back on the trails again

it's been a terribly long time since i posted! i am indeed still doing the portland marathon in october, i just sent over my recommitment paperwork last week. i found an awesome new set of trails to walk on, and aside from my slump, i'm feeling pretty good about walking!

boring park walk!

i'm getting a bit faster, but tonight i did the same old walk around the park. five laps, for 11, 535 feet, which is just a bit over 2 miles, in 1/2 an hour. since the days are getting longer, there are more and more people at the park later in the day, and tonight i saw a whole bunch of kids using the tennis courts. as a teenager, tennis was pretty much the only sport i would engage in of my own volition, so i like to watch other people play.

i know that the optimal time of day for a brisk walk or run probably isn't after 7 p.m. but that just happens to be the time of day i like to go out. plus, i work until 5 most days, so by the time i get home and have a snack and downshift from work mode to home mode, it just happens to be 7 anyway. the way i see it, if i work for 10 hours and then still work out, then there really can't be a bad time for that, right? right.

distance walked: 2 miles
time: 30 minutes
listened to: ugly duckling

ugh

i am going to be perfectly honest here: i don't want to go walking tonight. i haven't wanted to go walking since the last time i went, which was sunday. (sunday! four days of sloth!) even sunday, i didn't want to go. i admit i was glad i went once it was over, but getting myself out of the house was a bit of a task.

my uncle died last week. what we thought was MDS ended up being an aggressive liver cancer that most likely mimicked MDS by invading his lymphatic system and blood. a tumor cut off the blood supply to his liver as well as his kidneys, and an hour after being admitted to the hospital's ICU unit, he was in a coma that he never woke up from.

i was pretty sure i hated cancer before, but right now? i'm so furious i could spit fire.

i go back and forth between wanting to just go back to bed for a few more days (weeks, months, whatever) and wanting to do something. training for this marathon, walking when i don't want to, seem so small in comparison to what my father, uncle and family has been through. at the same time, i'm still grieving. i miss my pop, i miss my uncle. they were best friends; met in the navy and cobbled together a new family. they used to get into these huge, yelling discussions about politics/religion/military stuff, and end it with a beer and laughs. losing my father has been hard on me, but losing the man who knew him best besides my mother is like losing a part of him all over again. besides his connection to my pop, though, he was just a really great man. he loved his wife and kids, and i never met anyone who didn't have something nice to say about him. he gave me my first real job, he ate my food (and when i was a teenager, i was pretty much the worst cook ever), he supported my weird creative forays, he helped me pick out my first car, he introduced me to T Rex, he gave good advice and always let me know that he thought highly of me. i was, and always will be, proud to have been a part of his life.

so yeah, i'd rather be in bed crying, but maybe before that i'll take a few laps around the park.

nothing exciting!

today i went out and walked five laps around maiben park. i did some math on that, and if one lap is 2307 feet, then five is 11535 feet. a mile is 5280 feet, so five laps is a little over two miles.

i also discovered my first blister, on my left heel. i knew it was sore, but when i actually went to look, i found the jerk hanging out down there. honestly, i am seriously grossed out. luckily my boyfriend used to be an avid runner and not only is he not grossed out, but he gave me some advice about taking care of it. still, it's gross.

distance walked: 2 miles
time: 45 minutes
listened to: jimmy eat world. yeah, i know i'm too old for it, but i don't care. i love an earnest rock song!

Padilla Bay Trail

on saturday i went out to padilla bay to walk their shore trail. i brought my camera along with me to talk some photos, but left it in the car because i didn't want to carry it all along the trail. i should have just gotten it after i was done walking and taken some photos, but by the time i finished i was tired and wanted to go home. the light also wasn't as good as it had been when i got there! i saw a lot of amazing things, though. quite a few herons, which are my very favorite bird, including some flying. have you ever seen a heron fly? they give me the willies a little (honestly, most of my favorite animals do. i have the same reaction to deep sea cephalopods.). they're just so...pterodactyl looking in flight. it's not hard to believe that dinosaurs became birds when you see a heron come swooping down from the sky. i also saw a bunch of rabbits, some swallows, a few terns and a whole bunch of cute dogs walking around with their people. i hit the park at about 6:30 in the evening; i kind of like to take my walks later in the day. it was still nice and sunny, and the trail wasn't too overly populated with other walkers and runners.

the padilla bay trail is 2 and a quarter miles each way, all flat, gravel trail. on one side you have skagit farmland, and on the other you have estuary flats. the trail itself is built on the dike, and it's a nice, easy trail for walking. i saw lots of families out wandering around, and if you just want to go out for a stroll, they also have benches for sitting and admiring the view as well as port-a-potties at the end of the trail and at the parking lot at the head of it.

distance walked: 4 and 1/2 miles
time: 1 hour and 20 mins
listened to: mos dub and some lady gaga. i'm telling you, gaga is great for walking!

whooo!

i got my first donation today! i felt so awesome that i sent out some fund raising letters this morning too. not to sound too hokey, but doing this marathon/charity feels really good. not only do i dig on all the walking, but it feels good to raise money for a worthwhile cause.

it is a crazy beautiful day in the neighborhood, so i think since i'm feeling all awesome and motivated, i'll go get ready for a nice walk and take some photos while i'm out. that way you can see all the cool places we have to walk in the skagit valley.

welcome!

i am not much for exercise. let's just get that out of the way first. i have never been the type of girl who made time to go to the gym, jogged around the neighborhood, or even hustled to answer the phone. the things i like to do can all be done in bed or on the couch; reading, knitting, embroidering, drawing silly little comics. i prefer activities that can be done with a cup of coffee in one hand. running has never appealed to me, and i am terribly self-conscious doing it in public.

that being said, this year i surprised the hell out out of myself and signed up to participate in a half marathon. why would i sign up? because it's a half marathon that raises money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, and i have a bone to pick with lymphoma. a few years ago, my pop was diagnosed with T-cell lymphoma. the subsequent treatments were difficult for everyone, especially him, and about a year after he's finished being radiated and chemo-ed, he passed away in his sleep. technically, the cancer didn't get him, but it did make him weak, and definitely didn't help him live any longer. cancer went from being something on the periphery of my consciousness to being a major part of my life. i went from not knowing anything about cancers of the blood to knowing more than i wanted. going through this with my family, i realized how awful it is that anyone has to go through it; not just us. on the one-year anniversary of his death, i decided i wanted to raise some money for research in his honor. i wanted people to know how amazing my dad was, and how unfair i feel to have lost him so early. i'm doing it because i miss him, because it's upsetting that his granddaughter didn't get to spend more time with her Pop-Pop, because my fiancée and my future step-kids didn't get to know him, because when he passed away i realized how many people cared about him, and about my family. i'm lucky to have such amazing, loving people in my life, and i want to be able to pass some of that on.

i'm going to use this website to document my training as well as my fundraising status. i need to raise $2,400 by October 10th in order to participate in the Portland Marathon. if you'd like to contribute, there's a button on the sidebar that will take you to my Team in Training page.