)
7:00 -7:20 a.m. Run 1.5 miles to work
7:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Princess shift at work
12:30 - 12:45 p.m. Speed shopping, REI clearance
12:45 - 1:15 p.m. Walk 2 miles to meet Seyeon for soulful lunch
1:15-3:00 p.m. Amazing catch up lunch!
3:00 p.m. Run 1 mile home
3:15-4:00 p.m. Do homework for evening class
4:00-5:20 p.m. Sweet urban sunset 6ish mile run with Jenica and Lauren
5:20 -7:00 p.m. Cook/enjoy dinner with Lauren
7:10 - 7:30 p.m. Walk 1 mile to class, talk to Alan
7:30-9:00 p.m. Programming class
9:00 p.m. Run 2 miles into downtown
9:30 - midnight - Sweet Luc & the Lovingtons concert at the Crocodile with Zoe
midnight - 12:20 p.m. Dishes, apartment pick up
12:40 a.m. Drinking hot roiboos tea with milk and honey, listening to beautiful folk, blogging, feeling quite content

Total human-powered miles: 13.5

Yesterday, I did all my errands on my bike - library, post office, and grocery shopping. Loaded up the paniers with tons of fruits and vegetables and grains, and soaked up every drop of sunshine that Seattle had to offer yesterday...delightful. One of the things I loved about Amsterdam was how easy it was to navigate by bike or foot...and it's one of the big draws Seattle had for me as well. Having my car here makes me lazier (and poorer...gas here is at $3.37/gallon, oof), sometimes, than I'd like. (Thanks, Seyeon, for being a huge inspiration of late in the ways of human-powered urban transportation!) Getting around Seattle on foot or bike is one of my February projects...expect forthcoming blog entries on such.

That, and a report on my past two glorious weekends up on Orcas Island! But for now...

G'night, good world.

Midday mountain fix

2011-02-01T22:54:00.000-08:00

My day yesterday:

6 hour work shift
2 hours running up and down a mountain
4 hours of school
Late night grocery shopping
Zzz...

Heaven. It was a tightly scheduled day, and I was ten minutes late to class. Ten minutes is, without coincidence, also how long I saw at the top of Mount Si, basking in the sun and solitude and fresh air, looking out over epic views of Rainier and the valley 4,000 feet below me.

Even for my punctuality-driven self, this moment was worth my tardiness to school.
Still can't get over it...sitting on a mountain peak at 3:30 p.m., sitting in a classroom back in Seattle an hour and a half later. I love this state.

And I'd forgotten how much I love running up and down mountains. I'll find the time to write more about my past weekend at Orcas Island, which prompted me to recall the extent of that love, but the time is not tonight...must sleep.

Cheaper than therapy

2011-01-27T22:00:00.000-08:00

So, I've been struggling with something unusual and fairly disturbing lately...

Feeling bored while running!

My gosh. To my friends out there who frequently tell me I'm crazy and they have no idea why I enjoy running, I think I finally understand you. I have no idea what to blame for this unprecedented emotion, but the vast majority of my runs recently have just felt...dull. And mostly me just thinking about wanting to be done. Tired feet, tired body, feeling like I'm just dragging it through the motions. And resentful that I have some big races in the next few months (starting next weekend!) that I have to train for, so just not running if I don't feel like it is not really an option; I'm committed to those races.

Okay, maybe I have some theories:

1. I've been running in shoes that I've put over 1,000 miles on. Footwear faux pas/fail...and I should know better.
2. I've been running almost exclusively on pavement around the city, rather than out on trails in the mountains.
3. I made a New Year's resolution to run more regularly; not necessarily more miles overall, but changing my running habits from 1-2 ridiculously long (10-25 mile) runs/week to 3-4 shorter (3-7 mile) runs/week + the occasional longer one. The problem is that my runs usually don't start feeling good until 7 or 8 miles in...the first few miles always hurt and make me wonder why I do this to myself again and again. But then, inevitably, I hit my stride, my runner's high, and it all comes flooding back to me, and I can't wait to do it all over again. But of course, ridiculously long runs take ridiculously large swaths of available daylight hours - of which there are few these days, between work, school and January in Seattle.

Nevertheless, it's been bothering me a lot. Running gives me energy and pride and identity. Running makes me feel strong. Running is cheaper than a gym membership and cheaper than therapy. Running lets me eat whatever the heck I want and not worry about it. Running has helped me get to know Seattle in and out - its multitude of diverse neighborhoods, its parks and canals and bridges, its "backcountry" trails, its hidden public stairways, its best mountain views, its prettiest places to watch sunsets, its most hardcore hills, its nicest waterfront areas, cafes and bistros and independent shops tucked away in residential areas to go back and explore later. Running has romanticized the city for me in so many ways. (That's thanks to Amsterdam, the city which truly made me fall in love with running..., and where I learned the joys of exploring cities by (fleet!) foot.)

I don't want to be bored with running!

Fortunately, I've had a couple good runs this past week that have given me back some confidence. Maybe I do just need to rescind that New Year's Resolution, because the good ones were both 2+ hour runs, while all the meh-runs have been the much shorter ones. (This is why I always tell non-runner friends: If you don't like running, the solution is to do it more! The more you run, the more fun it gets.) One of the stellar, ah-I-DO-still-enjoy-this runs was at Cougar Mountain, my first serious trail run in a good while. It was raining, and the rain fell increasingly harder as the hours passed. I ran through so many washed out trails and mud puddles, and was soaked and chilled to the bone at the end of it - but deliriously happy! I felt like myself again: rejuvenated, alive, content.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep...
Then today, I planned a long urban run between work and class - one of my favorite routes around the city, starting in Belltown, running alongside Lake Union, through Fremont, along the ship canal trail (so reminiscent of Amsterdam - bikes and drawbridges included!), through Magnolia, around my favorite loop trail around the wild Discovery Park with stunning waterfront views of the Olympic Mountains, then back and to Gasworks Park for a good skyline view, and around the east side of Lake Union again. Did 17 solid miles today, and took the following set of cell phone pictures of all the reasons running was not boring today.

The sun finally crept out from under the clouds.

Bald eagle(s) sighting! See if you can see the pair of them hanging out in the tree. Seeing them in the wild out here still stops me in my tracks, every time.

Sunset reflected on Lake Union, with Space Needle in the fuzzy background. No colors digitally altered here in any way. It truly was spectacular.

So, I guess I'm still a runner.

Whew.

Are we home yet?

2011-01-25T22:30:00.000-08:00

(From my journal) August 31, 2009 - "I think I underestimated how lonely a new city can be...starting from scratch. Meeting new people who are all nice and friendly, but really just missing the close friends of my past, doubting if I'll ever be able to forge those kinds of connections anew again...
"Home" is so lost and distorted for me by now, with pieces of myself scattered across two continents and more cities than I can count, in the hearts of so many people I've met along the way. I just have to have faith that this place will work out, too; it just may take awhile."

I find myself coming back to the theme of home again and again in my writing. (It's been nearly two years since the last time I wrote about home, so I figure it's time again.) I've been reflecting on it a lot lately, because I've now been in Seattle a full year and a half, I am training new hires at REI (many of whom, like myself, are Midwest transplants), and I have begun to have friends who've come to Seattle even more recently than myself.

What a pleasure, finally, to feel like I have a good grasp on this place, that I no longer have to print out Mapquest directions to get to somewhere else in the city, that I can share my favorite cafes and restaurants and parks with newcomers, and above all, that I have cultivated the kinds of friendships here I feel are going to be friendships for life.

It took some time, though. Even with Alan here with me, and Seyeon in Seattle when I first arrived, the first few months (and then some) were often hard. Despite the excitement of being somewhere new that I felt confident would someday feel like home, the truth was that it didn't right away - far from it.

October 2, 2009 - "I took a shower in hopes that it would feel cleansing and rejuvenating, and it did, sort of...but mostly I just rubbed my eyes in frustration, feeling the hot water beading up on my back, and imagining myself years down the road when I'll look back on this time in my life and remember how lonely the city used to make me feel once upon a time. Cities ARE lonely. I'm so in love with this place, but what of it without Seyeon? I miss Ohio."

Am I homesick for Kansas? I get asked this. I have the same reaction that I see from many other new arrivals in Seattle when asked if they miss where they came from - a sort of scrunched up face, then: "I miss my family. And friends. But otherwise, no, not at all."

Don't get me wrong. I feel grateful for where I grew up - in a nice house in a beautiful neighborhood, across the street from woods and a creek and a hundred continuous miles of forested bike path, within walking distance of my elementary school and Chipotle and a Starbucks-knockoff coffeeshop, with a pond and waterfall and huge old trees in my backyard.

Me + Kansas = Home, Version 1.0. (Photo by Kelly Anderson.)
I regret that I ever found amusement in the bumper sticker "Kansas: As Bigoted As You Think It Is" (a play on Kansas' admittedly silly state motto, "Kansas: As Big As You Think It Is" (what? Coast People can't even point to Kansas on a map; they have no preconceived notion of its bigness...and even if they did, since when is "Big" a sought-after quality?))*, because in spite of a few intolerant people I grew up going to school with, there's no use in perpetuating unproductive stereotypes.

Truth be told, Midwesterners are great, and I maintain a fondness, and even protectiveness, in my heart for my home state despite my lack of desire to ever move back. I'll defend Kansas if you're Coast People and make flyover jokes. I am offended when you think Kansas and Ohio are next to each other. I get excited when I see KU bumper stickers on cars out here. Many of my favorite people in Seattle are from the Midwest (mostly Iowa!); I fell in love harder with Ohio while at Oberlin than I did California while I was at Stanford; I brought my born-and-raised-Midwesterner boyfriend out here with me. Yes, I feel an ache in my heart for wraparound porches and big skies and affordable houses and all-you-can-eat buffets and feeling safe running alone at night.

Me + Ohio = Home-like love, but not lifelong home-like love
But with all that said, I feel deep, deep in my soul that the Pacific Northwest is home for me. It's been a gradual settling in to this place, an exercise in patience, in finding my groove, in training my body to love running hills, in learning to take Vitamin D supplements to help make it through the gray blanket of winter. I thoroughly enjoyed the honeymoon phase while it lasted, and now am warm with the enduring comfort and affection I feel on the other side of that. I get to relive that discovery and share it with new Seattle arrivals, while ultimately appreciating the way Seattle has, for me, developed the ragged Realness I learned about once upon a time from the Velveteen Rabbit - the kind that's brought about only by real love, and never goes away.

Me + Washington state = Definite home-like love
Those of us that chose to move here, we were all drawn to the Northwest for different reasons. Nevertheless, there is a single and persistent thread that's brought so many of us out here, and it's one that can weave a home for anyone who simply has the patience.

May 3, 2009 - "I feel connected again, and a part of this world! So many times since I've moved here, Seattle has felt big and lonely and maybe not the right place for me after all - and nothing is scarier than wanting to crawl back into your own cocoon, into something familiar and safe again, only to realize that that home base has disappeared and you've no choice but to squint into the sunlight, spread your wings and fly. But today, right now, Seattle feels like home."

The lonely entries tapered off and ceased altogether a long time ago; it's hard to even identify with them anymore. Nearly a year since that last one, I feel content and comfortable here as though I have, in fact, spent my whole life delicately tucked between the Pacific Ocean and the Cascade Mountains, nestled next to Puget Sound, living where the highway signs point to either Vancouver or Portland, and I feel darn lucky to be sandwiched in what seems to me to be pretty much the greatest place on Earth. I am grateful for all that this city has given me in the past year and a half. Thank you, Seattle! I'm still in love with you.

*With apologies for the double parentheses. Annoying, I know. Couldn't help it.

On the unfolding conundrum of life

2011-01-17T10:09:00.000-08:00

I have been woefully inattentive to my blog of late - but not for lack of having things to write about, but rather the opposite...too much! Too many adventures! Too many ideas! I've had the hardest time sleeping lately, because my mind has been overactive since the start of the new year.

I love new years. Metaphorical or not, new beginnings are powerful places from which to draw out change, to make new commitments, to drop old ones that aren't working anymore. December 31 is always a catalyst for me, and this year was no different.

As I sat down a couple weeks ago to write my annual epic New Years journal entry (a tradition I have kept steadily for one full decade now), I reflected on 2010 - its triumphs, its ground-breaking or otherwise memorable moments, its times of transition, and the unfortunate few things that persistently stressed me out a lot! As is my tradition, I try to turn as much of my rambling year-end commentary into productive insight and fodder for a better year ahead. My overarching conclusions for this time around?

I'm proud and invigorated by many aspects of 2010:
- holding down several jobs that have both given me great pleasure and taught me infinitely about myself, the way I relate to others, and the business of life
- traveling to do what I love: meeting new people, taking photographs, and writing stories
- taking on a new level of commitment to long distance running that carried me to many beautiful mountains, trails, and islands in pursuit of the runner's high
- taking the time and energy not only to go back to school but also to figure out what continuing education program would truly stir my soul (and then going for it!)
- making the most of this beautiful city and state I live in, and not taking this landscape for granted
- focusing new energy and investing in my personal health and wellness
- cutting down on the turnover in my life that practically defined it during my college years...i.e. thoroughly enjoying the fact that I am still living in the same apartment, with the same wonderful person, enjoying the same amazing friends, working for the same great people, and waking up each morning to the same mountain range on the horizon, that I was last year. Three cheers for the first full year in nearly a decade that I haven't MOVED.

...but for all the good, there have been things at which I can do better, too. My number one priority for 2011 is to stress less. It's really been spectacular, reflecting now, how quick I've been to develop huge amounts of anxiety over the most mundane things. I didn't always used to be this way. If I trace it back, I think it generally goes back to senior year of college, the first year I tried to balance school, work, AND single-handedly organizing a community 5K race in Oberlin. While the school/work balance would have been okay, the race-directing thing pushed me over the brink of acceptable stress levels, because for the first time in my life, I felt that there could be no relaxing; if I had a moment to relax, it needed to be devoted to something productive. And I haven't really managed to get off the Efficiency Train since, which, though sometimes useful, generally moves too fast for its own good...

What stressing less looks like:
(or)
Excuses to share a few photos from recent months with my non-Facebook friends:

At my good friends Cam and Avey's wedding in October

80s-themed holiday work party.

First foray into winter hiking, Washington-style

Snowboarding for the first time in Washington! Mt. Baker

Snowshoeing on Christmas

Me and the parrot, hanging out at home.

So, not only for my sake, but for the sake of friends and loved ones around me who have occasionally suffered, too, at the hand of my stress levels, I am committing to stop that nonsense in 2011. This will mean: less perfectionism, less procrastinating, and less pressure on myself. (Out with the P's!) So far, so good.

With that said, I will NOT let go of the urgency I feel in my daily life - the urgency to get to work on the things that matter in this world - so that when I leave this Earth, expectedly or unexpectedly, 70 years from now or tomorrow, I can leave in peace with the confidence and knowledge that I did everything in my power to leave this place better than I found it. It is on that note that I will bring in the holiday, and take this moment in the blogosphere to reflect on the man we remember, honor, and celebrate today.

I am borrowing the following quote from Seth Godin's blogpost today - and Seth Godin, of course, borrowed these words from Martin Luther King, Jr. How powerful words are when their relevance transcends the boundaries of era or generation. The urgency King speaks of is what makes great leaders, and it is what I will continually strive for in my own life as well.

"We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood -- it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, "Too late." - MLK

2011

2011-01-04T08:02:00.000-08:00

Snowshoeing in the mountains.

Future string band.

Sunrise this morning.
I can feel it in my bones; it's going to be a good year.

(More regular blogging to resume soon.)

I choose bliss

2010-12-03T16:56:00.001-08:00

Dumb: Going for a long meandering run in a t-shirt and shorts in 40-degree weather, with no water or energy gels, in unfamiliar neighborhoods, and for nearly twice as long as the vast majority of my runs for the past half year.

Blissful: Running toward a stunningly silhouetted Mt. Rainier, plowing up and barreling down huge hills, getting utterly lost in unfamiliar neighborhoods, and listening to beautiful bluegrass music while at it.

Perception is everything.

Either way, warming back up with tonight's Vitamix blender creation = Unarguably blissful.

Yummy Thai pumpkin soup

My first juice fast

2010-12-02T22:57:00.000-08:00

From my blog entries here to the new kitchen appliances to my raw food musings and experiments to the dinner parties I've been sharing with many of you lately, it's clear that I've had food on my mind a lot lately! I've been cooking much more than ever before in my life, as the new blender and juicer have amped up my confidence to buy copious amounts of produce at the grocery store. If I can't find a way to prepare it (I've lost every single eggplant I've ever purchased this way...*sigh*), I can always just toss it in the blender!

