Home Sweet Home

No bigger than a double wide trailer,
it's not the ritz, but it's comfy, and it's
mine.
Four years ago today I signed on the dotted
line, pages of them in fact, and part of the
American dream became mine.
I became a homeowner.
Well, I will be about the time I'm 80,
and it's paid off..

3:15, 3:45, 4:30, 4:45

What do these numbers have in common?
They were displayed on the face of my alarm
clock this morning, when I woke up, but didn't
have to get up.
This has been going on for almost a year, and
though occasionally I do sleep straight though
the night, it's like winning a unexpected prize
in the lottery when I do.
Stayed a few hours after work last night to file
and it's getting easier as I get more familiar with
how the number sequences are laid out.
After an hour I get in the "zone", and my
subconscious zooms in on the location of the file
I need before my eyes focus on the numbers running
up the side of the file jacket.
I'm becoming a filing zombie!
This past weekend I splurged and bought a MP3 player.
It had proved a pain at times in Roanoke to handle
the bulk of my CD player before my races and I
noticed many skaters there had IPod's or the like
hanging around their necks or in hand.
Since all I wanted was something to play my
tunes, I didn't spend a bundle, and I'm satisfied
with the one I picked up at Radio Shack.
I still have to figure out how to transfer music
to it but the IT guy at work, Joe D. , is going to
show me how today.
He is super in helping non-tech people out even if
it isn't work related.
Once I get ear buds to my liking, I'll be in heaven :)
Music is such a mood/energy enhancer for me..
Like doing doing speed without any of the bad side
effects.
On the way home last night I felt the weight work
of Monday in my triceps and a few other places.
To be expected I suppose with the length of time
I've been away from a gym.
Coaches opens tonight at 7pm and I'm looking forward
to getting back on the slideboard and working on my
technique.

Metalurgy

Hit the gym last night for the first time in
over two months.
No membership fee, no locker room, no towel
service.
Just metal plates, Olympic bars and a rack of
dumbbells.
That and two slide boards.
Like the hard core boxing gym in "Rocky",
this no frills set up is for getting down to work,
not picking up a date.
What it lacks in amenities, it more than makes
up for in camaraderie among friends.
Eight of us moved around each other taking
turns at one station and then the next, sharing
space, stories and a few laughs.
Can't ask for a better way to spend an hour.
Around 8pm I said goodnight, and left the jovial group
to finish up without me.
In a cold car, pulling away from my coaches
house, I could smell a hint of iron on the palm of
my hands.
Heard a bit of bad news last night.
One of my favorite older skaters has thrown
in the towel and has given up the sport.
Sad news for me.
Not sure of the real reason and I wonder if he
even knows yet.
Life outside the speed team had taken up much
of his time in the past four or five months, and
when he returned to practice things weren't what
he expected or hoped for.
The more things change, the more things stay
the same..
We were the same people only going faster.
He was the same person, only going slower.
Being away for so long from our differing personalities,
a few perhaps challenging, I think we irritated him.
Well, it's not like I haven't jumped a ship or
two and I wish him joy in what ever waters
he lands in.
Other bad news.
No practice till Thursday night.
And a League Meet on Sunday.
Ack!
I've had enough racing to last me a few weeks..
I'm really not in the mood...

Pennies

Every morning I get out of bed with a pain free back is
money in the bank.
It might be stiff, and a little sore, but even that is lessening.
I can sneeze now without a 5am lower back seizure.
Good stuff!
With working all day Saturday, yesterday was busy with
errands and backed up household chores.
The parking lot at the local Giant was packed and I thought
perhaps I'd missed the news about Armageddon.
Usually I don't grocery shop on Sunday, but obviously the
rest of my town does.
More than likely it was on oncoming snow storm that had
folks freaked out and running for a gallon of milk.
Well, I can wait in a checkout line with the best of them.
Skipped our 4pm practice.
A rest day was called for, if you call everything I
accomplished rest.
There was no guilt about it.
Sometimes you need a break.
Weight training tonight, and it will be my first visit to
our coaches basement gym.
Looking forward to it.

