Someday could be today

Just random thoughts as I'm trying to see what regular writing would feel like. I'm sure my themes will be the tried and true topics of goals for the new year, where I am in my various self-improvement projects. I may try to practice writing about bigger things outside of my life. I would like to eventually shift to writing more about things beyond my long held but little progressed against fitness and reading goals. The fitness and reading goal posts are easy to write as the topics require little actual thinking. I'm just reflecting on what I'm not doing to achieve something that I say that I want. Maybe writing about my thwarted efforts to develop certain areas of my life will get me to actually work on doing something in those areas. My biggest problem with achieving any substantial effort towards a stated goal is a lack of energy to pursue activities related to that goal. My wife and I both feel a difficult to capture friction on our effort to get in better shape and just use energy to improve our lives. It's just an energetic malaise. I just want to sit on the couch and do something passive. Reading takes too much effort. That's partially from the books I've been reading, but it's also a lack of motivation to engage in activities with a more subtle emotional return. I'm looking for a more obvious emotional energy hit. My lack of doing anything more than watching TV or scrolling on my phone has made reading or writing posts like this more effortful. It's not a pleasant experience. The flow state has become impossible elusive. 

Once deeply meaningful and rewarding tasks feel empty. The pleasure I used to take from reading a good book or working on something interesting (however disconnected from improving my life in some kind of tangible physical way) is a thin imitation of what it once was. I still get excited when I get to work on a deeply scientific problem at work. Making sense from various bits of data that don't look related remains a source of pleasure, but my current work place doesn't offer an appreciative audience for my work. I can get all geeked up about a solution to a problem, but there is no venue for me to share what I've learned. I know when an approach to a problem was clever or inaccessible, but the people I work with just want the problem solved. I spent years learning how to solve hard problems, but my coworkers just want the problem solved. I used to work in a place full of people like me. They knew when a problem was hard and the solution was a real accomplishment. Now, people are impressed with easy answers to obvious problems. What I can do is taken for granted because it's not understood. My wins don't really resonate while my loses resonate. 

My emotional energy used to get filled up by the opportunity to work on interesting things in an environment that valued the work and recognized the value I delivered. That fuel has been gone from my life for a long time, and I haven't done anything to find a different way to gratify that need to feel valued, needed, and competent. My initial thought on what to write when I pulled out the computer was some kind of plan to refresh my approach to doing more with my time than watch games and be amused by social media posts. Hopefully trying to reframe my long standing goals would help me see a way to get being better a key part of my life again. I've just been being for too many years (Covid is the most convenient marker for the shift). Sticking with the marathon plan isn't a big deal as long as I get out to run a few miles. Read a few books because reading is a central pillar of my identity but those big, ambitious books you bought all those years ago can wait another year. You will eventually drop the weight. All these things are out there for you to have someday. 

I've lived my life with being on the brink of something a good enough proxy for actually realizing the goal. Anticipation is enough. Realization is not necessary. Applying to and getting accepted to law school is fine. Actually going isn't necessary. Being in a position to become a director or some bigger job is just fine. I don't need the job. The recognition that I have the potential to do the job is fine. I don't need to read War and Peace or Middlemarch or any of my other numerous important literary books. The idea for a Substack is just fine. Writing posts that make that idea a thing other people can engage with is irrelevant. Wanting to lose weight is fine (just don't gain weight). Knowing I could achieve a better marathon or heavier lifts is just fine. I don't actually need to do it. I like the idea of doing these things. I like the idea of the person I would see myself as if I did those things, but the effort needed to actually achieve that goal isn't really necessary. At least that's the story.I seem to tell myself when I don't have the energy to take the steps needed to actually improve my life. 

I would really like to get off my high blood pressure medication. I assume I could do that if I lost 20 or 30 pounds. This would put me right at my long stated goal of weighing around 200 pounds. To lose weight I need to improve my diet. Improving my diet means finding something not processed for breakfast and taking my chicken and baked potato for lunch. I could eat whatever T cooks for dinner and limit dessert to once or twice a week. Increasing my running volume back to the point where 10 miles is a pretty easy run (there was a time in my life when that was true) would provide plenty of physical movement (along with staying consistent at the gym and evening walks). My weight would likely go down. Would it settle at 200? I don't know because I have never tried. 