My reading list has also been pretty heavy on the food and diet spectrum lately:

So, I've been toying a lot lately with the idea of doing a juice fast. I have, undoubtedly, a ridiculous sweet tooth, and I often eat beyond the point of satiated comfort. (Why do you think I run so much?) Incorporating green smoothies into my morning routine has already helped me cut out coffee completely and maintain steady energy levels, even without ample sleep. I recently talked with one of my coworkers who juice fasted for an entire month, and saw huge health and energy benefits because of it.

Well, I decided yesterday to stop toying with the fasting idea, and just go ahead and try it - just a 24-hour one. I had dinner around 5 p.m. last night, went to school, went to bed, woke up, made a big glass of my Unpalatable Chlorophyll Juice and several mason jars to go, went for a 5.5 mile run, drank some more juice, walked to work, drank more juice after my shift, walked to school, sat in class for 3.5 hours (which took me into the 25th hour of my fast and beyond!), then walked home. And...ta-da, I felt great! No real hunger bothers or rumbling stomach or anything. Some cravings, sure, but those happen even when my mouth is already full of food and chewing, so I can't blame it on the fasting. Being out of the house and away from food all day certainly made it easier. Overall, it was much less of a big deal than I thought it would be.

Unpalatable Chlorophyll Juice in action: the last swig in my mason jar.
My run was especially excellent. I'm sure running (and doing sprints at the end!) are not what you're supposed to do while fasting for the first time. It would up being about 29 hours total with food...honestly, probably the longest stretch of time I've ever gone without food in my whole life. Even fasting for Ramadan with my host family in Turkey was only a 16-hour fast or so...though there was no juice or water then. But you know what? I'll trust my body's intuition over someone else's opinions any day - and I've felt great all day long.

I considered briefly extending the fast through tomorrow since I felt so good...but ultimately decided against it, not wanting to get ahead of myself. Went grocery shopping instead - which is definitely a crazy idea when you haven't eaten all day long. I must have looked at least mildly ravenous, because in spite of my modest $53 grocery bill, the checkout guy who was scanning my food said, "Dang girl, you must have been hungry today!" Fresh apple slices with Trader Joe's Blue Stilton cheese was a most excellent way to ease out of my fast.

Postscript.
And now, because I failed to post this when it was timely...why you shouldn't try to drive your car in Seattle when it snows:

Seek and you shall find.

2010-11-29T21:45:00.000-08:00

This is about ice cream, and some other things.

Today was a long day. I left home at 6:30 a.m., made a quick pit stop at home again in the late afternoon to shovel down some mashed potatoes and an English muffin, and between work, school, and picking up new tabs for my car, didn't come home again until 9:30 at night. 15 hours makes for a long day.

But you can bet I'm appreciating my couch, my music, my cat, and my pint of pumpkin ice cream now.

Pumpkin ice cream, in fact, was all I could think about for the majority of my evening. I considered going to Trader Joe's after class, but it was pretty out of my way; QFC has better produce, and I also needed some greens for my morning Unpalatable Chlorophyll Juice.

I scanned the ice cream freezers long and hard for pumpkin ice cream, almost to no avail. The cases of Ben 'n Jerry's and Haagen Dazs both failed me utterly; no pumpkin anywhere. I thought I was going to have to settle for a vat of Edy's low-fat pumpkin stuff when suddenly my eyes landed on a modest little pint of pumpkin custard ice cream from a local company, Snoqualmie Gourmet. + On sale. + I got the last pint.

Fate, no doubt.

It's the second time recently that I've walked into a store with a very deliberate idea in mind of what I want to walk out with, and the universe has worked in my favor. Last time was an impulsive nighttime venture to Elliot Bay Books in the hopes of walking out with a new novel. I had a really specific sort of book in mind for myself, and I spent a good hour browsing, reading book jackets and first pages, and nothing seemed to be speaking to me.

I'd just about given up when I cycled back to the original table of bargain books I'd been browsing and my eyes lit upon the One. (I'm about 70 pages in, and it's wonderful so far.)

So often, it can feel as though the universe is conspiring against us.

But I'm trying, more and more, to consciously acknowledge and appreciate it when it's not - which, honestly, is most of the time. After all...I do not have cancer! I have no broken bones! I'm on good terms (I think) with everybody in my life! My car did not break down today! I did not get in any accidents! While traffic was frustrating, and my schedule exhausting, and getting new car tabs a hassle, I have a home, and a job (or 3ish), and a vehicle, and I can afford to go to school. I did not lose anything important today. So many horrible things didn't happen to me today!

There ARE, in fact, things - good things - that have happened to me, things I should be writing about: the glorious ten days in a row Alan and I got to spend together, the plethora of amazing dinner parties attended and hosted this week, Thanksgiving awesomeness at Seyeon and Andrea's lake house, the crazy snowstorm and the giant car accident pile up on our icy hill of a street, the amazing snowy hike Jeff and Kate and I did a couple weeks ago, the usual Seattle love stuff...

...but it'll wait for another time. Tomorrow's a (more modest) 12 hour day, but I need my sleep. Good night, good world!

Running Meets Politics: 300 mile foot races vs. changing the world

2010-11-15T16:50:00.000-08:00

When I was at Oberlin, I got to attend free speeches, lectures, and performances by famous people all the time. (Toni Morrison, Michael Pollan, Newt Gingrich, Jerry Springer,etc...) Once you're no longer paying great sums annually into the system, however, there are fewer "free" perks. However, every now and then, I still luck out.

This week at REI, we had our annual all-store meeting. Some ambitious soul recruited world-famous ultramarathoner Dean Karnazes to speak at it. Again, I realize that for most people, "famous runner" is sort of an oxymoron, and the vast majority of you won't even recognize the name. (I know Natalie will, though! What Would Ultramarathon Man Do?) However, a short list of Dean's accolades: Ran 350 miles nonstop without rest or sleep, Ran 50 marathons in 50 states on 50 consecutive days, Ran a marathon at the South Pole in -40 degrees F, Voted one of Outside Magazine's Ultimate Top 10 Outdoor Athletes, Voted one of the GQ's Best Bodies of the Year in 2004, Winner of the 2004 Badwater Ultramathon (135 miles through Death Valley in the middle of July), etc etc etc.

He's been called "The Perfect Human."
The gist of his motivational speech to all of us was that what he does isn't so miraculous after all; it's just a matter of yearning to test his own limits.

Whenever I go for more than a few weeks or months without running a lot, I forget how much I love it. I forget how good it makes me feel, how simple it makes the world seem, and how much my mind and body alike appreciate me for treating them. I forget the surge of creative energy and flow that comes when I run, and I forget the natural high I get, and I forget, most of all, what a perfect metaphor running is for everything in life.

I've always said that I could probably be a fiscal conservative, under one condition: that how hard one works actually corresponds with how much money one makes. (A terribly gross oversimplification of my political beliefs and interpretation of the world, but allow it to suffice for now.) In such a "perfect world", it's easy to get behind the idea of straightforward economic incentives to motivate people to contribute to society, in whatever way they best can.

On a tangential but related note, my favorite quote find of the week, on the Facebook profile of a Seattle ultrarunner I met briefly at my Vashon Island run..."Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive." - Howard Thurman.

Anyway. Distance running is that "perfect world." Dean summed it up yesterday when he gave his tongue-in-cheek demonstration in response to the question "How do you run 300 miles without stopping?" He sort of did a little jog across the room in front of all of us and said, "That's pretty much it. Except instead of stopping, you just keep doing it until you've gone 300 miles."

Me smiling at the end of my first ultra!
In the world of distance running, anyone can excel. It doesn't matter if you're big, small, long-legged, short-legged, old, young, male, female, have a high V02 max or not, whatever...you see 55-year-old women kicking 25-year-old men's butts at ultramarathons. The only things that matter are: how hard you trained, how well you fueled your body, and how hard you pushed yourself mentally during the race. Sure, injuries and weather and other minor unpredictables can happen and throw you off course, but for the most part, there is a direct correlation between how hard you work and how successful you are. The playing ground is level, how much time you're willing to devote to make yourself great corresponds with how far you're able to go, and ultimately, anyone can win.

I'm finding myself more and more confused about how close or far our American society, as it stands right now, is from mirroring that world of "anyone can win." How level is the playing field? So many important people in my life, all whose opinions I value and trust, have completely different answers to that question. How much more level is the playing ground than fifty years ago? How much more level should it be? And how do we get there?

Big questions without easy answers. As opposed to...Q: "How do I get better at running?" A: "Run more."

I wish the world were like running: simple and easy to navigate. The path to running success is long, but at least it's clear cut. The path to other goals is so much trickier to identify and get started on. Seyeon, for example, wants to design and implement an entirely new school system for adolescents. I want to be a better asset to this world and use my words to help people feel more connected and understood, less isolated and hopeless. America wants to stay true to its founding ideals and ensure every one of its citizens is given the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Where do you even start with such goals? If you want to run a marathon, the first step is a literal one; you pick yourself up off the couch and put one foot in front of the other. And you keep going. I sure wish I could figure out the first step on all the other things I'd like to change about our world...

Monday Night Thanks

2010-11-08T21:45:00.001-08:00

A short list of things I feel grateful for:
(Note: Just things. If I included people, the list could go on forever.)

1. Pandora
2. WriteRoom
3. Dark, leafy greens
4. Public libraries
5. Mountains
6. Tulsi tea
7. Autumn leaves in Seattle
8. Paper and pen games
9. Open source projects
10. Audio books
11. Freezers
12. Fresh air
13. Mint.com
14. The entire Adobe Creative Suite
15. Yellow notepads
16. Merino wool socks
17. Groupon
18. Rosemary (the herb)
19. Sunny November days
20. UTNE Reader magazine

ZOOM ZOOM goes the rocket over the elephant shooting ants out of its nose!

2010-11-06T17:18:00.000-07:00

Weekends are lovely. Why did I ignore this fact for my first year in Seattle?

More FoodBlog! Homemade raw broccoli/zucchini hummus.
Yesterday, James and I trekked down to Burien to cash in LivingSocial deal coupons we'd purchased months ago for hourlong massages. We spent the rest of the afternoon having various adventures in Ballard, at Grocery Outlet (duh), and just hanging out at my apartment, watching the latest Office episode on Hulu (five years and counting since I've lived with a TV), listening to bluegrass and cooking stuff. Dinnertime brought new guests, and the five of us had a lovely evening of butternut squash soup, fresh bread, vegetables with various hummus dips - homemade and otherwise, wine, chocolate truffles, and pumpkin cookies to round it all out.

Who recognizes the table?
We all stayed up until well into the wee hours of the morning playing games - everything from Balderdash to a paper-and-pens game that Leo suggested. As he explained it, I didn't think I'd played it before; everybody sits in a circle, and each person has a sheet of paper. You make up one narrative sentence, write it down, then pass your sheet to the right. Then everybody has to illustrate the sentence they've been passed. Then you fold the sheet over so that only the illustration appears (and the original sentence is hidden), and pass again. Now everyone writes a sentence to describe the illustration they're handed. And folds it so only the sentence appears, and passes again. And so forth.

Essentially, the game is like telephone, on paper. The worse of an artist you are, the better, and the more ridiculous the sentence becomes as it gets passed around and altered with each new rendition. We were down to four people by then, so each sheet only got a few passes, but it was still amusing. My original sentence evolved as such:

Elodie and I continued the excellence of food tradition today with a lazy morning around the apartment, baking banana bread, drinking Dutch chocolate milk and green smoothies (grapes + pineapple + peaches + banana + kale + cucumber today), and making a scrumptious egg scramble with all the orphan veggies in my fridge, plus goat cheese. Delicious!

So here's the funny thing...and the real point of this blog entry in this first place...(aside from reveling in how awesome my friends are, and how nice it is to relax together over delicious food)...so also last night, after playing Leo's game, I went digging through my personal filing system and found a sheet of paper I'd saved from one time when I'd played what I remembered as a similar game to the one Leo proposed. It was, in fact, the exact same game, and one that Seyeon and I had played six years ago at Stanford, when we'd just met each other. And guess what? My story sentence back then was eerily similar to the one I wrote last night:

Six years later, apparently I'm still fascinated with abused, down-on-their-luck anteaters.

Who wants to psychoanalyze me?

For the love of vegetables

2010-11-04T10:18:00.000-07:00

I feel long overdue for a food blog entry. It's been about six months since my last food/cooking frenzy, and given that a lot of big things have been happening in my kitchen lately, I feel like it's time.

My grocery hauls have been really colorful lately!
Exactly two years ago, Seyeon and I took a fall break trip to Austin, Texas together. She was interested in scoping it out for grad school and future living, and I went along for the ride. Given that we were both wrapped up in our busy lives prior to the trip (I was in the final stretch before the 5K that I'd organized and stressed out of my mind about it), we had no time to plan anything, including where we'd stay once we got there. We found a decent hostel for the first couple nights, and from there, coordinated a couple homes to stay in after that via couchsurfing.com. FANTASTIC website.

Our first couchsurfing host was a guy named David Ansel, who'd started his own soup-making-and-delivery business in Austin, The Soup Peddler. Our next couchsurfing host was the self-proclaimed "Team Sprout" - three young, enthusiastic raw foodists who hosted us for a craft night and a board game night and made us delicious raw food and smoothies to take with us on our daily adventures around the city. The three of them - Kaye, Chris, and Kristy - have been in both Seyeon's and my mind since we visited Austin for the first time, and their introducing us to the raw foods lifestyle irreversibly piqued our interest.

A quick overview on raw foods: essentially, a 100% raw diet (though many raw foodists will only maintain a 70% or 80% raw diet) excludes anything that's been heated above 116 degrees Fahrenheit. The theory behind is it that heating foods above 116 changes the actual chemical structure of the food, introducing carcinogens, zapping nutrients, and essentially killing the life energy out of the food. There are countless stories of people reversing cancer, heart disease, Type 1 diabetes, and various otherwise life-threatening, degenerative diseases by switching to a raw foods diet. People report soaring energy levels, because their digestive system no longer requires huge amounts of energy to break down weighty, nutrient-depleted foods. It's like veganism on steroids; not only no meat or dairy, but no cooked grains (only sprouted ones) either. Even coffee and tea is technically not considered raw. ("Sun tea", in which herbs are left to steep in a cup of water in direct sunlight, is permissible.) No bread, no oatmeal, nothing pasteurized.

Of course, there's nothing practical about being raw in our modern society. Virtually nothing at restaurants fits the bill; you have to pack all your own food when you travel or go anywhere; our culture is truly built around cooked food and the sharing of it, and people will think you're crazy. Raw food is extreme, yes. But if you all could meet Kaye and Chris and Kristy in Austin, you'd want to give raw foods a try, too; you couldn't meet happier, kinder, more energetic souls in your life.

Don't worry; I haven't totally gone off the deep end with it yet. But I have been fascinated with raw foods over the past two years, and am trying to incorporate more raw foods into my daily diet. Finally having a powerful juicer and blender on my kitchen counter has made a huge difference. Already, just with incorporating juiced greens and green smoothies into my morning routine, I've entirely cut my dependency on or cravings for coffee. I switched to black tea for awhile, but now, I don't even need that. Some blended kale or spinach with fresh fruit really gets me going first thing in the morning.

A huge thanks to Alan for the juicer (birthday present!) that got me from just thinking and reading about raw foods to putting it into action in my daily life and seeing what happened. The 2-horsepower Vita Mix blender was a present to myself, with help from both Elodie and my mom, who contributed to my ongoing "blender fund" that's been pending since that trip to Austin. Amusingly, it was a sentence from Leo Babauta's "The Power of Less" that convinced me to get it - something about how if you think you really want something, to wait 30 days, and only if you still want it then, to go ahead and buy it. I realized I've been telling everybody in my life about how much I want a Vita Mix for two years now, so it was just time.

Here are a few of my raw food experiments so far:

Raw guacamole

Raw corn chowder (yup, cool soup...surprisingly good)

Green smoothie: Before.

Green smoothie: After.

So am I giving up on cooked food altogether just yet? Absolutely not. I just ordered a ton of yummy organic groceries from Spud.com, via a fantastic Groupon deal...so yesterday, when I got home from school, two giant bins of produce and loaves of bread and chocolate milk and fancy cheeses and hazelnut granola and locally made pumpkin cookie dough were awaiting me.

I've tried to do a few days of eating 100% raw, and my body wasn't happy about it. A lot of raw foodists would argue that my body sees cooked food as a drug, and trying to quit it cold turkey will elicit withdrawal symptoms...who knows? Otherwise, I can't imagine lots of fresh vegetables and fruit giving me headaches, but I have been especially headachey the past week or two.

Bottom line: I will continue to experiment, and probably write about my findings here. Last bit of awesome food-related news: My neighborhood just got hooked up with food and yard waste pick up! So now all my food scraps (of which there are many, especially with my juicer!) can get composted. Good news.

