One of my goals for weekends is that everyone — including me — has something fun happening that they are excited about. This weekend all four kids who are still at home had get-togethers with friends. My husband ran a half marathon on Sunday. I was registered to run the half but did not, mostly because I was not trained and also we had various kid things at church and we don’t have an extra driver on Sundays (the 15-year-old will hopefully have his license in about 6 months but…we’re not there yet). As this is one of a string of races I have signed up for and then not run I think I need to accept that I have very little desire to run long races anymore.
(The 15-year-old ran in a cross country meet on Saturday and got a significantly faster time than he ran on Tuesday, so that is exciting. At least one of us is getting faster!)
But I did have some other cool things. I met a friend for dinner on Friday at a Mexican place near her house. And on Saturday I went to Longwood Gardens, solo, because no one was all that excited to go with me. The grounds were beautiful as always, with a touch of golden September color. I enjoyed the lily pads and these (pictured) globe amaranths — “Ping pong purple” — that are just so ridiculously bright.
Another highlight: my 5-year-old starting the junior choristers program at church. We have a new co-music director, and he’s decided to revitalize the kids music program. Yesterday was the first meet-up for the junior choristers (pre-K- first grade) and they did lots of vocal warm-ups that my son has now been singing, and they started working on solfege with, of course, the song from Sound of Music. My son got the “do” part, but doesn’t really think of female deer first when he hears that word, so when we got home he kept asking me to do the “bread song.” Eventually I figured out that he was hearing “dough.” Funny!
I finally got back in the hot tub this weekend — there has been a monthlong saga of pool problems. But it seems to be 90 percent fixed so I’m hoping to enjoy that for approximately one more week before winter.
This is going to be an odd week — one of my kids referred to today as being “like Friday” and it’s true. They have two days off (Tuesday/Wednesday) for Rosh Hashanah, so that basically is an additional weekend. Kind of changes the vibe of Monday… Happy new year to all who are celebrating!
Kid interpretations of words are so funny. My 6 year old frequently asks for “the song about the sand bar” and it took a bit to figure out that he meant “A Bar Song” by Shaboozey (let’s ignore the fact that my kids love this song – we have discussed the inappropriate nature but we all agree that it’s catchy!).
I guess all our time on the sand bar in Bar Harbor, ME has ingrained that in his head so he associates every reference to bar with sand – ha!
Sounds like a great weekend for all you!
@KGC – I love it! Yep, only one kind of bar that really matters…
Hi Laura! Just an idea of a potential reframe on running. Maybe it would be easier to accept if you acknowledge that you have no desire to run long races RIGHT NOW. “Anymore” feels very final and while it may end up being accurate, you won’t really know that until you’re looking back. Maybe just considering that in this season, for whatever reason, races aren’t appealing to you will help you not sign up for more expensive t shirts (I, too, own several of these.) You could even set a time to reevaluate—say, next spring or summer? I remember reading that you hadn’t enjoyed your Maine half marathon (was that this year? Last year?) so reading this today that you’d signed up for another surprised me.
As we both know, there’s no right or wrong on doing races or not! As long as you’re staying healthy, it’s fine to acknowledge that racing used to be something you enjoyed and for whatever reason isn’t for you right now.
Happy first day of fall!
@Betsy – very true. Who knows how I will feel in the future, but right now races are expensive t-shirts so I will put a pause on signing up until maybe 1-2 years from now. We shall see!