There are so many books that I say I would like to read, but I never actually pick the book up and try to read it. War and Peace, The Count of Monte Cristo, Swann's Way. These are books I could read, but I don't want to exert the effort to get through them. I'm making a choice. What would it take to get through them? Fifteen minutes while watching TV in the evening? T has been reading at night. She's going to be back in classes next semester. The time is there. I just have to choice to use it. The days for me to ba able to say that are getting limited. I still have time to make these things happen, but someday needs to start being today.

Marathon training week 3 recap

Any week I get out and do all 3 runs is good. Making one of those a double digit run is even better. That was week 2. Two solid 4 mile runs during the week and a decent 10 miler on Saturday. I actually ran most of the 10 miler this week too! The weather was more agreeable to a long run this week, cloudy with a breeze and cooler terms than my 10 miler.a couple of weeks ago. I carried water for a couple of miles and had it stashed behind a bush for pickup towards the end of my run. These things all helped me get in a pretty good long run. My 8 mile run the week before was also decent. All in all, I'm pretty pleased with my training so far. My standard is pretty low, just staying consistent and getting in the miles, but I have no problem with this being the state of my running. I've been faster but I'm fine with where I am. 

I was looking through pictures I had taken on October11 through the years and saw that I had run 10 miles 8 years ago. My pace was a little under 9 minutes a mile. I finished the run in about an hour and a half. I would love to be able to run at that pace now, but I can't. I'm older. My commitment to running isn't what it was all those years ago. I'm about 15 pounds heavier. It's hotter in Florida. My life has changed in so many ways since that run. I'm still out putting in the miles. I could have stopped running years ago, but I'm still getting out a few mornings a week. I have no plans to stop any time soon. 

Marathon 7 week 1 training recap

My official training cycle for my 7th marathon kicked off this week. Not that all the training I've been doing for the last couple months wasn't so building up to this. The mileage was fine. I was a little over 17 miles for the week. This is much better than my kick off week last year so I will take this as a good first step. My weekday runs were decent enough. I cut my Thursday run short because I got out a little late and, knowing a 10 miler was my plan for Saturday, I didn't want to ramp up the mileage too fast. The 10 miler was miserable. I paced myself alright for the first half of the run. I've been doing kind of a run the first half of my long run distance and then walk / run as needed after that for the last couple of months. I figure staying on my feet and walking with an elevated heart rate beats limiting myself to what I can run with no breaks. I pushed this strategy to its bounds during my 10 miler. I pretty much walked the last 2.5 miles or so. I walk a ton during the marathon so I figure there is nothing saying I can't walk during the training too. I definitely need to carry water with me when I'm running for more than an hour or so. I also need to actually eat before heading out. One Pop-Tara isn't going to get the job done. I stopped at my gym and bought a Gatorade around mile 9. I needed something extra in my system to get me home. I tried running a bit after that but it was rough. Better to take it easy. This is only week 1 of the cycle. 

I did my non-running training as well. I rowed 5000 m Monday night. That was more challenging than it should have been. I went to the gym to lift twice (slow service at dinner Friday night kept me from meeting my 3 session goal) and did 15 minutes on the stairs today. I need to work the ab work back in. All in due time. 

This is a good start. Over 15 miles a week (it took me until late October to get over that mark last year) is the minimum I should be doing at this stage. Week 2 will be a bit of a departure from the normal workout schedule as I will be traveling towards the end of the week, but I built those plans into my workout schedule. I will get in 3 runs. The timing will just be a bit different. 

I can't run right now, but I can still prepare for the marathon

I wasn't exactly tearing up the streets with all my running miles prior to my injury, but getting out there three days a week is a constant cadence in my life. I'm continually surprised when I realize how central training for the WDW Marathon has become to my fitness life. I really shouldn't be. I've pretty much always had a race that defined my running effort. It was the Monument Avenue 10K up until the race stopped during Covid. It never resumed for me. It was some stupid virtual thing in 2021 (after all the monuments had been ripped out) and I moved away later that year. So my focus shifted to the WDW Marathon. I'm still marathon focused, but I added the half marathon to my weekend this year. I was planning on using this time post Springtime Surprise 10 Miler to start building up some distance in preparation for the many miles I need to run to have a solid Marathon weekend, but I'm limping around with plantar fasciitis or some other foot/heel ailment. I haven't run in almost 2 weeks. My foot definitely feels better, but I know I will just reaggravate the injury if I try to run. So I'm being patient and letting things heal up. I'm hoping that I can get back out there next weekend. I will be at WDW with my wife. Maybe I can try a short run on Sunday just to see how things feel. 