An FML Sort of Day.

2010-10-29T23:52:00.000-07:00

For all intents and purposes, today should have been a good day. I woke up feeling unusually well-rested, having slept in (until 7:45...!), well-satiated from a lovely impromptu autumn dinner party last night at Cam and Avey's, featuring a spectacular squash soup, grilled burgers and asparagus, wine, Ben & Jerry's and Theo chocolate for dessert...wow. Friday is the beginning of my weekend - no classes, no jobs. I had a lengthy to-do list, but mostly fun things like my web design homework and picking up tools for Elodie's pumpkin-carving party this evening. I had an email from the public library notifying me that two of my requested books were in and ready for pickup, adding yet another fun item to my to-do list. After a pretty rainy week, the sun was out in blazing autumn glory today. What was not to love?

But some days, despite the relentless optimism of most of my entries here, I just don't feel so hot. Today was one of those days, 100%. Everything just started going awry in small but insidious ways.

After much research and input-gathering from friends out here, I'd finally settled on a new dentist and made an appointment. Found out this morning they're out of network for my insurance. Called the office to find out if I switch plans, which companies consider them in-network - but the person in their office who has that information doesn't work until Monday. To-do list item check-off FAIL.

Onto working on my homework. But Adobe Illustrator just plum disappeared from my computer. It's the software I need to do my typography class homework, which was due this afternoon. I already had the assignment "finished", but I wasn't happy with my work - I'm still working on my graphic design eye, let alone that I've no idea how to use Illustrator - and wanted to work on it more before turning it in. No can do, apparently; thanks, laptop. Then when I tried to print out what I did have, my printer spat the whole thing out in shades of green - despite the fact that I just spent $60 on new cartridges for it and deep-cleaned all the nozzles.

On my walk to go turn in my homework, I got accosted by a friendly albeit pushy advocate for "Save the Children." These guys have gotten me stuck talking to them for up to twenty-five minutes in the past; I'm a sucker, because yes, I do love children, and yes, I would like to save them. I want to write letters to orphans in Africa. But I do not have an extra $10/week to spare for them at this point in my life :( The activist caught me at an intersection right as the light changed, so I had no choice but to talk to him. The light turned from red to green to yellow to red again several times before I was able to pull away, feeling like a callous jerk for not caring enough about orphans in Africa. And guess who was waiting for me on the other side of the intersection? "Hi, my name is Sarah!!!" - another "Save the Children" advocate. Didn't she see me talking to her colleague across the street for five minutes and know not to try and stop me?

When I finally made it into QFC, I found they were completely sold out of pumpkin carving kits. FML.

So I thought I'd buy some vegetables instead. There were two giant bins of avocados side by side - one labeled "Avocados: $1.49/each", and the other labeled "Avocados: $2.99/each." They looked identical, and even had the same stickers on them. Hmm. Fortunately, there was a QFC employee right there, stocking tomatoes in the next bin over, so I asked her, "Excuse me, can you tell me what the difference is between these?" Without looking up, she says, "Price", and continues stocking her tomatoes. Smiling a little, I said patiently, "Yes, I noticed that. That's what made me wonder what the difference is." She seemed to think this was a rhetorical comment, as she offered no further insight.

Honestly, working in customer service myself, and going out of my way every single day to be friendly and helpful with even the most impatient customers leaves me little tolerance for people like Tomato-Stocker lady.

Tried to call Alan on the walk home. His reception dropped within two minutes.

When I got home, I found that the sun had come out and gone to work melting away the giant Ziploc bag of delectable Theo dark chocolate (kindly bestowed upon me last night by Cam) I'd casually left on my living room floor. My own fault, for being too lazy to put it away somewhere in the kitchen, yes, and I'm sure it's bad Seattle-karma to feel angry at the sun in late October...but still :( Now I just have a big, brown melty mess in a Ziploc bag.

Small things. Trivial, and halfway amusing, now that I can write about them in retrospect. But I was not amused earlier. It mostly just felt like a long, rough, tiring day...and such a bummer, for my first day off after a pretty busy week of long work/school days. Fortunately, Elodie's pumpkin-carving party was a true delight. Here is the fruit of my efforts:

Other redeeming things about today: Picked up new library books. Read one cover-to-cover already this afternoon. Went for a spectacular 9.5-mile run along my favorite running route in all of Seattle. Second email from the public library with even more requested books available. Great talk with Shari. Placed a very exciting order for organic grocery delivery from Spud (from a Groupon I purchased months ago); portabello mushrooms and Dave's Killer Bread and Dutch chocolate milk and smoked goat cheese and Cougar Mountain pumpkin cookie dough are on the way! + In spite of it all, I'm still pretty excited about my big, brown melty mess of dark chocolate.

And Seattle. I still live here. So ultimately, no complaints.

Unearthing secret geekdoms

2010-10-21T23:14:00.000-07:00

I guess the last word of my last blog entry wasn't entirely accurate.

I'm having that feeling now where I'm so behind on my blog - too many stories that need telling, too many thoughts that need sharing, too many musings that need processing - that I've no idea where to begin.

As with my personal journal, there's always the conflict between wanting to relay tangible events in my life for the purposes of chronicling and memory preservation and urgency to somehow render my experiences permanent, less ephemeral than they really are - and the desire to just elaborate indulgently on all the crazy thoughts and ideas that have been spinning around in my head lately. I always tend toward the latter.

But for the sake of posterity, the tangibles include: being 4 weeks into school now...Alan and his daughter Kristin being in town for a week and a half of Seattle sight-seeing, great meals and many trips to Old School Frozen Custard, cozy evenings of cooking and board game-playing and movie-watching...road-tripping to Leavenworth for Oktoberfest...pumpkin-carving parties and art parties and fancy schmancy wine and cheese parties with good friends...the increasingly regular Seyeon-and-Yitka get-togethers of frenzied TED-talk, UTNE Reader, and book sharing...Cam and Avey's gorgeous wedding in beautiful, wild Washington...multiple visits to Seattle's homegrown chocolate factory, Theo Chocolate. The list goes on and on; it's been a gorgeous month here, of sunshine and stunning colors and crisp autumn air and wonderful adventure.

As for the intangibles? I can't even believe how much my life has felt lately like a jigsaw puzzle with pieces flying into place at light speed. I'm sure there's a better, less hackneyed metaphor out there for what I've been feeling lately, but the puzzle one really tells it like it is.

Here's the deal: I can't imagine myself having majored in anything but creative writing at Oberlin. Creative writing was the reason I ever even looked at Oberlin in the first place. I met "my people" in the creative writing department. I unearthed a love for creative nonfiction there. Nothing, absolutely nothing, sets me on fire the way putting words on paper does.

But.

My grammar and vocabulary and storytelling geekdom is not my only geekdom. I'm a geek about other things, too: hex codes, acronyms like XHTML and PHP and MySQL, obscure keyboard shortcuts, feeling a warm affinity for people who recognize "& n b s p ;" as a meaningful combinations of characters.

Now, not only do I readily point out shoes and grammatical examples in every day life to people who could care less (e.g. "Hey random stranger, how do you like those Salomon XA Pro 3D's on your feet?", or "Damn you, grocery store, it's 10 Items or FEWER, not less!"), I've also begun pointing out typefaces to my poor unsuspecting friends and loved ones. (e.g. "That pilates studio is branded with Helvetica Neue Light...nice.") Thank you, Typography class. Bored, finally, of keeping a daily Subaru sighting count in Seattle, I've started tracking Papyrus sightings on business signs and posters instead. Atrocious...

I guess I'd just forgotten how unbelievably fired up geeking out about tech stuff gets me - and how being in school for an IT field now makes me feel like so many threads in my life are all coming together in big, exciting ways.

Seamless connections between disparate aspects of my life crop up everywhere:

In my how-to-be-a-webmaster/web designer/web programmer/content manager/project manager/freelance business owner class (not its official name, of course, but that pretty well sums it up), my teacher Mike shows us a website he designed for David Lemley - the man behind major corporate rebranding projects for Starbucks, Home Depot, and...REI. I read about his work, fascinated by the driving forces behind this company I work for and admire that's succeeded in maintaining a pretty darn loyal, happy base of employees. How? Rebranding efforts a few years ago.

I have some rebranding(ish) ideas for Outdoors NW, even though it's on a completely different level. Yet truly, the skills I'm garnering in school, week by week, I get to turn around and apply immediately in my creative work for the magazine. As well as in building an art portfolio website for my friend Jenica. Jenica hosted an art party several weeks ago in a big art space basement studio on Capitol Hill. When I got to the party, I found none other than Oberlin's semi-famed Kalan Sherrard chopping vegetables in the kitchen, talking about Oberlin-nostalgia-friendly topics, but with a Seattle touch: dumpster diving at Pike Place Market, doing puppet shows and performance art on the streets of Capitol Hill...

See how it works? Web design -> REI -> Outdoors NW -> Seattle -> Oberlin -> Creative writing -> Web design...Full circle; small world.

My friend Tom (originally met at REI) recommended to me the blog zenhabits.net several weeks ago. I didn't make the connection then, but the author of it, Leo Babauta, has written "The Power of Less" - a book for which I'd just put a special order request in with the King County library system, independent of Tom's recommendation to me. Got the book last week, plowed through half of it, called Seyeon to rave about it to her. Turns out she'd put a special order request for the exact same book from the Seattle Public library system, and was in the middle of reading it when I called.

Seattle's an awesome city. It's an unbelievable hot bed of amazing energy and creativity and inspiration. Every time I stumble across another blog or website or book that completely changes the way I look at the world, I swear, 90% of the time, the author is either from Seattle or lives here now. So many incredible people here with big ideas living out big lives...I want to be a part of it all. Life doesn't feel long enough.

That's probably one of the top ten best problems in the world to feel like you have, though.

But won't your dress get wet?

2010-10-06T20:50:00.001-07:00

It was a glorious day for a wedding here in the Northwest. Congratulations to my friends Cam and Avey on consecrating their 11-year relationship on this beautiful Wednesday afternoon!

At the confluence of the Taylor and Middle Fork rivers, LC bid these two partners for life.

Kilt-clad guests frolicked in the rivers.

...and the cake was yummy.

More soon.

Full circle: How I came to be where I am now

2010-10-02T13:07:00.000-07:00

a.k.a. The entry in which I try (and fail) to address the afore-mentioned 7,000 items in need of addressing.

First of all, thanks to everyone who took the time to respond to my blog entry about life as a 15-year-old Yitka. I've had a lot of rich conversations with different people that came out of that entry - and it's that sort of meaningful content on the web that makes me, paradoxically enough given my reflections on The Shallows, excited about it as a medium. That entry alone has fetched well over 500 unique visitors, according to my GoogleAnalytics, which is rather unheard of for my humble little personal blog. (And Tom Atchity, I still owe you some book recommendations in response...)

I want to write about some other things first, but you'll find some afterthoughts on the DMTM entry at the end of this one.

So. I started school this past week. I am officially a full time student again - though the fact that all my classes are evening classes makes it feel very different than full time studenthood has in the past. The vast majority of people in my classes are in their late twenties, thirties, forties, and fifties. Many have full time jobs already, but are looking for a change of scenery. It's amazing how many people are completely miserable in the jobs they do. And a shame, too. More power to all of them for having the courage to try something new. I think especially in this economy, it takes guts to not clutch on to job security, even at the cost of your soul.

I am pursuing a certificate in web design. After a couple years of feeling, admittedly, a bit huffy that my college degree didn't lead me straight into full time work, I'm realizing what a blessing in disguise it's all been - and how, given the chance, I wouldn't have it any other way. The truth is that at 17 or 18, most of us have no idea what we want to do for a career. A liberal arts education helps you figure out what you like to study, and it teaches you to be a professional, lifelong learner - which however priceless it may be, is not an especially marketable skill to throw down on a resume. Creative writing was the perfect major for me, as there's nothing that fires me up like thinking and learning about the written word - but does that mean I'll be happy in a writing job for 40 hours every week?

Not necessarily. I loved writing in school, and I still would love to go back and get my MFA someday...and in the meantime, sustain my soul with my own writing projects, and the omnipresent pursuit of publishing my own book. But writing for a job is very different from writing for yourself.

Don't get me wrong; I love the writing and editing I get to do for OutdoorsNW. (Did I mention that I got paid to bike around Oregon, drink wine, and write about it?) But in working for them and starting to rethink their web presence - an imperative at this point in time for all print media publications - I've gotten back in touch, again, with shades of my former self. I have always been really, really into this sort of thing. I love design and layout. Thinking about it again, and for the first time ever in terms of a possible career path, takes me back to building and distributing table-based layouts on Expage for other aspiring 13-year-old web designers, to laying out pages for yearbook in high school, to designing grunge brushes in Photoshop to use for our literary magazine The Muse when Kelly and I were co-editors. I feel like the color of my parachute has been right under my nose, but somehow I've been so hung up on the writing thing that I've forgotten about this whole other huge part of what's sustained me so much throughout my life.

So, isn't it better that I spent those formative years from 18-21 immersed in education that helped me learn to think and explore - and now that I've had a few years to be in the so-called real world and figure out what aspects of different jobs I like and what aspects I really don't like, to be able to go back to school to pursue the thing I'm confident now I could be happy doing full time?

Honestly, my appreciation for school at this point is higher than it's ever been. At the end of Oberlin, I felt burnt out. Now, a few hours of classes at the end of a long work day feels like dessert. I'm giddy that I can justify spending my money on books that are going to help take me from where I am to where I want to be, career-wise. The fact that it's my own money I've saved up over the past year paying for these classes makes me value every second I get to be in the classroom, soaking up knowledge and tools and advice from my teachers.

Also, even though I'm now pulling 12-14 hour days four days a week, I have (or will soon have) something that I have never had in all my life in Seattle thus far: a weekend. It'll be a Friday-Saturday weekend, but nevertheless, generally speaking, two full days off every week that I can count on. The peace of mind of it is beyond thrilling.

Afterthoughts!
So I found the handwritten notebook where I was keeping a journal of ideas when I first came up with the DMTM project. Amongst my plans for that are also several other interesting gleanings...mostly lists (generally not given in their entirety below...just excerpts.)

A list of things I wanted in my life at that point:
Better relationship with my parents
Get A's
A boyfriend

A list of tangible ways to go after those things:
Don't get mad over little things, try to see things from my parents' perspective, no yelling
Study groups, make outlines/flashcards, DON'T PROCRASTINATE!
Be more outgoing, hang out in groups, work on my sense of humor

A list of Likes: Doing makeup (ha), sleeping in, making websites, playing soccer, making collages, photography, being patriotic, chocolate ice cream with marshmallows, Harry Potter, connecting with nature, thinking, gel pens, happy people

A list of "Things That Suck": School, waking up early, smoking, math, regret, spinach, the smell of trash, death, liars, the color brown, Eminem, bad moods

I have to admit, that list cracks me up. My opinions, at least, on school, waking up early, math, spinach, the color brown, and even Eminem (such excellent running music) have all done a pretty serious 180 over the last decade...

A list of things I wanted to be able to buy: skateboard, belt, winter jacket, camera/film

And a list of ways to save more money: limit vending machine spending at school to $3/week, fewer snacks at the movies, bring lunch, remember that EVERY PENNY COUNTS!

Lists of good words: myriad, brazen, cascade, sagacious, illicit, atrocity, nuance, abyss, rhetorical, calamity

A list of things I missed when I was at Stanford (age 16): Sasha, my hermit crabs, my parents and friends, Luna Moonshine (my car), Eternal Sunshine (wasn't out on DVD yet...)

A list of things I wasn't missing when I was at Stanford: Humidity. (That's literally the only thing on that list.)

Lastly...I was able to actually track down the first "professional" website I ever made - where I designed layouts for other people and distributed them for free to my 5,000+ visitors - on archive.org, a website that has catalogued 150 billion current and expired webpages over the years. Mine is so embarrassingly bad and amateur on so many levels I won't link it here, but I will leave you with this fun tidbit: On my "About Me" page on that site, I had filled out a little meme that included the "Currently, I am listening to..." question. My response?

Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians' "What I Am", which was playing on the local radio station at the moment I was making that webpage. Whew, bringing back the memories...

A rude awakening

2010-09-30T07:12:00.001-07:00

I have 7,000 things I need/want to blog about, BUT this morning, I've got about ten minutes I feel okay devoting to blogging before I get on with my to-do list, and there is one thing above all that absolutely NEEDS addressing.

At approximately 5:30 a.m. this morning, I woke up to a very noisy, very nearby clamor. It took a few seconds to register what was happening: someone was yanking open the blinds on the window right over the headboard of my bed...they were jerking upward at an alarmingly fast but haphazard rate. I think the thought in my head right at that moment was, $@#%, somebody'sbreakingindamnitI'mdoomedIhopealltheimportantpeopleknowhowmuchIlovethem...