Onward

Last night, realizing that the big lead up and adventure
of the BRC in Roanoke is one to put away in the drawer,
it occurred to me that Nationals is less than 4 and a half
months away.
Ichee Mama!
Our coach has ramped speed practice down several notches
and is turning us towards more technique and strength work
in preparation.
This includes beginning practice with new warm up exercises
off skates, and afterwards booting up and taking to the track in
the opposite direction.
Now indoor speedskating is all about, "go fast, turn left".
I've been going that direction for 3 years.
Changing is like going to Europe for the first time and
having to drive on the other side of the road.
Some habits are just hard to break.
Amazingly, it's not as difficult as I thought it would be.
Not like I don't stink at it, but considering it took me
years to learn how to scooter push with my right foot,
I'm shocked I can do anything close to it with my left.
Five or ten minutes going "right", works that quad big
time, and the right glute along with it.
Good stuff though.
For a switch we did 100 laps at the end of practice and
I thought our coach had lost his mind.
The pace was kept down so as many people as possible
could stay in for the whole thing, and I was happy that
one of them was me.
We each cycled through as leader every 5 laps.
Being the next to last person on the countdown,
I wanted my "5" of 95 to be strong, put my mind to it
and made it so.
Boy did my hamstrings feel it when we were finished.
I had a hard time standing up straight as we rolled it out..
Monday we start weight training in earnest.
Coach has put much work into buying and setting up a
weight room in his basement for the Team to use.
With my lower back on the fritz I wasn't able to participate
before the BRC.
It wasn't worth the risk of making matters worse,
but now I can get to work.

Spent almost 9 hours yesterday in the file room at the
Ford dealership whittling down the huge back log of RO's
that need to be sorted and put away.
Didn't have as much to show for it by the end of the day
as I would have liked, it's very slow going, and hell on your
hands.
By the looks of it I have several months of Saturdays ahead
of me to get caught up.

Posing

The photo I had my son put up to replace the one on
"Stillwater Heron" surprises me each time I see it.
Why?
Because I don't see myself so dark, or chunky, or
boyish.
Funny.
When I met my biological father for the first time,
we of course, compared looks, among other things.
He's 76yrs old now, and totally gray, but to him I
noticeably take after his side of the tree.
Lucky me, he has numerous albums of family photos.
Generations of relatives. All back in the old country.
Swedes and Germans, not blond as I would have
imagined, no, dark haired, all of them.
Well, a few of the Germans were blond..the ones in
uniform..
The slanted, hooded eyes are a family trait too.
I saw, but didn't see.
The them, in me.
As I met extended family, they would comment,
"oh, you have the dark looks of grandmother so and so".
Didn't mean much and I never thought about it.
The inner picture I carry around, of what I look like,
had pretty much been set in stone long before I ever
met Dad.
Hair styles have come and gone, long, short, long, and
now short again.
Weight went on and came off, but in my head, and in
the mirror every morning, I was unchanged, except
for some age lines and changing skin tone.
Pesky things.
The pictures I have from Roanoke show me as my father
sees me, as the DNA laid me out.
As everyone else must see me.
A "sturdy girl", with dark hair and a boyish hair style.
I wonder where I got the other picture?
The more feminine one.
Was it created from the desire to be other than I am?
Ah well, if wishes were promises, I guess I'd look different.
But that's not how the game is played.
Besides. I was a blond once.
A box blond.
Didn't turn out the way I hoped it would..
Looked pretty stupid in fact.
Just wasn't "me"..

New Beginnings

"Where ever you go, there you are."
At least that's what the sages say.
Stillwater Heron, my first blogging effort, was a great
way to get up and running on the Internet.
In retrospect, I find it hard to believe I kept it going for
or so long.
My Heron blog changed as I changed.
Starting out as a runner, I turned back into a skater.
And it was a worthy venue to measure growth.
I reached out, and many people reached back..
Strangers and friends.
Blogs are kinda like open letters to the world aren't they?
Anyway, this is a fresh cover to an ongoing story.
One that only ends when I do.