In lieu of being able to run, I should really be focusing on other things that I can do to get better prepared for the marathon. Resume ab work (I say that like I didn't stop doing ab work regularly back in 2020 and haven't even done my 5 days of 50 butterfly kicks in almost 3 years). That's just lazy. It takes a minute or two to do that work. Pick a time and just do it! I'm putting on weight, just like I do whenever I get injured and stop running regularly. Dropping 15 or 20 pounds would make a huge difference during my Goofy Challenge. Stop eating dessert. Stop snacking. Take a few easy steps to make your life and health a little better for crying out loud! Get back to the gym. I've realized I just really don't like lifting at the Y. I'm hoping to sign up for the new Crunch tomorrow (I'm off for Good Friday). All of these things will be good building blocks towards marathon success. 

The biggest obstacle to a sustained focus on my physical fitness has been my mental energy. I'm so defeated and drained by the end of the week, it's a struggle for me to really engage with my workouts. It's been a just doing it to get it done kind of thing since I moved to Florida. There has been a big change at my workplace that I'm hoping will reduce the amount of mental and emotional energy I dedicate to my job. This could be a huge development for my physical training. I'm so accustomed to dealing with the mental stress that I hadn't realized what it would feel like to have it go away. I'm starting to see that option, and I'm cautiously optimistic that I can regain a sense of calm and order that was so central to my ability to stay disciplined and focused on my workouts 5 or 6 years ago. I very much want to get back to that space. This change in work (same job, just a change in my organization leadership) could be huge to restoring a key aspect of my life.   

Infinite loops

The big news in my life today was seeing that Nintendo is bringing the NES version of Tetris to Switch Online. The teenage version of me is very excited to have the chance to play this version of the game again. I have an NES system and a Tetris cartridge, but it's a hassle to get it all set up and my controllers are not in the best shape. The change to revisit this staple of my young life is an exciting prospect. I play plenty of Teris 99, but the NES version has been the one that I have played the most (with the original GameBoy version a close second). I'm not sure if it's pathetic that this kind of news is exciting for me or if I should be more of an adult and not return to youthful things like this. I'm 48. Did I freeze as a person when I was a teenager? Did I just latch onto a few things I really enjoyed and just stick with it?

I'm sure I've discussed this elsewhere in these many posts, but the prominence of things from my youth in my adult life is something that I continue to find striking. I'm wearing a Cobra shirt as I type this for crying out loud! The details and decorations of my life have obviously changed over time, and I've experienced the big life events that mark our transition through key life stages. The core of my life, the supporting structure that holds up all this other stuff, still feels very similar to me. My approach to life, what I pursue and what I avoid, doesn't feel like it's shifted much over the decades. If I hadn't gotten married and had kids, it would probably look very similar. Replace school with a job, and you would still see me playing video games, reading books, and doing things like this (I've had many paper journals over the years). 

I don't know why I have an expectation that I would undergo some kind of personality/interest shift as I age. I certainly had a hope that I would get over the issues that caused me angst when I was younger. The fantasy of a superior future version of me was a constant source of reassurance. I could turn to a fantasy of a time when I was no longer awkward in social situations, comfortable with girls, and confident in my value, capability, and worth. My reading, video games, and unloading my feelings into things like this were how I coped with my issues. My continued reliance on these activities imply that I"m still in the pattern of sheltering myself from life by hiding in these fantasy spaces. I haven't made a concerted effort to work through the issues that prevent me from making my fantasy future a real future. Let's not pretend that this is a simple process. It's very difficult. There is a reason most people just kind of bump through life following the same pattern over and over again. 