...until I sat up in a panic, flipped the light on, and realized what was actually happening. Chloe had gotten herself tangled in the cord of the blinds. She'd managed to get it to be a sling for her belly as she leapt from my pillow to my nightstand, thereby pulling the entirety of the blinds open in one (albeit herky-jerky) fell swoop.

I'm still trying to figure out whether I've got the clutziest, most accident-prone cat ever created, or the brightest, craftiest one in the world who's simply realized that quieter efforts (tromping across my pillow and wiping alternating sides of her body across my face like a paintbrush, gentle paw-prodding at my eyelids) to wake up her breakfast-provider have proven fruitless lately. Chloe knows: desperate times call for desperate measures.

The adrenaline rush of thinking someone was breaking in to my apartment kept me up for awhile. I might have been angry, but she's just so darn cute...

Booklust: Another long one.

2010-09-22T18:27:00.000-07:00

A book must be an ice-axe to break the seas frozen inside our soul.
- Franz Kafka
Less than one month ago, I finally picked up a copy of The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains, by Nicholas Carr - a book I'd heard much about, picked up every time I wandered into Elliott Bay, and tried to chase down at libraries and used bookstores all over - before making the plunge. I read it in two days, and it's been a serious wake up call.

Flipping open my laptop first thing in the morning, starting my days with internet, and punctuating most of my free moments with mindless web browsing is NOT good for the soul. Nor for the mind. I've justified it, telling myself that it's important to read the news and stay up on current events, that Facebook is a pleasantly mindless, relaxing pleasure at the end of an exhausting work day, that the internet is crucial to being connected in this modern world, that most careers are web-based anyway, that it's far more interactive than TV anyway and hey, at least I don't own a TV.

All those things are true - but it doesn't mean that constantly being connected is a positive thing in my life.

I should know, right? As a lifelong devotee to the great outdoors, I've written plenty of journal entries that attest to the mystical powers of disconnecting from the daily grind, of immersing oneself entirely in the natural world and just living in the moment.

Oct. 2006: Mammoth Cave National Park, KY
(Case in point: Journal entry, Oct. 22, 2006, after my first multi-day backpacking trip: As cliched as it is to say so, it was so refreshing to liberate myself from all the meaningless crap we fill our day-to-day lives with, the "free time" we create through microwaves and laptops and flush toilets, that we just, in turn, squander. Or, at least, I feel like I do. Even as I'm writing this entry, I'm multi-tasking a bit online...and I HATE that! I felt so very "in the moment" during our trip...I was just thinking about the woods, the rain, the people I was with, my body - "moments of being" as Virginia Woolf called them.) It's a powerful thing.

It's not just in nature. It happens, too, in deep, rich conversations with a close friend. Or on my morning walk to work, face turned to the sun's first rays over the building tops downtown. Or when I curl up in bed with my leather-bound journal and ink pen and let my thoughts flow. Or on a 15-minute break at work, the din of screaming kids and bad 80s music on XM radio in the background, as I lose myself, however temporarily, in the refuge of a good book. Or in dreams, or while cooking, or while riding my bike, or while stepping over a fallen leaf, or while photographing the full moon, or in those groggy, post-alarm clock, first few moments of a new day.

The moon last night.
It's in those moments that thoughts are born. Not just normal processing thoughts, but the fodder that gives rise to our best insights - the very stuff that makes us most human. That insight, those connections, is what separates the human brain from the computer brain, and what can be the saving grace of our species, if people can only not lose the ability to harness that power...the power of insight, from which we also derive the powers of compassion, of imagination, of free will and ambition and creation.

Since The Shallows, I've been in a reading frenzy (as I've mentioned in brief passing already in this blog, I know.) It's crazy that two months ago, I was saying, "I'd love to read more, but I just don't have the time." Wrong. I just wasn't making the time. I've had the same 24 hours in my day as before, the same crazy 50-60 hour work weeks, the same obligations, everything; I've just made reading priority again. As Gandhi once said, "Action expresses priorities." After all, I didn't seem to have a problem reading when I was at Oberlin. One (delightful!) semester's worth of reading then:

Here's my reading list from the past month, most of which, yes, I've read cover to cover...a few are still in progress.

Compelling Nonfiction: Because we live in a fascinating world.
The Shallows, by Nicholas Carr
Bait and Switch, by Barbara Ehrenreich
Framing Innocence, by Lynn Powell
UTNE Reader: The Best of the Alternative Press, Sept/Oct 2010 Issue

Business Books: To help me help the companies I'm proud to work for.
Raising the Bar: The Story of Clif Bar Inc., by Gary Erickson
The Power of Full Engagement, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
The New Rules of Marketing and PR, by David Meerman Scott
The 4-Hour Workweek, Timothy Ferriss

Personal Development Books To give the gifts of knowledge and motivation to myself.
Rich Brother, Rich Sister: Two Different Paths to God, Money, and Happiness, by Robert Kiyosaki
Awakening the Buddha Within: Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World, by Lama Surya Das
My Reality Check Bounced!, by Jason Ryan Dorsey
The Myth of Stress, by Andrew Bernstein
You're Broke Because You Want to Be, by Larry Winget
Poor Dad Rich Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki

Writing Books To give me a definitive shove toward my dream of being a published author.
Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott
Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg
Nonfiction Book Proposals Anyone Can Write, by Elizabeth Lyon
Writer's Digest, October 2010 Issue

Some samplings:

It seems to be that Facebook and Twitter and YouTube - and just so you don't think this is a generational thing, television and radio and magazines and even newspapers - are all ultimately just an elaborate excuse to run away from yourself. To avoid the difficult and troubling questions that being human throws in your way: Am I doing the right thing with my life? Do I believe the things I was taught as a child? What do the words I live by really mean? Am I happy? The problem...with Facebook and Twitter and The New York Times [is that] when you expose yourself to those things, especially in the constant way that people do now - you are continuously bombarding yourself with a stream of other people's thoughts. You are marinating yourself in the conventional wisdom. In other people's reality: for others, not for yourself. You are creating a cacophony in which it is impossible to hear your own voice. - from "Solitude and Leadership" by William Deresiewicz, reprinted in UTNE

My favorite season is autumn; my favorite time of day is sunset. These are beautiful times - poignant and ever so fleeting. Isn't that true of many of life's loveliest moments? Everyday problems teach us to have a realistic attitude. They teach us that life is what life is: flawed, yet with tremendous potential for joy and fulfillment. Everything is workable. Until we fully learn this lesson, we are burned time and again by our unrealistic expectations. - from Awakening the Buddha Within

In an interview Writer's Digest did with Alice Walker, WD asked, "You've said that heaven should be a verb. What other words are underutilized?" Alice responded, "Bliss, ecstasy, joy. I live in Mexico part of the time, and my friend Yolanda always says that something is maravilloso. The word marvelous - especially when she says it about almost everything - reminds me that yes, indeed, that's the truth of it. Even with all of the things that are so awful, if you walk into your yard and stay there looking at almost anything for five minutes, you will be stunned by how marvelous life is and how incredibly lucky we are to have it.

Word.

Thoughts on a rainy Friday

2010-09-17T19:16:00.000-07:00

Changed my blog layout, as some of you non-RSS -feed readers may have noticed. Just needed a change of scenery, I suppose.

That's what autumn is all about anyway, right? Shifting seasons, changing colors, falling leaves, a new year beginning for the schoolbound, that cyclical creep of cool, crisp September air nosing its way into August heat. For Seattle, it's just meant a lot of rain the last few days. I keep thinking about Ruth, who just moved here a few weeks ago from New York, and how she must be calling home and telling everyone, "It's really true, this gray and rainy all the time business about Seattle!"

For now, though, I like it. Rain means books, fleece, butternut squash soup, music, snuggling with Chloe, Cozy Time socks, copious amounts of tea, and snowboarding season just around the corner. I guess that's how I know I moved to the right city...I can take my place among my Seattle friends whose Facebook statuses all echo my sentiments: James "likes that it's overcast today" and Gale wrote, "has anyone looked outside? Exquisite rain. Really. Top notch Seattle rain. I love it.", etc. Clearly I am in the right place. I was listening to some great music a minute ago, but I've turned it off, because I'd rather sit by my open window and just listen to the droplets splattering in the gutters. What a great sound!

Life's been interesting lately. I've read more books in the past month than I think I have in all my time since graduating. A bittersweet observation...completely awesome and tragic, all at once. Why did it take me until now to remember how much I love reading? How much richer my life feels when it's surrounded by words - real, thoughtfully crafted, deliberately transposed words - and not just Twitter posts? For once, I haven't held myself to one or two books at a time. I've checked out dozens from the library, spent afternoons lost in bookstores, placed exorbitant orders with Amazon (no, I don't think they're evil, just because they're an online retailer), and woken up every morning surrounded by books and let myself take to work the one or two that really appealed to me on that particular day - rather than holding myself to the one, necessarily, I was reading the night before. It's been fantastic.

I went for my first run in 6 weeks. I did about 3.5 miles, and it felt spectacular, but also hard (though not as hard as I was worried it might be.) But I was ready to be done by the end. It's sad to not be in the kind of running shape I was in just a couple months ago, but my body feels strong and rejuvenated and excited for all the rebuilding and strengthening that's possible when you're not already in tip-top shape. The fact that "going for a run" only takes half an hour now instead of three or four is also very productive for the book-reading habit.

Got together with three lovely Oberlin folk a few nights ago for tacos and a political discussion on the pros and cons of Katy Perry and her effect on American pop culture. Ah Oberlin...it's amazing how many fellow alumni have settled in the rainy city, too.

School starts in another week and a half. I'm excited for all the possibilities. And again, for change. Change is great. It's always been a positive driving force in my life. I've had so many ideas in the last few years, but with the modern technological age, it feels like a roadblock to not have the skills to build websites for my ideas. School will (hopefully) help me develop those skills, and for that, I'm infinitely grateful.

My eclectic soundtrack for the month:
Goodbye, Sean Fournier (his whole album if obtainable free at his website)
Jolene, Dolly Parton
Turns Out You Won, Meredith Bragg
Seminole Wind, James Taylor
Otherside, Macklemore
Alla This, Ani Difranco
In the Barrel of a Gun, Emily Wells
Cornflake Girl, Tori Amos
When You Come Back Down, Nickel Creek
Ain't No Reason, Brett Dennen
Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Israel Kamakawiwo'ole

That's all I got for now, folks.

Ramblerambleramble on life.

2010-09-06T08:26:00.000-07:00

Many years ago now, I initiated a huge, huge project that absorbed hours of my life every day - part journaling, part artwork, part web design, all with a huge dose of self-reflection - and I didn't tell a soul about it. To this date, until this moment in which I'm deciding to write about it on my public blog, nobody's really heard about it. Bear with me.

During my sophomore year in high school, I was fairly depressed and angsty. I was going through a devastating breakup in my young life, having lost my best friend and the person I'd been sure I was going to spend the rest of my life with it, all at once. My mom had gone back to school herself and my dad was getting crushed under his workload, so I felt like they were both too busy for me - and even when they weren't, I shut them out in the stubborn way that only 15-year-olds can. I hadn't really blossomed yet socially, and the word "shy" was still the dominant adjective people used to describe me. I was struggling with everything from my self esteem to my body image, from feelings of hopelessness to a serious exhaustion with life.

But I was good at hiding it.

At the same time, I recognized that I had to do something drastic to get myself out of the hole I felt like I was in. I credit my parents fully with having loaded up my emotional toolbox in childhood with tools to cope with challenging situations. I thought about what I'd read in my one of my favorite books at the time, "Succulent Wild Woman" by SARK: a story the author relayed about a male friend of hers who'd whined to his mother about not being able to meet the right woman. The mother told him to stop worrying about meeting the right woman (which was out of his control) and focus instead on making himself into the right man (which was within his control) so when he finally found her, he'd be ready for her.

That was my thinking when, at 15, I launched my secret project, which I dubbed DMTM - "Discovering Myself Through Myself." Using techniques Mike had taught me during our relationship plus a lot of research on my own, I built myself a website on my personal computer. I never uploaded it to the internet, but instead kept it buried on my PC for personal access only. I designed a main menu that led to a dozen pages and sub-menus. I moved my personal journal onto the site. I kept other writing I was proud of on it, too. I put up scans of my sketchbook pages. I kept record of any and all dreams I had and remembered. I showcased my budding web design projects - all with no audience in mind but myself.

The focus of my project was to redirect all my angsty energy into something productive - an investment in my own future. I refocused my journal entries on positive thoughts of change, of learning, of growth, rather than on negative ruminations about how stagnant and trapped and sad I felt at that point in my life. I meditated. I went running a lot. I tried to calm my soul, and recorded the entire process on DMTM as it was happening. On the first day of it, I wrote:

So many people spend their lives so desperately seeking their own purpose on this Earth, and they are seeking for it so intensely that they lose sight of what’s right in front of them. Life. Reality. Humanity. Being. Existence. This. Now. My purpose is to find myself and be true to that. I am forever changing myself, changing who I am, to make others happy. The few times I don’t do this are when I write in my journal with the confidence that no one is going to read what I’m writing and while I am running and my mind is completely centered on that.

In a world full of people screaming to be individuals, I’m just like everyone else. I want to leave my own unique imprint on the world. I want to be special, too. I want to inspire. I want to be an individual. But I’ve come to realize I can’t do that merely by dressing funky or writing band names on my backpack or posting my poetry in my AIM profile. I have to start small. Before I can even think of advertising who I am, I need to find out who that is. I don’t do that by trying a million different self-images out on my peers and seeing which one everyone else likes best. I have to start with myself.

Psychosocial scientist Erik Erickson acknowledged in his work that, indeed, identity formation is the most crucial task of adolescence. (Check!) The next steps of young adulthood and beyond include the searches for intimacy (vs. isolation) and "generativity" (vs. stagnation) - so I suppose those are naturally my next life projects. The point of writing about all this is that, first of all, I'm infinitely grateful to my 15-year-old self, and second of all, the amazing thing about personal development is that you can do it for free, anytime, anywhere, and it always, always yields results.

A few years ago, when I first began dreaming of moving to Seattle, I imagined myself securing from afar a full time job in publishing or editing. I certainly never imagined myself working in retail once I got here. And yet, "things not going as imagined" can be such an unforeseen asset. On the bright side, I work for three fantastic companies, doing diverse projects and work at each, generally loving it all - all the while getting to reflect a lot more on what aspects I appreciate most in each, plan for my future accordingly, learn about different business models, and develop my own life skills along the way. I love that REI pushes me constantly to be a better worker, a stronger communicator, a leader with positive drive and energy. I love that everything about my job with Kaplan is pretty far out of my comfort zone, and made me miserably scared at first, but sticking with it despite my anxieties has led me to grow into a confident, effective tutor. And I love that all my work at the magazine so far has helped illuminate for me this path I'm interested in pursuing further academically...the overlaps between print journalism and internet media. Hello world.

It almost feels like cheating to be reading books on personal success, because they're full of wisdom and lessons that people have taken entire lifetimes to earn - and I can access them all now, at this age. That's powerful. I've just been reading a ton of books lately. I've stopped checking my email or Facebook when I wake up, or on my breaks at work. I read books instead. It's completely transformed my energy levels throughout the day.

It's part of the reason Seyeon and I bonded so intensely when we met at Stanford the following year; I recognized instantly that disparate as our personalities were, we were made of the same clay. I emerged from conversations with her energized about life, about thinking, about learning, about planning for the future. We're both feeding off that energy again in each other now, and our reading/hiking seminar on Mt. Teneriffe last week was only the beginning. We're both going to school this fall; after Oberlin, I was burnt out on school and vowed not to do any more of it until my adult self figured out for sure what I wanted to study and could pay for it with my own money. That time has come.

Happily, Alan's on board, too. I know it's rare for me to do this much personal rambling on my public blog, and probably most of you won't make it this far anyway (web stats show that the average person reads only 18% of text on any given webpage), but I'd like to state for the record that I feel really lucky to be in a relationship with someone who loves and supports me as much as Alan does, and furthermore, is making purposeful tracks of his own in creating the future he wants. Motivational speaker Jim Rohn once said, "You are the sum of the five people you spend the most time with." True story. I'm a lucky lady.

Let me know if you would like to share book recommendations. I'm in a reading frenzy, and would love to share in it with you. So, no awesome photos of beautiful Washington this week. Just a lot of enjoying being home, reading and writing and relaxing and catching up on both sleep and cuddle time with Chloe.

Thoughts always welcome, in the form of blog comments, emails, Facebook messages, handwritten letters, phone calls, in person, or whatever other crazy medium you can come up with.

