Peach Pie and Getting High

I started my day on Saturday 3:00 AM. I can barely sleep the night before a race, this night was no different. I ate my pre-race breakfast of oatmeal with raisins, dried cranberries and walnuts and, about 30 minutes later, a Clif Bar and a big cup of coffee.

The race Saturday morning was in Auburn, about a 45 minute drive away. Auburn, being a major university town, is more runner friendly than other places around Alabama. The course was hilly, but shady, through the neighborhoods around the University. The heat and humidity took it's toll on me, and I did not do as well as I hoped. That's the way it goes, summer in the south, so it wasn't surprising.

The Church sponsoring the run was having a Peach festival, and there were lots of free peach treats after the race. Peach Pie, Ice Cream, Cheesecake, cobbler, and the baskets of Peaches were the prizes. As if the whole south was in synch that day, I heard the Peaches song on my way to the run, and my race number was 42.

Going to the Country, gonna eat a lot of peaches...

The plan for the rest of the day was to go home, take a nap, then drive to Birmingham to do the Trak Shak 5K Retro Run that evening. This is not unusual for me, if I can find two races close-by that I can schedule in one day, I will.

After my nap, with dreams of dogs and Granddaughters, I got up and starting prepping for the evening run. I turned on the weather channel and saw a big area of rain heading for Birmingham and Montgomery. At first I thought that it would be good to run a race in the rain, I always do very well in the rain. The Trak Shak run has a big party afterword, and that would be ruined, and many people would not show up because of the rain. I'd like it, I love to be in the rain in the summer here, but most people don't like to be rained on.

I was also thinking how lovely it would be to go for a long run in the rain. So as the storm approached, I cancelled my Birmingham plans, put on my running gear, waited for the storm front to pass, and went for a long, wet, wonderful run in the rain. It rained for three hours.

The world made love to me. I was in euphoria for the rest of the evening.

Friday Book and Blog Dogging

I hear that Starbucks has these new "healthy" smoothies, so I run over and try one of the Chocolate Banana beverage/meal. It is very good. Yes, I have smoothies for dinner sometimes.

I'm standing there as they make my drink and I see this new book they are promoting The Art of Racing in the Rain a story from a dog's point of view. The author is Garth Stein



The book's narrator is a philosophical thinking dog. This will most likely be the next book I read, and the cover jacket synopsis told me this is the kind of story I'd love.

Dogs, Rain, Racing, Philosophy. It's like they are marketing directly to me. The racing is car racing, but at least they know how to get my attention.

GARTH STEIN is the author of three novels, The Art of Racing in the rain, How Evan Broke His Head and Other Secrets (winner of a 2006 PNBA Book Award), and Raven Stole the Moon. His play, Brother Jones, was produced in Los Angeles in 2005, and was hailed as "brimming with intensity" by the LA Weekly. He teaches writing to students from second grade to adult, and lives in Seattle with his family, including Comet the quadruped.

- http://www.826seattle.org

Success?

Addendum to my last post: Responding to the "great job" comment from the PostSecret postcard I posted.

The next postcard on that blog talks about how unhappy a person can become in a stressful job.

Most of my career I've had great, interesting, and seemingly important jobs. When I first started in my present career, I loved the work and would do it for fun when I wasn't working. It was software development. Slinging code is much like solving complicated math word problems, which is somewhat easy and fun for me. I don't enjoy it as much anymore, it has become so complex and mismanaged. I've been dreaming a new career, but what?

I have a great job and work with wonderful people, but I desperately want to run away from it. I've had jobs that I like better, and I've only had one job that I really hated (worked for a Major TeleCom Corporation). I'm afraid to leave a good job, not knowing what's next for me, so I stick to my "lead role in a cage", but dreaming about something else.

Some people thrive on change, others hate it. It's not so much the change that I dislike, it's the unplanned or unforeseen consequences of the change that stress me, so I stick with cold comfort.

Running over the same old ground.
What have we found
The same old fears.
Wish you were here.

I'm just rambling.........

The American Dream

When I was 35 I bought a home.

I loved the house. It was in a perfect location next to a park with easy access to hiking trails and bike paths. You could walk out the front door and bike or hike to the city, or the wilderness. For someone like me who loathes driving and dependence on a motor vehicle, the location of the place suited me well.

Even though finally I fulfilled the standard of success in the U.S., the ownership of that house was not only a heavy weight to bear, it felt like ball and chain. Almost like a virtual prison, disabling my freedom.

We sold the home four years later, as a result of my divorce. I've not had a desire to buy another home.

Why is home/land ownership an "American Dream"?
Why is it so important for us to declare "mine, mine, mine"?