I have some very concrete examples of how my old patterns repeating are keeping me from having a superior life experience. Let's bring the past version of myself into contract with my current life. I was not very successful with the ladies in high school. Now, looking back, I can see that was more from a failure to act more than any disinterest from the girls in my circle. I was certainly given hints and subtle invitations to pursue relationships and the kind of physical experiences that I so desperately wanted. And these weren't girls I was interested in. My first huge crush opened the door for me a few times. There were certainly suggestions and hints dropped when I was in college by girls I would have been happy to spend some time with doing interesting things (and some girls that were not quite as appealing). I've been married for 25 years and I'm still not responding to hints and suggestions about how I can spend more time naked in bed with my wife. She's told me what she needs, many times, but I haven't made a conscious and consistent effort to do what she needs. Telling her that she's beautiful is not exactly some terribly difficult task. Unfortunately, one of those support structures holding up the rest of my life is something about not sharing how I feel about other people. I've always suspected that there is an element of self-protection at the core of this pattern, but some deep seated protective strategy that is either just inherent to my personality or a strategy I adopted very early in my life has kept me from having experiences that I would really like to have had. But I'm still doing it! What am I protecting myself from? I'm expecting my wife to do what I need but not do what she needs? That was the pattern that kept me a loser loner in high school. I adopted this inaccurate self-perception when I was very, very young and I've never taken the effort to overcome that powerful pattern as I've matured and gained more control over how I live my life. 

I like to play it safe. It's better to take what I can for little to no risk than put a little something on the line to get more. The really sad part of that statement is that what I was afraid to put on the line, some sense of emotional security and safety, is only as real as I allow. Rejection (which, as noted above, was actually a low risk because I was getting signs that interest was mutual) is only a risk to my mental state. There is no physical risk. I just had to develop a mindset that would allow me to deal with that emotional state. It's the same thing that I'm dealing with in offering my wife compliments. The risk is only a perception in some irrational part of my psyche. I'm locked in a pattern. Am I strong enough to put in the work to break it?

We'll see. I need to go download the GameBoy version of Tetris on my Switch. 

Be Bold?

I've been reading a book about how different cultures define masculinity. David Gilmore, the guy who wrote the book (Manhood in the Making), not the guy from Pink Floyd, is circling around the idea that the definition of manhood is rooted in a need to get men to take on important economic tasks needed in a particular culture. It's an older book, it was written in the 80s, so there is more Freud than I find useful and he never really explores the simple idea that the masculine ideal in a society is rooted in the characteristics of the men who rose to positions of power and influence. Certain types of guys tend to rise to the top when resources are limited. The pushy assholes happy to exert themselves on the world to get whatever thing (status and sex mostly I would guess, mostly sex as status puts you in a position to get more sex) usually win these zero sum games. The template for success is established, and the next generation(s) just keep going after that same idea. Masculinity has a glint of a cultural success algorithm.

A long time half joke that is also a half (or more?) truth about me is that I have a feminine coded brain in a distinctly male body. I started making this joke when I read that males who write well may have had their brain exposed to higher levels of estrogen in the womb. I'll leave it to you to decide if what I'm putting down here qualifies as good writing, but I will say that my verbal abilities are well above the male average. Whatever the hormonal composition of my uterine environment, I have never really demonstrated the masculine ideal of boldly pursuing limited resources. It has always seemed like my body responded to testosterone, but my brain kind of sloughed it off and was content to lay low and take the passive path. I know I have touched on my ambush strategy to important life pursuits, but that preferred style frequently puts me at odds with the way a man is expected to behave.  

Years ago, I don't remember the exact date but I think it was maybe the early 2010s, I was questioning the value of my focus on my various side projects. I was wondering if they were anything more than distractions. Maybe I should take time to learn about Bitcoin or explore a business rather than writing Amazon reviews, applying to law school, or getting an MBA (to list the more potentially useful channels of my mental energy). Of course I didn't do those things. Would my life look much different if I had? I'm not a very big risk taker, kind of the point of this whole entry or maybe the blog itself, so it's unlikely I would have put more than a token amount of money into Bitcoin or any other investment that I may have identified. I've never felt compelled to take the big risk in any life domain. Drifting along has always just seemed so much easier. 

It's getting late so I don't want to start a whole new line of thought here, but my often pondered health and reading pursuits are not going all that well. As usual, there are many reasons for this, but a big one is me just not putting in the energy to make something happen. I have a vision, it's small and personal but it's a vision, but I'm not doing much to make that vision a reality. Lots of reasons why this isn't happening, but the choices I make are a big part of this issue. Getting up to run tomorrow before it gets too hot is a big part of marathon training success. That's why I need to stop now and go to bed.

Resolution reset (or not so much?)

Tis the season to once again set up a stack of goals and ambitions that I will in all likelihood fail to accomplish. I've been doing this long enough that I have fully adopted the idea that setting up these goals gives me direction and intention that I lack without them. I would definitely like to accomplish more of my goals, but I am fine with making progress without necessarily achieving the goal. 