100 Miles. Done.

2010-08-30T21:37:00.000-07:00

Before my own ego gets too puffed up, I'd just like to point out that this past weekend, a handful of amazing folks covered 100 miles on foot...in less than 24 hours.

I did it in less than 31 days, which is cool, too. My shins and knees are pleased that this year, at least, I chose the latter of those two options :)

So, a confession: I've been composing an "I failed, and I'm trying to be okay with it" blog entry for the past two weeks. When I first set out to do this Hike-a-thon business, I had to set a mileage goal for August. My initial thought was to aim for 80 miles. It seemed ambitious, but doable. Then I reflected on how often I set "ambitious but doable" goals for myself...I'm a go-getter by nature, so even goals that sound crazy to most people (write a 50,000 word novel in a month, organize and direct my own road race, run an ultramarathon...) don't necessarily seem so crazy to me.

But, ambitious as some goals might appear to those on the outside, it's lame to create goals you already feel 100% confident you can achieve. What's the point? Even as you achieve them, it creates a false sense of satisfaction when, in fact, you haven't really pushed yourself to your limits at all. Hiking 80 miles in a month felt too readily attainable. So I upped my goal to 100 miles. And I genuinely spent all of August thinking there was no way I'd make it; I only had one day off from work per week, with the exception of my birthday week (3 days off).

When I got back from my birthday trip and realized I still had nearly 40 miles to hike, and only one more day off in the month of August, I thought I'd have to give up on my overzealous goal. Unfortunately, I'm too much of a...I don't even know what the right word is...nut?...to just give up. With a little creativity, I somehow managed to squeeze in all 40 of them. Well...39.5, by my most accurate count, officially clocking 99.5 miles for August...but without GPS to verify mile-by-mile each of my hikes anyway, who's really counting?

HIKE #10: MT. TENERIFFE

I've been fortunate to have great company on all my hikes this months, but this hike was particularly special. Though Seyeon is the person in Seattle I've known the longest, until this day, we'd never hiked together, just the two of us; with no nearby mountains, northeast Ohio wasn't really a place to hike much, and when I first moved out to Seattle, REI hadn't helped the hiking bug find me to bite just yet.

Given that we live within two miles of each other, Seyeon and I have a remarkably hard time actually getting together to hang out or catch up. This is largely the fault of My Ridiculous Work Schedule, the Yitka-time-hogging qualities of which many of my friends and loved ones are all too aware. (It's going to get better someday, I swear.) But we've both been reading some fantastic books lately, and having some equally fantastic thoughts and revelations surrounding them, so this hike was far more about spending time together to catch up with each other's minds than anything else.

We headed out to North Bend to take on Mount Si's neighbor, Mount Teneriffe - a mountain with several different routes to the top. We opted for the longest, most roundabout one - a steep, winding abandoned logging road that proffered some nice views of the fog on the way up, but mostly provided us with eight hours of uninterrupted conversation. We had the mountain entirely to ourselves, and our hike mirrored our conversation: meandering, full of tangents, no absolute summit at any point, but a wonderful journey along the way nonetheless. We stopped multiple times for snacks and to read to each other, then discuss what we'd read. Kind of like an intellectual seminar, except on a mountain.

Books discussed included: Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, The Shallows by Nicholas Carr, and You're Broke Because You Want to Be by Larry Winget.

"It's not enough to just know what you want. If you only focus on wanting things, you will end up with more want. You have to have an action plan: things you can do every day to move yourself closer to your goal. Always ask yourself what you could be doing right now to make sure you have the future you want to have."
- Larry Winget
Mileage: 14 miles

HIKE #11: KENDALL KATWALK

My friend Gale is wearing pink in this photo, a tiny speck on the trail that's cut into the granite on the side of the mountain. See if you can find her.
This hike was another spectacular one, on the other side of the basin from Rampart Lakes, where I was last week. In fact, we could see Rampart Ridge from where we stood today, and likewise, last week, could see the Katwalk from our vantage point there. Very cool.

Gale and I also had never hiked together before (not even in a group), despite not having known each other for over a year. A fortuitous day off in common allowed us to head out early this morning for this trek up to Kendall Katwalk, a popular destination along the Pacific Crest Trail (the west coast's equivalent of the Appalachian, i.e. a 2,650 mile trail from Mexico to Canada.) Lucky for us, Mondays mean very few cars at the traihead, and most of the hikers we encountered were thru-hikers with big packs.

The views along the entire hike were stunning. Getting to talk to Gale more than our usual cursory chats at work was awesome. We also got to watch scurrying pikas and listen to screeching marmots. Video footage of this phenomenon forthcoming in a future entry...

Our weather ranged from blazing sunshine to a trail-flooding downpour, with a lot of partly cloudy in between. After months of being nervous about screwing up my feet for either running or hiking, I finally have absolutely no other physical adventure penciled in on the horizon, so I felt like it would be a good day to start breaking in my new boots. In truth, they're old boots...a pair of Vasque Sundowners from the 90s, back when Vasque still manufactured full-grain leather boots in Italy rather than China - an era of bootmaking in Vasque's history for which hikers across the world are still nostalgic.

Landing myself an unworn pair in my size was a serendipitous gift from the universe. Nevertheless, the leather is ridiculously stiff and in need of a lot of breaking in. 11 miles today with only one tiny blister isn't a bad start, though! And given the downpour at the end, I was grateful to be wearing Gore-Tex footwear for the first time in my life...my feet were the only dry part of me by the time we got back to the car.

Glad it was nice at the top, though!

Mileage: 11 miles

Total August Mileage: 100 MILES

Ultimately, here's what I feel I got from all hundred of them: the kindling of new and old friendships alike, a better knowledge base for my job(s), some much-needed mental clarity, strong gluteus muscles, rest for my battered shins from too many running miles, a lot of fresh air, rich food for thought, many awesome photos, and an even deeper appreciation for this beautiful world we live in.

And onward!

I saw the ocean!

2010-08-27T18:48:00.000-07:00

It's been far too long since I've updated my blog. Apparently, working long hours and hiking on all your off-days doesn't leave much time for writing. I have more reflections on the psychology behind this goal-setting experiment, but I'll save writing about it for once the month is over altogether. For now, suffice to say that I have raised over $200 for the trails, thanks to all you spectacular souls who've helped sponsor my Hike-a-thon. I'm short of my fundraising goal, but I've still got four days! (This will be the last plug for it on my blog, I promise, but if you're at all interested in helping the effort, this is your last chance! Click here to help out.)

In the meantime...the latest in long-awaited hike reports of the past couple weeks...

HIKE #6: BALD MOUNTAIN

Not the most spectacular hikes I've done, but the Bald Mountain Trail nevertheless enchanted me and my crew with its sheer solitude. Jenica, Casey, Wayne and I set out for what some of us thought would be a cool summit - but because we did our approach from the Ashland Lakes trailhead, rather than the generally recommended one by Cutthroat Lakes, we wound up just hiking for a long, long time in the woods until the threat of sunset forced us to turn around, still in the middle of the woods, sans summit or views. We at least had a nice day for it, and a pretty lake on the way up:

We also had the trail entirely to ourselves, which amounted to the intrepid Casey having to fend off many spider webs on the way up. We ate many berries, talked music, and shared stories from our disparate homelands of Appalachia, the Midwest, and southern California. Though the hike itself was nothing to write home about, the company was. Again, so grateful for the friends I've made since moving out here. Good people. :)

Total miles: 11 miles

HIKE #7: OZETTE TRIANGLE (Pacific Coast)

Seyeon and Leo hiking along the beach.
I've been talking about wanting to go out to the coast since I moved here. With that ambition in mind, I took a few days off from work surrounding my birthday last week and, in all the craziness of August, failed to plan pretty much anything. Happily, things worked out all right anyway. I didn't get in the dozens upon dozens of miles I envisioned myself hiking in Olympic National Park, but I did get: amazing time spent with some of my favorite people in the world, a beachside game of Scrabble on my birthday, and my first rain-free camping experience in as long as I can remember (well, it did rain...but only when we were already in the tent, so who cares? At that point, it was just a soothing audio companion to the waves crashing against the rocks thirty feet from our tent.)

There is a sweet loop trail on the coast that Seyeon, Leo, Alan, and I decided to hike and camp along. We had to hike about three miles ("hike"...really, it was an extended stroll through the woods on boardwalks) out to our campsite, an amazing spot right next to the water.

My crew.

Camp: Leo making dinner, Seyeon tending the fire, Alan off searching for firewood, and me predictably behind the camera lens.
The Washington coast is far more rugged than most coastal areas - lots of jagged rocky outcroppings, far less developed, i.e. quite isolated and wild. I definitely want to spend more time exploring it. After an evening of drinking hot cocoa, inhaling s'mores, talking politics, and telling ghost stories, we retreated to our respective tents. I woke up before anyone else and decided to seize the opportunity to go for a little solo birthday morning hike. I walked out quite a way on the beach and found myself a nice big boulder amidst the tide pools to listen to the sea lions, watch the birds, and wish the darned sun would come out. It didn't, but I still felt perfectly content.

A good start to a new year in my life!
When I got back to camp, Alan woke up and joined me for morning stroll #2. We walked out to a cool little island that I believe is only accessible at low tide. There, we watched the waves and speculated about the array of strange objects washed up on the beach. Returned back to camp for a long, lazy day at our campsite, spent drinking more hot cocoa, stirring up our fire again, and playing some Scrabble oceanside.

I couldn't have asked for a better way to spend my birthday.
Total miles: 11.5 miles

HIKE #8: KLAHHANE RIDGE (Olympic National Park)

This was a seriously rockin' hike. Alan and I car-camped at the national park's Heart o' the Hills campground the night before, slept in, and got up to Hurricane Ridge by late morning to start our generally unplanned trek.

Alan and I outside of the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center.
At a park ranger's suggestion, we began our amble along the Klahhane Ridge trail, which was paved for a short bit, albeit ridiculously steep and at elevation that made the climb seem much more intense than most of our typical hikes. The pavement and national park crowds quickly and drastically thinned out as we climbed, until finally we pretty much had the largely exposed ridge trail to ourselves.

Although the elevation made it a challenging one, it was a stunning, stunning hike. Sunshine and mostly clear skies proffered spectacular views on both sides of the ridge - on one side, Port Angeles, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Canada visible, and Mount Baker poking through a thin line of clouds...on the other side, a panoramic view of the Olympic Mountains, way more up close and personal than is visible from my beloved home city. No photos will do it justice.

All the wildflowers and wildlife - friendly deer + even friendlier marmots - were icing on the cake.
Total miles: 10 miles

HIKE #9: RACHEL LAKE + RAMPART LAKES

I'm sure I've said it before, but I really, really mean it this time: this was the most gorgeous hike I've done in the Northwest. At the recommendation of a new hire at work whom I was helping train last week, I gathered five friends this past Monday and made the epic trek up first to Rachel Lake, a sometimes gentle, sometimes brutal 4-miler up, then even more brutally upward to scale a ridge and drop back down into the Rampart Lakes basin - a truly magical little hideaway in the mountains, isolated, and pocked with crystal-blue, shimmering mountain lakes. I've been doing a lot of alpine lake hikes lately was, I'm ashamed to say, beginning to feel sort of like "Ehh, once you've seen one mountain lake, you've seen 'em all" - until this hike.

Alan above Rachel Lake on our hike up to Rampart Lakes.
Alan and I were both disappointed as we reviewed our photos later, because somehow more than usual, they completely and utterly fail to convey the majesty of this place. But so it goes. That's, I suppose, why I go outside and hike instead of just admiring the photos in the guidebooks.

The coolest part of the day? At Rachel Lake, as we were all doubled over catching our breath, already massaging our exhausted quad and gluteus muscles, we ran into a 90-year-old man who was hiking with his dog, Dusty. Really friendly guy, who told us that every year, he's worried it'll be his last time getting to see Rachel Lake - but so far, so good; what an inspiration!

Total miles: 12 miles

Total Mileage so far: 74.5 (of 100)
Total Funds Raised so far: $210 (of $300)

Trekking with a pooch + Meteor-watching with wild pigs

2010-08-13T09:18:00.000-07:00

HIKE #4: WEST TIGER MOUNTAIN

Seattleites love dogs. They're everywhere. People hike with their dogs, swim with them in the lake, take them into stores, sit with them on the sidewalk outside of cafes. Of the six units in my apartment building, which technically disallows dogs, two managed to talk our landlord into keeping one anyway.

Every time I'm out running or hiking in the mountains, I'm a little jealous of the people who are hiking with dogs. I still remember reading an article in Runner's World maybe 5 or 6 years ago about the ultrarunner Scott Jurek, and how he'd go for epic long runs in the mountains with his husky, Tonto. (On a sidenote, the article also discussed his making a home in Seattle, working at a local running store, and cooking delicious vegan food all the time. Upon reading the article, I remember thinking to myself, I want this guy's life! It's kind of cool now that we live in the same neighborhood in Seattle and overlapped at the Orcas Island run back in February.) Anyway - the problem, of course, is that there's no way my current lifestyle would allow for a dog. Some days, I leave for work by 8 in the morning, and between jobs, don't get home again until 11 at night. Not a dog-bladder-friendly schedule, by any means.

Likewise, I think it's really cool that people don't let having babies keep them from getting out into the mountains; I love the kid carrier backpacks, and how happy and engaged the little toddlers look as they get to go for a slow ride through the forest. I will strive to be that kind of parent someday. But of course, no dogs or small children for now; in the meantime, my only hiking companions are other grown up humans, when we can coordinate our work schedules.

Happily, this week, though, my friend James called me up with an awesome proposition: he's dogsitting for the week and wanted to take his dogsitting charge, an adorable lab/border collie mix named Ruby, for a hike. Elodie and I had made late evening dinner plans on the eastside for that evening, so it worked out well for James, Ruby, and I to do a nice local hike on the eastside, then meet up with Elodie for dinner (giant avocado bacon burgers at Red Robin, YUM) afterward.

Yes, it was everything I dreamed it would be.

The sunset rocked, too:

Miles: 7.5

HIKE(ish) #5: THE PERSEIDS

This one wasn't really a hike, but I'm enjoying my blog's temporary foray into hike-chronicling, so I'll keep the format. Last night around midnight, the annual Perseids meteor shower peaked. It's always the second week of August, and traditionally, my aunt and uncle host a big stargazing/meteor-watching party and campout on their land. I'd forgotten about the meteor shower this year, until Brant brought it up at work yesterday and mentioned that he'd rented out a bivy sack, with no plans whatsoever except the general thought that it'd be cool to go sleep somewhere away from the city's light pollution and watch for falling stars.

The big deal this year is that we've just had a new moon a couple nights ago. "Moonless Perseids" only happen once every three years - but the absence of moonlight makes a big difference in terms of how many stars are visible with the naked eye. Although I had a late tutoring lesson last night yesterday and had been dreaming through my whole workday about getting a long night of sleep in my wonderful bed, I was intrigued by Brant's plans. Although neither of us knew exactly where to go to watch for meteors, Cam popped out of the woodwork at the opportune moment to contribute a suggestion. He reappeared moments later with a printed Google map and a hand-drawn dotted line snaking all over country roads between Redmond and Fall City, with a little star marking "Da Spot" which he recommended for us.

Come 10 p.m. last night, Brant and I set out for the country. Again, I felt amazed at how easy it is in Washington to move between vastly different landscapes in a short span of time. You can literally go from beach to mountains to city to suburbs to rural farms, all in the span of an hour's drive. It didn't take us long to get completely away from city lights. With my sun roof open, we cruised winding country roads in search of the perfect place to lay out our bivy sacks and sleeping bags.

We found it. We had it all to ourselves. We had flat ground to lie on and a panoramic view of the night sky that included thousands upon thousands of stars. I could hardly even find the big dipper, because I'm so unaccustomed to several hundred stars being visible inside of the dipper, too. The meteors were pretty spectacular - at least one every couple of minutes, and sometimes two or three right in a row, almost criss-crossing each other in the sky. We had great snacks.

At some point, there was a fairly loud chorus of snorting and grunting from the other side of the tall row of blackberry bushes we'd lay out sleeping bags next to. Brant was off exploring on his own, and my sympathetic nerve system seriously kicked in at the idea of some wild animal being out there in the darkness. Brant had heard it even from where he was, probably fifty yards away, but we concluded that it was probably just a little piggy at the farm next to which we'd camped out.

Finally around 2 a.m. or so, I dropped off to sleep. Woke up at 6 to Brant tromping around in the sea of fog that had come in overnight. (The sky was completely clear for the duration of our meteor-watching...a miracle!) I got up, and we walked around a little bit, plucked fresh blackberries off the bushes, and picked up where our conversations had left off the night before as we dropped off to sleep.

Overall, a great success.

Breakfast!
Miles: .5ish

Total Mileage so far: 30.5 (of 100)
Total Funds Raised so far: $170 (of $300)

Donate?

Inopportune Moments

2010-08-09T23:28:00.000-07:00

The universe is conspiring against me. Three signs of it:

1. Pilot lights went out on my gas stove and oven three times in one day.
2. My car died.
3. 3 of 3 friends I was supposed to hike with on Sunday bailed on me (it's okay, team; I know homework and boyfriends and parties happen!)

Fortunately, all of this happened to coincide with the 48-hour time period that Alan snuck home for the weekend from Portland where he delivered a load on Saturday. So for the most part, crises were averted.

HIKE #3: ANNETTE LAKE

Rainy days in the Northwest.
After I awoke to sorry-I'm-bailing-on-you texts on Sunday morning, I rolled over and promptly went back to sleep, bummed out as all heck that my plans for the day (group hike out east + stopping in North Bend afterward for the Sound to Mountains Bike Festival, for which I'd gotten several comp tickets) were shot. While I certainly enjoy being out in the woods alone, it's just plain not safe; the fact that it's black bear hunting season in Washington now doesn't help. Anyway, Alan wasn't originally planning to come along for the day's festivities, but being the Personal Hero Boyfriend he is, he pulled me out of bed and said he'd go with me.

We got a later start, and the weather was plenty cool and rainy (really, Seattle, really? It's August. Why has it been 55 degrees and overcast for days? The weather's the same as it was in February), but we made good time on the Annette Lake trail - a nice amble through old-growth forest, past a few little creeks and waterfalls, and ultimately arriving at a small little mountain lake, cupped by three big peaks, which were pretty much completely encased in fog. The sun emerged for approximately 45 seconds when we first arrived at the lake, but was promptly beat back into submission by the clouds and the onset of a gentle rain.

Woohoo, summer in my rain jacket!

Miles: 8.5ish

Alan hiked in his Hawaiian shirt. (One of several in his possession.) We have an ongoing...conversation?...about his enthusiasm for Hawaiian shirts. He noticed that I'd left this particular one within easy access in our apartment, which I'll venture to say was a complete accident on my part. Inevitably, wherever we go together when Alan dons Hawaiian shirts, there will be some woman who will smile wide and call out to him all swoony-like, "Hey, nice shirt!" I've tried to explain that it's a different sort of compliment if (when, always) the woman is elderly, but no matter; I always get a big, smug grin from him in the wake of these exchanges.

I think it's a losing battle. Either way, the shirt certainly brought some color to an otherwise fairly uniform landscape of greenery and fog. When we came back down from our hike, we got malts and milkshakes and other yummy diner grub at Scott's Dairy Freeze in North Bend before meandering over to the Bike Festival. There, we met up with Cam, Avey, Jeff, Kate, LC, and other assorted friends, several of whom had ridden their bikes all the way from Seattle(ish) to North Bend...crazy impressive. (Someday I won't be such a scaredy cat when it comes to riding long distances on my bike.) There, we hung out in the grass, listened to live music, and picked blueberries. I fell in love with U-pick blueberry farms in Ohio, but I have to admit, the backdrop of this one was a little more awe-inspiring than any other blueberry farm I'd ever been to.

Overall, the day wound up being a great success.

That's Mount Si in the background!
Total Mileage so far: 22.5 (of 100!)

It's not too late to help out!

WTA Hike-a-thon Reports, Part I

2010-08-06T22:51:00.000-07:00

First of all, a huge, huge thank you to Mike, Kate, Melissa, Duy, and Chris for their amazing generosity in helping sponsor me in the WTA Hike-a-thon! You guys are absolutely fantastic, and I cannot thank you enough. We are six days into the month, and I am at an unbelievable 42% of what felt to me like a somewhat ambitious fundraising goal. THANK YOU!
(Linky at the bottom of this entry if you want to help out, too.)

HIKE #1: SURPRISE LAKE

Technically began on July 31, so I can't count the hike in toward my Hike-a-thon miles, but the hike out was on August 1, and I'll write about it the whole shebang here. Most of our crew left early in the day, but my trusty trail compadres Camba and Jenica were both down for a little bit later start; morning work shifts, errands, etc...these are the same terrific two with whom I'm frequently counting shoe boxes at 7 a.m, so I swear, it's not that we're just lazy bums who didn't want to get up early to hit the trails.

I hadn't backpacked in a long time; the last time was when I was still in school, when I could just borrow gear from Oberlin's virtually unknown Outings Club (translation: tons of awesome gear and gas funds always available...college was great). Fortunately, REI looks out for me, too, and so I was able to rent a backpack for free, and take out my new Half Dome tent for its second outdoors excursion.

The hike up was hot (in Pacific Northwestern, that's 78ish Fahrenheit), but as is always the case with Camba and Jenica, the company was great. I forgot how much harder it is to hike with a giant backpack! Silly me. We got to the lake and didn't see our crew's camp right away, so we asked some other hiker passersby whether they'd seen a group of hooligans, some bearded. They shrugged, said not really, but that there was an inflatable dinosaur with an arrow a little ways down the trail.

"That's probably us!" Cam replied. And sure was. We found our people frolicking by the lake, leaping off boulders into the crystal clear chilly water, making music (leave it to Jeff, Mr. Superhuman Treadmill Climber from my Ragnar report to haul a guitar all the way up the mountain, in addition to his backpack, tent, and other gear), and having a good time.

Jeff leaping into the lake. Kate and I jumped, too.
For all intents and purposes, our group had a great evening hanging out. The weather was muggy but decent. We made food. Mark had brought a portable fishing pole and caught himself a nice big stick. We sat around and drank and sang and generally were merry.

Surprise Lake by twilight.
That's where the good times went downhill. It started raining. It didn't stop. I stayed out of my tent hanging out with Jenica and Cam and Jeff in the rain until late, until all of us were soaked (and, in my case, chilled) to the bone. Got into my sleeping bag sopping wet, slept like a rock, and awoke to Lizzie yelling that there was a chipmunk on my backpack just outside of the tent. Turns out the little bastard had chewed a hole through the fabric of my pack to get at an empty sunflower butter packet and some tiny corn chip morsels. Left the entire back of open trail mix twenty feet away on the ground alone.

The hike out was a foggy one, but an enjoyable one. We stopped on the way home at a tiny little diner (really, just a big table in the front of a convenient store), but they had exactly what I'd spent all morning craving: breakfast food and a chocolate milkshake. I wolfed down a big egg scramble and went home a very happy woman.

Miles: 9ish total, but 4.5 toward Hike-a-thon

HIKE #2: MASON LAKE/MOUNT DEFIANCE

This one was just a day hike. I had to work until noon, but Wayne and I took off from Seattle right when I got off. We were on the trail by 1:30 (I LOVE THIS PLACE) and up to Mason Lake a few short hours thereafter. The trail is shared with a large stretch of the Mount Bandera route, which Alan and I had done several weeks ago - though I could already tell my hiking legs had developed some strength since then. I had less trouble on the uphills. The weather was sunny but really hazy; the trail proffers great Rainier views, but the haze was too great to see it.

Instead, we checked out the gorgeous wildflowers along the way - fire weed, lupin, Indian paintbrush, glacier lily, fox glove - and shared great conversation, as we often do out on the trail. Wayne's lived all over the country, but he's been working in the outdoor industry in Oregon and Washington for awhile now, so it's wonderful to pick his brain and hear his stories about various mountains, trails, Northwest icons.

We picnicked at Mason Lake, where I enjoyed the sunny rocks for awhile before taking a long dunk in the lake. Swam over to the other side and back, saw a salamander and a crawfish, and had some tasty snacks before picking up and moving on in our attempt to continue to the summit of Mount Defiance. Somehow, we got off trail in a mini boulder field, and wound up following a narrow, unmaintained trail that eventually led us into a mosquito-infested swamp. Always up for adventure though, we thought to ourselves, Ah, but surely if we just bushwhack through this brush right here, we'll find the trail! And so off we went into the trees and marshes and brush. No trail. But...surely, just over this ridge, we told ourselves. And still no trail.

After meandering off-trail for quite awhile, we finally decided to back track all the way, pretty much, to Mason Lake. There, we figured out where we'd gone wrong and got back on track - but by that time, we were pushing time. We made it up a little more than halfway up the mountain before the clock nabbed us and we had to turn back. "Don't worry, Lady Defiance, we'll return to you soon!" Wayne called out as we turned around and made our way back down.

Drove home into a stunning sunset:

Ah Washington State, how I love thee!

Miles: 9.5ish total

Can you spare five bucks for the trails of the Northwest?
Total Mileage so Far: 14 (of 100!)
Total Funds Raised so Far: $125 (of $300!)

10 Seattleite Essentials

2010-08-03T23:13:00.000-07:00

Brainchild of a recent hike: my list of 10 Seattleite Essentials! Feel free to comment, add, subtract, protest, express offense, etc. I know it's a departure from my usual blog material, and the potentially controversial mix of self-deprecating humor and amused social critique is a little edgier than I usually opt for, but here goes:

1. Beard, bearded boyfriend, beard envy, or all of the above
2. Reusable Trader Joe's shopping bags
3. Waterproof commuter backpack
4. Forest green Subaru and/or cornflower blue Prius
5. Obama/Biden bumper sticker
6. Pair of Chacos
7. Sounders FC scarf
8. Kindle
9. Cup of Vivace espresso
10. Chocolate lab

(I'm 2/10 so far, and clearly failing at my own game.)

Runners Up Include: NPR messenger bag, utility kilt, fixy bike, hiker chick girlfriend, white guilt, home espresso machine, Vibram Fivefingers, cloves, microbrew snobbery, altimeter watch, MacBook, backyard compost.

(4/12 this time!)

Back to the usual blog material soon, including my Hike-a-thon update, but first I have to hike some more. And not be working 58-hour work weeks so I can actually have the time to update my blog! That's all for now, folks.

Love hiking? Me too.

2010-07-31T10:23:00.000-07:00

Photo by James Harnois.
Tomorrow is the first day of the Washington Trails Association's (WTA) 7th annual Hike-a-thon, and I will kick it off by waking up in the middle of the woods in my tent and hiking out the second half of the (very short) backpacking trip I'm taking with a few friends. In an attempt to give back to the trails systems that have made me fall in love with this state, I have set the far-too-ambitious-for-my-own-good goal of hiking 100 miles during the month of August, and trying to raise at least $300 to donate to the wonderful organization that helps maintain the trails and wetlands here.

Asking people for money, even when it's for a good cause, is one my top ten list of least favorite things to do in the world, but...the WTA is spectacular, and I want to do anything I can to help preserve their efforts. If even just half of my Facebook friends and blog readers donate $1-5 each, I will blow my fundraising goal out of the water...just sayin'.

I'm at 3.33% of my goal so far!

Now I'm pointed north, hoping for the shore

2010-07-31T00:23:00.001-07:00

I feel like the vast majority of my blog entries lately have been very image-heavy...and they've been more sporadic recently, I think because uploading and linking in so many pictures takes a long time, and given how busy my schedule is already, I intimidate myself out of posting. So in an effort to get better about that, here are just some post-midnight musings, sans photos.

Today at work, my coworker and friend Brant spent the day asking customers, "Hey, what do you get when you spread icing all over a thesaurus?"* Apparently in the mood for quotes, at the end of the evening, he also quoted Dr. Seuss to us all, as general food for thought: "You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams."

That's been my problem this week. And by "in love", I mean in love with life: with this amazing state in which I live, with Alan and Seyeon and Becca and Shari and Elodie, with my amazing parents, with all the wonderful friends I've made in Seattle, with my body for allowing me to do all the things I do, with nourishing food, with bluegrass music, with books and public libraries, with dreaming about the future, with the mountains and the water and the 65-degree sunshiny summer days, and with the best cat in the world that's alseep on my butt right now as I type this.

Despite being off coffee for over three weeks now (okay, minus during Ragnar), I've had so much energy at the end of every day that I can't sleep for the life of me. Tonight's a perfect example; I was so exhausted when I woke up this morning that I could hardly drag myself out of bed, and I just stood in my kitchen in my PJ's, rubbing at my eyes and feeling miserable...but not a drop of caffeine today, and here it is, nearly 1 a.m. and I just feel so darn giddy about things that I don't want to go to sleep; I'd much rather stay awake and keep enjoying this high.

What's keeping me up at night? Big ideas. Upcoming, tentative birthday plans to drive out the Olympic Peninsula and backpack around a bit with Alan and potentially Seyeon and Leo, too. Maybe running the Leavenworth Oktoberfest Half-Marathon this fall. Having signed up for WTA's hike-a-thon in August, for which I'm going to take a break from running for a month and instead hike my butt off and raise money for the Washington Trails Association. Also, considering trying to take some community college classes this fall, an idea that's making my heart want to explode with excitement; I was burnt out on school by my fourth year at Oberlin, and I didn't have the slightest interest in continuing education at that point because I needed more time to grow outside of academia, recenter, establish some more independence, get to Seattle, and ultimately, figure out what kind of career path I really want to be putting myself on...writing? Editing? Publishing? Communications? Business/entrepreneurship? Teaching? Higher education? Psychology? Counseling? But that time has come, and suddenly my path feels crystal clear...like a fog has lifted, and now it's just a matter of putting it all into action. More on that soon.

Well, I thought I could do a whole entry without photos, but I was wrong. A few from my Granite Mountain hike earlier this week with Cam and David are begging to be shared.

David scopes out the meadow where we plan to someday return and camp.

Camba checks out the view.

The ladybug that hitched a ride to the top with me.

The Cascadias continue to serve me well.
Thanks for tuning in, folks. The title of my entry is a line of lyrics from James Vincent McMorrow's beautiful song, "If I had a boat":

Enjoy listening to it if you're in the mood to share my mood on this fine evening. Add James Vincent McMorrow to that list of loves at the beginning of this entry...so fantastic. Thanks, as always, Grey's Anatomy soundtrack, for introducing me to stunning musicians. Off to sleep now, I hope. Good night, beautiful world.

---

*"A synonym bun!" And this is why we love Brant.

RAGNAR Race Report

2010-07-26T20:07:00.000-07:00

Many, many months ago, a piece of expertly marketed advertising arrived in my mailbox at our apartment: a postcard with two scratch-and-sniff vans, one that smelled great, one that smelled terrible, and a dotted line labeled "187 miles" connecting the two. So it was that I was introduced to the Ragnar Relay Series - a dozen gigantic relay races throughout the country in which 12-person teams pack into two vans and leapfrog their runners to the finish line over a series of 36 legs (3 per runner). The Northwest Passage Ragnar starts in Blaine, up by the Canadian border, and goes all the way down to Langley, a small town on the south end of Whidbey Island.

I think Ragnar got my address from my Seattle Marathon sign-up, but more power to 'em: the scratch-and-sniff postcard hooked my interest. I posted it up at work and asked if anyone might be interested in putting together a team. Within a month, I had 11 hooligans interested in joining me for a two-day fest of sleep-deprived, pavement-pounding madness. After many months of organizing, reorganizing, planning, training, and the occasional team run/BBQ, this past weekend finally plunged us into the craziness of running a huge relay in one of the most stunning parts of our country.

To those who know me well, it may come as no surprise that our official team name, "Alpacas by Day, Ninjas by Night" was my doing. Four years in Ohio cemented my slight obsession with alpacas...and as for the ninja part, I really have no idea. But it worked; our competition included team names like "Runners with an Eating Disorder", "Blood, Sweat, and Beers", "Postpartum Aggression", and the "IT Bandits", and costumes and van decorations ranged from Robin Hood-themed warriors to a van with a three-foot cardboard shark emerging from the top.

Seeing all the other vans was inspiring and awesome.
We met up in Seattle at 7 a.m. on Friday to decorate our vans, don ridiculous noses and starry glasses (which, of course, have nothing to do with either alpacas or ninjas, but who cares?!), caravan up to the starting line, and torment/amuse drivers in other vehicles along the way.

Ron started us off at our staggered start time of 10:30 a.m., taking off for the first of 36 legs total. The two vans, one with runners 1-6 and one with runners 7-12, alternated being "on" and "off" vans - so for the first six hours or so of the relay, my van was "off" and able to just wander around downtown Bellingham, stroll around by the beach and boardwalk, grab some lunch at the Colophon Cafe, and pick up some IPA's and Scotch-style ales from the infamous Boundary Bay Brewery in anticipation of our post-race celebration (still more than 24 hours away at that point! And as for how to make room in our coolers for the beer...who needs cold Gatorade anyway?)

In the meantime, Van 1 was leapfrogging our first six runners all the way from Blaine down to the first major exchange point in Bellingham, where around 4:40 p.m., I laced up my running shoes, lined up in the exchange chute, took the baton (err, slap bracelet) from Jenica and took off running.