But what would it take to achieve the goal? I was thinking about the organizational axis of my life when I was in high school/college. I could have been focused on making money or getting women or being really good at football. I was focused on academic achievement as a validation seeking behavior. My life long habit of doing enough to be well above average but not the very top performer was set during this time. I became very proficient at finding the low risk route that would yield comfortable results with significant but not all encompassing effort. That's kind of how these resolutions work. I set a goal, make some progress, but never really sell out to do really well on at least one of my resolutions. Had I organized my life around making money I would have found ways to take bigger risks. Lower risk paths can get you to comfortable security, but really outsized results require taking more chances. (Just to be clear, I'm not regretful about the choices of my younger self, I'm just trying to think about what a different approach would have looked like.) Taking risks doesn't mean guessing that something will work and going all in on that path. It just means identifying and pursuing opportunities. 

It also means taking a different approach. That's what I should be more open to as I pursue different outcomes to rephrased but essentially the same resolutions that I've been pursuing for years. Taking a different approach to reading would be embracing the idea of reading what sounds interesting when it's time to pick a new book. I haven't finished a book in weeks. That's mostly because the books that I've been trying to read, volume 2 or the Malone's Jefferson bio and Oliver Twist, are not books that I crave reading. I faced this problem last year and I just slogged through long books that were just boring. Maybe next year it's more about progress than depth, significance, or validation seeking. (I did start reading the memoirs of a professional gambler on my phone. In two days I've made more progress in that book than Oliver Twist.) 

I was also reflecting on the role that running played in my life when I was training for my first marathon. Running provided a challenge. I get plenty of challenge from my job these days. Running is just as much emotional and mental as physical. Overcoming emotional and mental fatigue has been my biggest obstacle since moving to Florida. I run out of habit more than anything else. My big distance goals and training for the marathon have kept me running consistently. I'm pretty sure I would have all but abandoned the habit if not for those challenges to keep me moving. The beginning of my run this morning was challenging. I've had my mom at my house for five days and spent all day yesterday driving her to Daytona (and then driving back home). I'm still recovering from months of work challenges. My emotional energy tanks are drained. I just didn't have much to pull from to keep myself out there in the cold and rain. I took a walking break after 3 miles. After I recognized that my emotional energy was low my run suddenly improved. I stopped fighting to keep running and just ran. I also throttled back a bit on my pace which probably helped a bit. I need to just run and not get wrapped up in all the drama of my life. I may not want to run, but that doesn't mean my body isn't capable of running.

So I will try to read more books next year (while buying fewer). I will try to drop a few pounds while sticking with the running habit. I will work on getting back into the gym regularly and put in meters on the rowing machine. 

Heading to Richmond, what to do?

I get to spend a little over 24 hours in my old community this weekend. The question is how to best spend that time. I expect that I will be largely on my own with no obligations or commitments until right before we leave. I don't want to waste the day just hanging out in the hotel, but I also don't want to just go the entire time. There are restaurants where I would like to eat and an ice cream place that I will visit at some point during the day. Let's break down the day and see what kind of plan I can put together (because if I play it by ear I will just drive around and not really do anything). 

We arrive around 8:30. By the time we get off the plane and pick up the car it will be 9. It will take a half hour or so to get to where I will be dropping off my son so he can hang out with his friends (the purpose of the trip). Let's just say I start being on my own at 10. I plan on picking up breakfast while driving so that won't take any additional time. I don't expect that I will be able to check into our hotel until after noon. That leaves me with two hours to fill. 

I stumbled on a live stream from a railroad crossing in a small town about 20 minutes north of Richmond. I thought it would be funny to drive up there and wave to the camera so my wife can see me during the trip. I think I head that way as soon as my drop off is complete. I won't have any place to hang out other than the rental car so taking a half hour to drive up there will give me something to do. Parking, finding the camera, and putting on my little show will take 15-20 minutes. It's getting close to 11 at this point. Assuming I can get a day pass to my old gym, I think I would like to get in a workout. By the time I drive down there, get changed, workout, and get back into my regular clothes, it's a little after 12. First big decision time. Where do I get lunch? There is a fun place to get Asian/Mexican fusion dishes on the way to the hotel. A quick take out order from there would be a good choice. I could get unique food and head over to the hotel. Baseball games will be starting at 1 so I can eat while checking out some games on which I have placed a few dollars in wagers. After lunch, I will be taking a nap. No doubt about that.