Tempted as I am to write a play-by-play of the whole 28-hour ordeal, I understand that might get tedious. Instead, I'll summarize the highlights, and rely heavily on photos to bring the event to life for those who weren't there in person to run under a full moon, watch sunrise over Deception Pass, smell the sweat, feel the aches and pains, and experience the drunken stupor of total sleep deprivation. (1.5 hours of sleep during the entire event, AGHHH!!!!)

Washington state is gorgeous. It's more diverse in its landscape than anywhere I've ever visited, let alone lived, before. We ran by all of it: mountains, volcano views, lakes, bays, beaches, forest, farmlands, everything. Each leg of the race brought new scenery, new places to ooh and ahh over. When our van was "on", we leapfrogged our runners, cheered and hollered as they ran, blasted bluegrass from our van, danced along the side of the road, took photos of our antics, and ate snacks pretty much constantly. When our van was "off", we also ate snacks pretty much constantly, hung out, laughed ourselves silly, and occasionally tried to pile into sleeping bags and catch a few winks of sleep, generally in vain.

First and foremost, our stellar team of volunteers, without whom our run wouldn't have even been possible.

My van mates broke out their best "Yitka pose" by the side of the road.

Don't we look like fun?

At sunset on Friday: 4 of our van's 6.

Elodie got both the sunset and the sunrise run.

75% of the team, pictured at Exchange Point 12.

...where they had free s'mores!

In our blazingly attractive reflective vests.

Getting sleep during the relay meant getting creative about beds.

Homeless? Nah, just runners. Notice the Pringles can and stack of bagels on top of it.

Eating salty chips and guzzling Gatorade at a convenient store in the middle of the night. Just about sums up the whole Ragnar experience.

Sunrise over Deception Pass.

Post 1.5-hours of sleep: Breakfast, sunshine, listening to bluegrass, waiting for Van 1 to arrive.

Jenica arrives!

Greg kicking butt on his last leg.

Exchanges ranged from smooth to messy; this one was speedy, sweaty, and largely a failure of coordination on our part, but Greg's sprint at the end succeeded in giving me the leg up on the team that was even with us at that point.

Peter and I toast at the finish line...

...while Jeff hops on a treadmill and takes 7th place nationwide for Most Elevation Climbed in 5 Minutes. Crazy man!
Overall, it's just impossible the put the experience into words. No worries, though; the Alpaca Ninjas fully plan on returning next year for their second Ragnar, so let me know if you're interested in joining the team for next year! We ran hard, averaging a team pace of 8:51 overall, with our fastest legs paced at a ridiculous 7:17 pace (go Jeff and Elodie!) There were some blisters, some sore knees and shins, some seriously taxed muscles, some general heat exhaustion, some Sunday work shifts that needed calling off...but overall, I think it's safe to say we had a blast with it. Couldn't recommend the Ragnar series more highly to anyone thinking about doing one.

Ragnar 2010: Alpacas by Day, Ninjas by Night

Trio of Epics

2010-07-18T16:20:00.000-07:00

Epic One: Fireworks & Four Wheel Drive in Meth Country

Camba Quote of the Evening: "Yitka, you may love Seattle, but it comes with the whole state, too."

Apparently there are a lot of meth heads out in the woods of Washington state. I guess that's true of just about any secluded area in the country (the highways in Montana are overridden with anti-meth campaign billboards), but it's a fact I hadn't given much consideration to until this Independence Day. And actually, it's generally unrelated to the rest of my story, except that I really loved Cam's quote and wanted to include it in my July 4th report. My creative writing degree is failing here, however, to craft a smooth transition from lamenting the prevalence of meth addiction in WA to the fireworks part...so with that said...

July 4th was great. It did involve five of us packing into my friend Maddie's 4X4 and venturing deep into the forest in Washington state. The evening's thick fog intensified the sense of adventure as we rumbled through giant potholes and undulating gravel road on our way to Camba's Secret (not so secret?) Spot on a mountain, where each year, good company gathers to celebrate our great country.

In the spirit of the rugged Northwest, we spent the evening: pitching tents, making s'mores by the campfire, grilling burgers on Camba's portable grill, drinking cheap wine out of Camelbaks, shooting fireworks off the side of the mountain, dancing with sparklers to djembe drums, belting out Bohemian Rhapsody, and singing a few too many rounds of Row, Row, Row Your Boat as well. We camped overnight and I woke up colder, I think, than I ever have on a July 5th...shivering in my sleeping bag, grumbling to Alan about wanting hot chocolate NOW.

But back up for a moment...back to the 4th itself, at oh, around 9:58 p.m. We were all hanging out by the campfire, unassuming, having given up on the chance of seeing any fireworks other than the ones we'd set off ourselves, since the fog was so thick. Ordinarily, I'm told, there's a spectacular view from the Secret Spot, and fireworks shows from a hundred miles in all directions are visible. But come 10 p.m., someone suddenly exclaimed and pointed through the fog. Sure enough, hundreds, if not thousands, of pinpricks of colored light began flashing all over the horizon, like silent fireflies in the distance. It was truly spectacular.

(And yes, I did get some hot chocolate the following morning, during our caravan back to the city.)

Epic Two: Alan and Yitka Go To In-n-Out Burger

Once upon a time, at an interstate exit in the depths of California, I had my first In-n-Out Burger. Since then, various obstacles have gotten in the way of my pursuit of a second one: namely, (1) vegetarianism and (2) lack of In-n-Out Burgers in pretty much the entire country. Customers and coworkers alike donning In-n-Out Burger t-shirts taunt me weekly at REI, even though the closest one to my apartment door is 593.6 miles away. Lame.

When I discovered that the Burger Chain of the Gods had opened franchises in Arizona, too, I nearly exploded. (Literally!) When the price of renting a car and taking a shuttle to get from Flagstaff to Phoenix for our flight proved equally pricey, renting a car emerged as the obvious choice for two reasons: (1) opportunity to get our ambrosia fix before returning to the In-n-Out dead zone of the Northwest, and (2) a chance to listen to ESPN radio coverage of the World Cup game as we drove through the blisteringly hot Arizona desert.

The radio station may have switched over at half time to a local baseball game instead, and "pelota" may have been the only word I understood as I tried to follow the game instead on the Spanish channel (but my my, how much more exciting they make soccer sound than the American/English announcers!), and I may have learned via text message from Seyeon that Holland lost, and our flight that we pushed so hard to make may have gotten delayed by two hours...we may have had serious problems finding the In-n-Out Burger joint amidst the serious suburban sprawl of Phoenix, and the line, when we got there, may have been nearly hanging out the door with a 20-minute wait, but at the end of the day...

Do I really have anything to complain about? Nope. Nada. 'Til next time, oh Tasty One...

The views on the flight home weren't bad either.
Epic Three: Eating Snickers Naked on a Mountain

Well, not naked. Not entirely, anyway...some shirts may have been removed for temporary airing out and enjoyment of the solitude and breeze at the top of Bandera Mountain, a quaint little peak at 5,200 feet just east of North Bend; hopefully nobody on Rainier across the valley from us had binoculars.

After a hike up Mount Si a couple weeks ago on a cold, foggy "summer" day, Alan and I finally hit the hiking-weather jackpot with our ascent of Bandera a few days ago. The skies were clear, the wildflowers and beargrass in full bloom, and we had the whole darn thing to ourselves.

See how sharply the foreground slopes off? The photo's not playing tricks; it really was a near-vertical scramble to the top.

Flowers, Rainier, blissful 65-degree sunshine all summer long (all 1.5 months of it!); Good God, yes, I'll take the whole state, too. It was one year ago, today, that I arrived in this place, and it still makes my heart swoon.

Humility Has Buoyancy: The Grand Canyon Entry

2010-07-11T15:58:00.001-07:00

Alan and I in the canyon.
As all vacations go, our trip to Arizona has gone by in an absolute flash. I imagined finding the time to blog along the way, but no such thing. After spending the day a *little* tense about making our flight today, Alan and I got a call from Southwest Airlines as we were on the shuttle from the rental car dropoff to the airport that our flight status has been "updated!" The d-word* was never dropped in the phone message, but here we are with two extra hours to hang out at the Phoenix airport...so bloggy blog time it is!

(*delay)

The flight down to Phoenix was lovely...good company (my first time not flying solo in quite some time!), good reading along the way, and fantastic scenery to boot:

We counted volcanoes as we flew over them: Rainier, Adams, Saint Helens, Hood, and Shasta.
We got into Flagstaff on Wednesday evening via, literally, planes, trains, & automobiles (light rail to Sea-Tac, flight to Phoenix, van shuttle from there to Flagstaff), fueled up with some fantastic brats at an Irish pub in town, and slept well that evening. Woke up at the crack of dawn to pile in for the drive to the Grand Canyon. We had reservations to bunk at Phantom Ranch at the very bottom of the canyon - reservations that have to be made at midnight 365 days in advance, and come with tasty steak dinners, temperately cool cabins to sleep in, and a stunning landscape accessible only by foot, raft, or mule.

BEFORE Photo: The crew!
We hiked down from the South Rim on the South Kaibab trail - the steeper, lesser traveled trail than the Bright Angel Trail on which we hiked out the following day. The hike down was nice, albeit a bit rough on the joints, even for the young'uns (ages of hikers ranged from 22 to 62, with some of us in every decade in between!) We mostly stayed together, told stories, laughed often, and generally took our time getting down the 7.5ish-mile trail to Phantom Ranch.

The other youthful hiking companions: Shelly (my...3rd?...cousin) and her husband Jay

We went from 79 degrees at the rim to 104 in the bottom.

Lizard.

The squirrels were really friendly.

Photo credits to Alan on this one.
We got down by early afternoon and spent the rest of the day soaking blissfully in the Colorado River...

Check out my rockin blister.

He might have looked on the verge of death, but my dad was just relishing the moment of total relaxation.

...Here's the proof that he was, in fact, having one of the best moments of his life.
With celebratory beers and steak sitting cozily in our bellies, Alan and I dashed off a couple postcards to be delivered out of the canyon by mule, and with the rest of the crew, made it through a couple rounds of Rook and a ranger program on the geology of the Canyon before all passing out in our bunks. Wake up was 4:45 a.m. the following morning for a hearty breakfast and the 9.5 mile hike back out...doesn't sound too brutal, but throw in 4500 feet of elevation climb (mostly concentrated in the relentlessly steep second half of the hike, and often in soft, deep, red sand...hello calves!) and 105-degree temperatures and miles and miles of exposed desert hiking in the sun...

Well, needless to say, it was a bit of an adjustment from my usual, deeply forested, cool hikes in Washington. Let's just say there was a lot of nuun and trail mix involved. And a hat which Alan diplomatically described as being "well...functional, at least!"

Also, we got milkshakes at the top.

AFTER Photo: The whole crew
The rest of the reunion went by far too quickly, in a flurry of good food, conversations to make up for lost time, storytelling and copious amounts of laughter, exploring Flagstaff, rough-housing with adorable kids, guzzling Grand Canyon pilsner, staying up late to share memories, and trying to figure out what the heck a second cousin twice removed really is.

I'm learning that outside of Seattle, it's near impossible for me to be "home" in any sense of the word without feeling a pretty strong storm of emotions. By "home", I mean either literal places from my past, or figurative ones...that is, in the midst of people who've been with me in my life longer than the year now that I've been in the Northwest. I know I'm incredibly fortunate to have the family - both immediate and extended - that I do, and to be able to come together like this to share good times, mix generations, pass on stories, feel that powerful sense of roots, despite the fact that we are spread out all over the country - and, in some cases, world. Nevertheless, all the shared stories and laughter and snacks on the trail couldn't keep a seemingly inevitable barrage of tears from pouring out at some point. Bah. Just struggling still, I suppose, to process that ever-simmering sense of growing up and letting go of the comforts of childhood and home and all that jazz. But such is life.

In the words of Ani Difranco...

I love my country
By which I mean
I am indebted joyfully
To all the people throughout its history
Who have fought the government to make right
Where so many cunning sons and daughters
Our foremothers and forefathers
Came singing through slaughter
Came through hell and high water
So that we could stand here
And behold breathlessly the sight
How a raging river of tears
Is cutting a grand canyon of light

Vashon Ultra Race Report!

2010-06-27T12:40:00.000-07:00

Team REI takes on yet another island!
I can officially, legitimately call myself an ultramarathoner now! Yesterday, I ran 50 kilometers - which roughly translates to about 31.1 miles - nearly five miles longer than a standard marathon, and not without coincidence, five miles longer than I'd ever run in my life before. The moment in which my Garmin rolled over from 26.2 to 26.3, and I noticed that my legs were still moving along just fine, was pretty darn exhilarating.

I didn't make my Sun Mountain mistakes; I started toward the back of the pack, and used the first mile or two as a very slow, gentle warm-up, rather than trying to push hard right out of the gates. The course was a lollipop loop course, with 3 ten-mile loops, and a bonus 1.1ish-mile loop at the beginning for all the 50K runners (there was also a ten-mile event that took off at the same time as the 50K, but skipped the 1.1 bonus loop.) I started catching 10-miler runners about half an hour in. About halfway through that first loop, something scary happened: I passed a 10-miler who said, "Hey, I've been passed by about a dozen of the male 50K-ers, but as far as I can tell, you're the leading woman!"

I had NO idea that I was leading the women's race at that point. I still wasn't sure, but a family who'd set up a makeshift aid station at the foot of the gravel driveway of their tucked-away-in-the-woods home confirmed such on my second lap. They'd cut up a bunch of watermelon, which I gobbled down with the most profound sense of gratitude, but the mom was just like, "Go, go! You're the first woman...go win this race! You're an inspiration to my girls!" It's probably good she said something, because otherwise I might have stayed and eaten watermelon there forever.

Of the three laps, the first lap was, naturally, the best: the exciting exploration of a new course, my muscles fresh and energy levels high, the adrenaline of the race just getting started in my veins, plenty of other runners still around to keep me company...I felt fantastic. The single-track portions through dense forest were gorgeous and fun to run, and with some baby hills, but nothing too aggressive elevation-wise, at least not in comparison with what I usually train on. The weather was ideal: overcast and in the 50s.

The second lap was mentally, by far, the toughest. From 11-21 miles, my body started wearing down, so I couldn't cruise the course quite as easily as I had the first time around. The 10-mile runners were already done, and the 50K-ers more spread out than before, so I was mostly running alone by the second lap. I started psyching myself out with the unknown...what if I hit the wall the way I did at 18 miles on my road marathon? What if my stomach got upset? What if I developed blisters? What if I'd been horribly overambitious and would lose all momentum, and have to walk the last lap in the same cloud of defeated disappointment that I spent the last six miles of my marathon? I was the first woman then...but what if I got passed? What if I was stupid to go out as fast as I did, even taking it as slow as I thought I was? 31.1 miles is a hell of a long distance to run...

But once I made it to the third lap, I knew it was going to be okay. Elodie came out to pace me for the final ten miles, and knowing that I'd have her at my side made things a lot easier mentally. My body was certainly more tired than ever, but I never hit a wall. I remember moments in my road marathon when I thought I was running, and suddenly notice that I was actually just walking, and be unable to either remember when I'd stopped running, or muster up the energy in my leg muscles to run even more step. That never happened this time. My last lap was the slowest, but I held a steady pace, and didn't get passed by a single soul. I still even ran up the majority of the hills.

Me with my illustrious pacer!
I crossed the finish line in 5:34:34 - far from a truly spectacular time in the scheme of the ultrarunning world, but almost half an hour faster than my secret time goal I'd hardly even admitted out loud beforehand, and a first-place finish (14th overall) for my first 50K...can't complain there! The course was spectacular, and the support along the way - the volunteers, the aid stations, the families cheering along the way, the friendliness and encouragement of other runners (so many genuine "You go girl!"s from 10-miler women that I passed on my way out on my second loop as they were just approaching their finish line) - were downright amazing. I couldn't have asked for a better first ultra experience.

It's been said that long distance races aren't even about running; they're simply eating and drinking contests. My stomach does not digest well on the run, so as much as I can, I avoid consuming more than water and the occasional GU, even on long training runs. But all the advice I got for this 50K was that fuel is more important than anything else, and I HAD to eat in order to survive that kind of distance. So I did. I stopped at nearly every aid station and ate fruit and energy chomps and the occasional handful of potato chips. I carried a 1.5-liter bladder of nuun-infused water on my back the whole race, and drank it all by the end, in addition to guzzling water and electrolytes at most of the aid stations, too. I bought squeezable packs of peanut butter and almond butter which I ate while running, in order to get some protein in my system, too. I took GU gels every hour. My stomach wasn't happy the whole time, but for the most part, it cooperated. No blisters, rolled ankles, sore knees, or serious chafing either. *Knock on wood.*

The ferry ride back to Seattle at the end of the day, post-run, post-BBQ, post awards-ceremony...
As for the aftermath? My right shin feels a little sore - but otherwise, I don't even feel like I did anything strenuous at all yesterday. I think I was more sore from my Mount Si run last week than I am now from yesterday's adventure. Such a sharp contrast, again, to the Seattle marathon last November, after which I hobbled and limped around for several days. The biggest post-run effect has just been my appetite: I can't stop eating. I had a giant breakfast this morning, and my stomach still rumbled all the way through my tutoring session. Second breakfast when I got home from that, which involved pizza and eggs and a giant bowl of granola and milk. It's been about forty minutes since I finished that, and I think I'm just about ready for first lunch now...

Yes, someday I do have to go to work again...

2010-06-23T13:58:00.000-07:00

World Cup season: The only time you can see a Seattleite wearing an American flag shirt and downing a brewski at 7 a.m.
My blog entries may make it seem as though I no longer have a job. Of the last seven days, however, I've worked five of them...I'm just like a normal working person now, instead of a crazy working person. I still have to work today, for example. But first, I woke up at the crack of dawn to go pick up my friend James and drive to the relatively new soccer bar, the Market Arms, in Ballard to meet Greg for some early a.m. World Cuppin'.

The line just to get admitted was ridiculous by 6 a.m. The game didn't start until 7 a.m. Pacific time.
Happily, we all made it in before kickoff. Unhappily, DirecTV cut out for a few minutes shortly thereafter, which very nearly resulted in riots...but happily again, it returned, and a good 20 to 50 minutes after placing our order, we even got some drinkies (the 20) and breakfast sandwiches (the 50) to enjoy with the largely scoreless, albeit fast-paced, fraught-with-tension USA vs. Algeria game.

Bloody Mary, Guinness, or Coffee...take your pick.
All 90 minutes of regulation play passed without a goal; meanwhile, in the England-Slovenia game, England led 1-0. Either Slovenia needed to get a goal in their game, or the US needed a goal in theirs, for the US to advance. Although the US dominated the entire game by far - and had even scored once, earlier on, though the referee called a somewhat questionable off sides and threw the goal out - it took until the four minutes of stoppage time for the US to finally knock one in. It looked like this:

USA scores...finally! Screams, high fives, embraces with strangers all around!

The atmosphere inside was equally celebratory.

After the game, throngs of soccer fans poured out onto the sidewalks in Ballard. Every other car coming through the intersection blared its horn, and the fans erupted into another chorus of screams and cheers.
Long live soccer!

More gazelle-ing

2010-06-22T22:22:00.000-07:00

The obligatory shoe photo.
A perfect summer day, in absolutely every way. Let me count the ways.

Woke up to 73-degree blazing sunshine. Walked down to Belltown for a yummy brunch with Seyeon at Portage Bay Cafe. Walked back up the hill together for frozen custard. Sat in the sunshine for four hours to catch up. Walked home, hopped in my car (more optimistic impulse!) and drove out east to attempt to run up Mount Si.

Miraculously, it went MUCH BETTER this time around than the last time. I actually ran up more than I hiked this time (probably 70% vs. 30%) and although it was still hard, especially the last mile, it didn't feel unreasonable to imagine that I might someday be able to run the entire thing...a feat I previously thought to be absolutely implausible.

A nice place to spend the evening

Mount Rainier in the distance

Puget Sound and Seattle skyline, as seen from the top of Mount Si

Panoramic video here:

Tomorrow's supposed to be rainy, but fortunately my plans for the day mostly involve indoor activities for once...glad I got my sunshine in today. We live in a beautiful world.

Moments of Optimistic Impulse, i.e. Sun Mountain Race Report

2010-06-21T15:28:00.000-07:00

Photo Credits to Glenn Tachiyama, from the 2009 Sun Mountain Run
Oi vey...where to begin?! I'll start with the most recent, and work backwards. My trip to Oregon last week might require its own blog entry altogether...

So. I don't know that I've mentioned it on my blog yet, perhaps out of fear of jinxing myself into injury, but I am registered for a 50K trail race on Vashon Island this coming weekend. I've been lucky to get in two training runs a week for the past few months, given my crazy schedule - but fortunately, this is not the world of road marathons with hard and fast training plans etched in stone. No, in the trail running world, it's perfectly acceptable to train when you can, register for ridiculous distances in a moment of optimistic impulse, and come race day, show up with a tub of Vaseline and a backpack of gels and snacks, pin a number to your shorts, and see what miracles your body can pull off.

In yet another impulsive fit, I decided to also register for a 25K the weekend before - a decision made some 50 odd hours before the race began. I figured I'd take it easy as a pleasant training run; I've been doing almost exclusively 2+ hour runs lately anyway, so why not make my Sunday's training run one with the company of a hundred or so other runners, in a gorgeous part of Washington state to which I'd never been before? No matter that it would be a 415-mile drive roundtrip, or that I'd have to set my alarm for 4 a.m., and didn't get home from work until 10 p.m. the night before, or that none of the five people at various points who thought they might join me for the adventure actually wound up doing so; I love a good adventure all the same, especially when running is involved.

In my usual punctuality-obsessed ways, I got to the town of Winthrop about an hour and a half early. Pumped full of adrenaline, peanut butter & jelly sandwiches, cheap gas station coffee, and useful Dutch phrases such as "De vrouwen proeven de rijst" ("The women taste the rice") from listening to my Rosetta Stone Audio Companion on the drive out, I arrived at the trailhead. I quickly found some interesting folks to chat it up with, including one guy who remembered having run with me for part of the Orcas course. It's always amazing how quick runners are to open up to each other...I walked up to this circle of people, and everyone greeted me with, "Hi! We're just talking about how we all got involved with running...divorce, Diabetes, mental instability...what's your story?!"

As for the race itself - I made my usual race mistakes and (1) accidentally started at the front of the pack, and (2) started off way too fast. It generally takes me a few miles to get into my running zone and feel good, so if I actually start off feeling good and strong, it's usually not a good sign. So this time around, while the first mile was full of happy race adrenaline, I felt trashed by the second...not a good sign when you're going 16.

After a few plodding, self-doubting miles of getting passed and being terrified I was going to epically fail to run even half the distance of what I'll be running next weekend, the course unmercifully turned into pretty relentless uphill until about mile 10.

Course profile.
Rough...though a bit of nuun at the aid station helped. Once the course dipped back into a pretty steep downhill, I got all my running zest back in an instant; I tore down the steeps and had a blast pretending to be a sprightly gazelle instead of a lethargic human who probably wound have been better off sleeping in after all.

The second half of the course was a lot of mixed terrain - some uphills, some downhills, some rolling flats, and one particularly brutal scramble up what can only be described as a near-vertical wall of dirt. (Leave it to race director James to contrive of such a thing...) Nevertheless, I felt much stronger. All these long runs I've been doing have trained my body how to keep going, even when I've been running for two, three hours already. At some point, even though I was feeling vaguely nauseous and rather ready to stop, I just shut off the entire mental soundtrack and let my body do its thing. My pace picked up. I plowed right over all the hills, rather than walking them as I had earlier on in an attempt to conserve energy. By the last few miles, I caught up with many of the people who'd passed me in the early ones. I crossed the finish line (measured by several runners' Garmins to be at 16.7 miles) in 2:45:something...not too shabby for a "training" run! (Ha. I'm incapable of not "racing" a race, I've learned.)

Because I'm lame and failed to actually take pictures at the race, and because the usual race-photographer-extraordinaire Glenn was busy prepping to shoot Western States and couldn't make it, I have no imagery to show for the day except from the drive out there on Highway 20:

I hung out at the finish line for awhile, chatting with many of the runners whom I ran stretches of the course with at different times, and enjoying some of the post-race pizza and good ol' party cups of keg beer. (I'll chalk that up as yet another reason why trail runs beat the pants off road runs.) I thought the pizza would tide me over, but two hours into my drive back to Seattle, I found myself pulling into the parking lot of this palace: a restored 1944 caboose turned Southern-style barbecue joint, with grills smoking on the patio. I wolfed down half of the Big Daddy's Brisket Sandwich (appropriate, I thought, given the holiday yesterday) and thought I'd make it to Seattle with the other half intact...no such luck either. I don't think I'd even made it past the Marblemount town limits (population: 281) before I'd devoured the whole thing. Nothing like darn good food after running your butt off. I can only hope the lingering barbecue scent has overpowered the other, less favorable smells in my car, thanks to yesterday :)

With all that said...here are a few other photos to make up for the lack thus far in this entry. They are of other various adventures in my life over the past week and a half. (And, indeed, the Oregon trip + accompanying photos will be a separate entry.)

Canoeing with Elodie!

'Twas a gorgeous day to paddle by the arboretum indeed.

We watched a few members of the Seattle Hash House Harriers play in the lake.

Sounders game! I've been lucky to get to a couple of them in the last few weeks. World Cup break now...which I've been woefully lacking in my observance of.

Hike with Wayne at Lake 22.

Mmm mountains...

Clearly, still doing too much, it seems...but at least doing most of "too much" in the great outdoors, which breathes life and energy into me :)

6 Days Until My 50K...

2010-06-20T22:07:00.000-07:00

Impulse race this morning! My post-25K legs.
Miles Driven This Week: 1,017
Miles Run This Week: 61
Miles Biked This Week: 35

Ha. Can we see which activity I'm still a beginner at?

There have been many great adventures of late, and my blog is behind on all of them...boo. Happily, though, I should actually have some time in the next day or two to get it all up to date. Oh. And...

Wines Tasted This Week: 27

Yes indeed...much to catch up on...

Round on the ends and high in the middle

2010-06-11T19:58:00.000-07:00

Watching the silent flashing yellow lights at 3 a.m. on the streets of Oberlin.
I haven't written yet about my Ohio trip, I know. As with all vacations, it came and went in a whirlwind of experiences, thoughts, conversations, moments...I feel that the trip initiated some movement and change within me, which is always productive - but writing about it in retrospect, it's difficult to capture it all. When I went to Seattle for the first time five years ago, my journal entry about it was just a mess of details. I wrote, Chai lattes, acoustic guitar on sidewalks, sketchbooks, flying fish, postmenopausal hippies, Thai food and mango bubble tea, walking everywhere, anarchy bookstores, no internet, browsing zines, pink hair, Ramen by coffeemaker, art and more art, running up 25 flights of stairs, falling asleep on windowsills, rain, thrift-store explorations, pigeons, local poets and magic tricks, the boy at Seattle's Best Coffee who thinks my name is Francesca, the drunken Scot with a lip ring who followed us around for a bit...

This trip to Ohio? Even though I saw a plethora of friends and had a zillion thoughts about myself, my past, my life path, necessary changes for the sake of my sanity...my journal's seen little of it, my blog, obviously, has seen none at all so far, and my camera only has a few sparse pictures, mostly of silly things that have nothing to do with what this trip was really about for me.

What I did get to do: Truly sleep in, on more than one occasion! See a ton of friends and acquaintances alike - Oberlin kids, Elyria kids, old professors and bosses... Have a silly night out at the Joyful Mug, and in celebration of the good ol' Midwestern cost of living, buy a round of drinks for my old co-workers. Run 13 miles at French Creek. Eat at all my old favorite Oberlin restaurants (including the Feve twice in one day...yesss.) Hang out on a lot of Oberlin porches. See the new Creative Writing House, the stunning new jazz studies building, the new bagel place in town, the new green East College developments and Oberlin's first true coffeeshop, Slow Train. Listen to Julie Taymor's commencement speech (On a scale of 10, I'd give it a 6.5, but it sure beat the heck out of Richard Haass' speech at my graduation.) Stand on a folding chair and scream my head off as graduating friends' names were called. Enjoy Giovanni's pizza and watch a stunning sunset over the lake with Alan at my side. Sit out a lovely afternoon thunderstorm underneath the Mudd library ramp. Nap in the sunshine in Tappan. Drop by the Dick's store in Elyria and have lunch with Quinn. Spend a lazy afternoon in the backyard shade with (some of) Alan's family. Walk down the middle of the road at night by myself under a full (ish) moon and listen to the crickets.

What I didn't get to do: Go to Cedar Point. Have a beer at Stubby's. Belt out a duet at Loco karaoke with Aseem. Splash around in the Arb lakes. Spend any time in Cleveland whatsoever. See Quinn perform. Ride bikes on the old rail trail. Read in any of the three books I hauled with me.

But that's all right. There will always be next time. Until then... photo album!

Iconic Oberlin photo.

Ruth*, with our delightful $4.50 plate of nachos on Agave's new sidewalk terrace.
*who will be moving to Seattle in September!

Feve burger and tots. Mmm...indeed, most of the pictures I took on this trip involved food one way or another.

The ridiculously slick new jazz studies building.

Hint hint, Seattle. See? The Midwest knows how to a Happy Hour right.

CLE Airport. Oh Cleveland...

Mini Cup o' Joe report!

Cappucino, Slow Train Coffee. This place, though not perfect, beats the pants off of JavaZone.

Slow Train Coffee interior.

The strange thing about returning to any place that was once home is that it's generally about as you left it...yet you no longer occupy the same role there. You don't have a place to call your own, nor a routine to claim - but rather, you piece together an itinerary for yourself out of familiar elements in hopes of reliving a glimpse of your past, but inevitably probably falling a bit short. The one day I made it to Black River for brunch, the coffee they gave me was bitter and lukewarm, and the sausage overcooked and hard as a rock. Go figure. The new coffeeshop, Slow Train, is awesome, but aptly named; it took nearly 15 minutes for them to handle a line of four people wanting espresso drinks. The day I ran at French Creek, it was hot as hell, with 90% humidity and mosquitoes everywhere, so it hardly felt like this blissful running spot I remembered it as...and I realize that Seattle's taught me to love running hills, of which, of course, Ohio has none.

But I suppose that the big guy in the sky is just looking out for me: if, this time around, Ohio felt like the cozy blanket it once did, it would have been hard to leave. And it wasn't. I felt I got what I needed out of it - seeing the important people, being nudged to reconnect with my biggest, original passion in this life (i.e. writing), having the time to breathe for what felt like the first time in months - and it's clear to me that since returning to Seattle, I've been in a much better, calmer, Zen-like state of mind than I have been in awhile. I was definitely in need of a vacation - but, I'm also happy to be back in my new home, where things are familiar and cozy and full of friends, decent coffee, spectacular baristas, hills aplenty, and fresh, cool mountain air.

I love checking out the patchwork farms from the plane window as much as the next person, but mountain peaks are cool, too.

Sigh. Isn't she lovely? I'm still in the honeymoon phase.

Greeted by the albino squirrel

2010-05-29T04:20:00.001-07:00

Well, I've made it to Ohio. I can't get over how strange and absolutely surreal it is that a few hours ago, I was walking briskly through the streets of Seattle under a dusky darkening sky in order to catch my light rail to the airport...I promptly fell asleep at takeoff, and woke up at 10,000 feet to a stunning sunrise eclipsing the full moon.

And now it's morning in Oberlin, and I'm back in this place for the first time in nearly a year, and it feels very odd indeed.

A couple times throughout the flight, my eyes drifted open. I'd forgotten that the moon is (nearly?) full right now - so the view was unbelievably spectacular...the moonlight was so bright it reflected off the clouds we were flying above, lending them to a sort of golden-silhouetted look, and the whole dark blanket was punctuated with occasional holes into the glittering night-lit towns on the ground below. I love red eye flights.

In the interest of not disturbing my kind host too early in the morning, I have staked out a swinging bench in Tappan Square to listen to the birds and bask in the sunshine that's pouring through the trees and evaporating the morning dew on the grass. It's so much warmer here than it is in Seattle right now. The albino squirrels are here, as they've always been, and came out to greet me.

I'm warmed by the thought of the lazy days ahead I have here to lounge in this good Midwestern sunshine, indulge in the simultaneous relief to have moved on from this place and yet still mourn the loss of my past life in this state, and catch up on some general, much-needed self-reflection.

G.O. Saves the Day Again

2010-05-25T23:26:00.000-07:00

Three work shifts today...I haven't had time for a darn thing lately, including buying myself food to eat. I somehow managed to get semi-lost between tutoring in Madrona/Capitol Hill this evening and getting up to Greenlake, and just as I was lamenting my rumbling stomach for lack of a proper dinner between everything, I turned a corner, and BOOM, there was Grocery Outlet. Like a sign from God.

Highlight of my haul this week:

'Nuff said.
Leaving on a jet plane in 72 hours...as pumped as I am to see good friends and for Black River pancakes and running at French Creek and Cedar Point and Feve tots and visiting Dick's and Great Lakes microbrews and West Side Market and Commencement and lazy afternoons at Oberlin Market...the biggest excitement on my list right now of Things to Look Forward To is just catching up on sleep. Slumber is so sweet. Speaking of which...