Let's say I'm awake from my nap and ready to do something around 3. I want to spend some time reading. I'm not sure for how long I want to read, but let's see what the rest of my day looks like if I read for an hour. It's now 4ish. I will likely eat dinner at 6 so I have a couple of hours. The only things I really miss about Richmond are being able to bet and the beer. I will already be betting so maybe this is the time to get some beer. The closest brewery to the hotel is Hardywood. Not my favorite but they have plenty of good options. They also usually have some bottles that I would be able to drink in a single night. Other breweries have better beer, but they are a good 30-40 minute drive from the hotel. I could go get a 4 pack from The Veil or The Answer, but I wouldn't be able to finish all 4 of them. Let's say I decide to do this. A trip to The Veil would be long enough that I would likely just go get dinner right after. Dinner is an easy choice. Rico's. We'll say I finish dinner around 6:30. I'm planning on taking a walk in my old neighborhood that evening. I will leave my car at a park and walk the loop that was our staple route for years. That will take about an hour. After my walk, I'm getting ice cream at Gelati Celesti. Two scoops of something delicious. Or I get a pint and have some for breakfast the next day? Maybe. Either way, I'm getting ice cream. 

The first big decision may not be where to get lunch, but whether to hit a brewery right after the gym or to head to the hotel and come back later. The clock will likely be the deciding factor here. If I'm finished working out before 12:15, I could head to The Answer or Veil and still eat lunch around 1. As a bonus, I could have one beer while I was eating lunch and another while I was reading. I wouldn't get drunk if I did it that way. That also assumes I can get into my room soon after 1 pm. Maybe I should try that online check in option. The later I get into my room, the less likely I am to get a good nap. If I'm a nomad all day, I can't exactly pass out somewhere. That would be the least favorable outcome. I've caught an early flight to Richmond before. I felt fine until late morning. Once I hit the wall around 11, I wasn't doing much without a nap. I will be struggling if I can't get into my room until the afternoon.

I have no plans for the evening. I expect to just hang out in the room. I would like to say that I will spend that time reading, but it's more likely that I will be watching TV or messing around on my phone. I could hit the mall or walk around B&N. There's a used bookstore that has a really nice selection that could be fun to visit, but I would almost certainly buy something. I'm trying very hard not to buy books at the moment so that would probably be a bad choice. Those would also be things to do if I hit Veil before I have lunch. We'll see how the day unfolds!

Is Fear the Master?

Do I expect perfection? I know that I acknowledge the unattainability of perfection, but I seem to have a way of chiding myself for not doing things that I should have done but maybe just did not realize that I should have done. I don't envision failure. Is this a lack of imagination or the refusal to acknowledge that failure is a possibility. Is looking for ways that things might go wrong (and acting to prevent them) a refusal on my part to acknowledge the possibility of failure. I have lamented my fundamental passivity numerous times in these electronic pages, but is my passivity a desire to not act or a reluctance to confront and contend with failure? I tell myself I won't fail so I never really think about what could go wrong if things don't go just right. 

A whole series of professional failures have come from not seeing how things could turn out badly and take action to prevent that bad outcome. I have to kind of wonder if my entire mindset and orientation towards life isn't a reflection of my fear. Some people are angry. I'm just afraid. Fear of ridicule. Fear of failure. Fear of being exposed as something less than I've always thought of myself. Bad things happen at work and I get scared of what could happen next. I'm not mad that it happened. I'm not working through a way to recover from the situation. I'm scared of what could happen next. I avoid situations that might make me feel uncomfortable because I'm scared. 

Is that the summation of all the things I've written here (and all the other things that I've written but never published, all the notebooks that I filled when paper was the main way to do these kinds of things). I'm scared. Fear is the unmanliest of emotions. Fear is weakness. Well, the refusal to act when you're scared (or to acknowledge and confront the things that scare you). Is the undercurrent of uncertainty and anxiety that I"ve been feeling for the last three years unacknowledged fear? 

I started this by wondering if I expect perfection. I had to stop reading Tom Clancy books because I was getting annoyed by the excessive competency of the characters. They always know the right thing. They fully assess the situation and see exactly what is happening. Navigating ambiguity and uncertainty is a cinch. Hard decisions are made easy and every sign of something that isn't quite right is easily recognized. LIfe isn't that easy. I guess it can be pleasant to envelope yourself in that fantasy. Read the book and participate in that masterful execution of an impossible plan. It feels good to be the winner. 

This is probably all bullshit. I just have bad mindset habits. I fall into easy and familiar ways of handling problems. Those patterns could have been set by my desire to avoid fearful situations (and a strong reluctance to push beyond that fear to engage in activities that make me uncomfortable). Part of why I write things like this is an effort to figure out why I'm not more like the vision of myself that I have in my head. That vision is not afraid. That vision does what makes him uncomfortable rather than taking the easy way out and avoiding the situation. It's not a fear of my physical safety. It's emotional and identity threats that I fear. 

This is a theme to explore, but I really need to get some sleep. 

Marathon #4


I could pretty much cut and paste what I wrote after last year's WDW Marathon and have that be this post. Undertrained, not prepared, didn't put in the miles needed for the distance. All those points are still true. I'm not trying to run 1000 miles this year though. That could be a real difference maker. Let's explore.

I started 2022 focusing on distance. Miles were my primary target. Nothing about pace, form, effort level came with that goal. Just run 5 miles on Tuesday, 5 miles on Thursday, and 10 miles on Saturday and I will achieve that goal. I followed that pattern the third week of January. I had the marathon the first week and was recovering from the marathon effort the second week. I was in Richmond the fourth week of the month so no long run on Saturday. I managed one week with that pattern in February. Another Richmond trip and I started to cut the runs shorter. I got up too late one Tuesday which forced me to go longer on Thursday. I got up too late on Saturday so it was too hot for 10 miles by the time I got out the door. I was tired. Who knows why I started cutting the runs short. I just did.

This plan to get back to running faster (as laid out in my Marathon #3 post) overlooked a couple of very important factors. I essentially extended marathon training. I gave myself 1 week to recover physically, but I never really put down that obligation to go out and get in a bunch of miles. I had already felt like I failed in sticking to my marathon plan. Now I was pretty much failing on a new plan right from the outset. If I had just stopped to take a look at what I was going to be doing over the next several months, I would have seen that long weekend runs, the linchpin of this whole distance plan, weren't going to happen at least one weekend a month. The plan failed for oversight of some pretty obvious facts.

So the 1000 miles in a year plan failed because I put pressure on myself for volume and failed to plan for important life events. If I wanted to get faster, why didn't I plan for some short runs that would allow me to work on speed? My previous marathon training cycle started with prepping for a 10K in the spring. I shifted away from long runs to shorter, faster runs. That set my level for easy runs at a faster pace when I started marathon training. Instead I just found ways to keep myself slow (relative to previous running paces). I always felt pressure to get in the miles.

Until looking just now, I did not realize how little I ran after April. I basically didn't run at all from May to August. It wasn't until I started ramping up my Saturday runs to 10 miles that I was regularly running on the weekend. Wow. I made the joke that I was finally in shape to do my marathon plan about three quarters of the way through it. That was the truth!

Moral of the story. Give myself the space to do shorter, faster runs early in the year. Stay consistent through the year, and actually be ready for marathon training in mid-September.

Complicated and Complex

The existential problem of Book Shelf Zero is that I think I'm setting up a series of wins, but all I'm really doing is frustrating myself by constantly failing to achieve my longer goals. I'm not sure the outcome is worth the stress. I mostly feel bad about not reading the books I own while buying new books. I may get a few small bursts of glee when I finish a book, but those minor moments get washed out by the constant thrum of failure. Not achieving what I really want is a big problem when it takes me 3 months to read one book. I expect that for something like War and Peace or something similarly gargantuan, but this was The Once and Future King. That book was dense in just about every way possible. The content required effort, the margins were very small, and there were long descriptive passages with very little dialogue. It was a 600 page book that felt like 1000. Definitely worth reading, but it was such a chore. I'm not sure I want to repeat this cycle 170 (at current count) more times.

It wasn't all the book's fault though. The reading timing was bad. I should have had a single New Year's Resolution, get the family settled in Florida. That's what really matters right now. The Once and Future King took 3 months to read because I started reading it right before the push to get my family down here. Weekend trips to Richmond, getting my daughter settled, having my family with me in the house again, these are all things that were far more important than reading. My reading/fitness system works best when my life is calm and predictable. I haven't had a calm and predictable life for two years. I'm gradually getting back to that space. I have to make an effort to get back into regular reading and working out. Sliding into passive living is so tempting. A few videos is so much easier than a handful of pages of whatever book I'm reading at the moment. Well, that kind of depends on the book. I'm reading The Promise at the moment. It's part of my Booker Prize project. Excellent book. This one is complex without being complicated (The Once and Future King was complicated without being complex). I was just going to read a few pages of a new chapter last night. I ended up forcing myself to put the book away so I could get to bed. That reading is fun. That's why I read. Reading to cross a book off a list is a real drag (I guess it's like reading a book for school).

The existential problem is that I set up these goals that just stress me out rather than making my life better. It's the same with my fitness goals and career. It's about wanting to be someplace that I'm not and feeling stress that I'm not there. It just throws a blanket of stress over everything. I end up always feeling like a failure. There must be a better way to live. 

Reading hasn't been a top priority for a few months

I've been reading the same book for 3 months. 3 months! I'd like to finish it tomorrow but I doubt that will happen with the morning walk, watching stuff with Maggie, football, and other stuff around the house. It will be done in the next few days. The Once and Future King will be crossed off a couple of lists. No regrets reading it. I'm not sure if the long reading time is more about me or the book. I'm not particularly enamored with the book, but it's well written with a legendary story and characters. The fault must be mine. I'm going to pass that blame off to the circumstances of my life. I started reading this book right before the family joined me down here in Florida. I was unpacking boxes, getting the house ready, and carrying on everything else that I've had going on. We got back together in July. It's been all kinds of work. COVID took a couple of weeks away too. Yeah, reading hasn't been a top priority for a few months. 

Add running to that list. And eating well. And lifting weights. Rowing. My various side quests that are really my main quests have been sidelined by responsible adult stuff. Work isn't the warm peaceful water that I swam in 10 years ago. I don't have all this extra energy to channel into side projects. Important life things are much more demanding. That's not to say I will abandon or neglect these other things. No, those other things are a key element of my mental health. I need them to operate and maintain a sense of myself. I just need to get more creative with fitting them into the space allowed by a more challenging job and other elements of my Florida life. 

Getting out from under The Once and Future King will be a big step to reclaiming my reading life. I just don't relish picking up this book. It's not a book I crave getting back to once I'm done with my life stuff. The wife goes to sleep and I turn to my phone or the TV. I've been reading a few pages as much I can to just get through it. The next few books I read need to be books that I want to read. Nothing too heavy or demanding for the next few weeks. They don't have to be frivolous. They just have to be something that I want to read. My emotional and mental energy is too tapped in the evening to read something that takes effort. Short books won't hurt. Long books, no matter how pleasant, are their own challenge.

I've embraced walking during my marathon training runs. That's how I run a marathon anyway. I might as well train that way. Pounding away with my pulse up at 170 isn't going to get me ready for the long distances. Doing 10 miles of a 12 mile run isn't getting it done. Better to take small breaks and finish the entire distance than cut runs short. I will use my shorter runs to not walk. No issue including some walking periods while I'm out for 10 or 12 miles. The walk I added to the end of today's run is another nice touch. My heart rate was already elevated. Might as well take advantage of that work and stretch it out a bit. Extra time on my feet won't hurt either. 

Still impressive at 30 years?

Weird confluence of some random events put me in a very nostalgic frame of mind. I dug The Nineties out of my nightstand last night. I bought it back in March and kind of forgot about it. I started reading it last night. My entire high school and college experience are contained in The Nineties. Big things happened in that decade. My senior football season still resonates strongly almost 30 years later. One of my teammates posted an edited version of a playoff game against a rival to YouTube. I watched that tonight. We were good. I'm pretty sure that we would have won the region if the field hadn't been a muddy mess. Football highlights were a big part of the video yearbook that the same guy has on YouTube. I'm in that a couple of times. A random joke in a weight training class is the only time I show up without wearing football equipment. 

The game was played in November of 1993. I was 17. I turned 46 last week. I'm far enough away from that experience that I can appreciate how special those few months were without feeling too pathetic for harkening back to my high school glory days. The Washington Post story about that game notes that we were the only team to score against that other team. I had the chance to be part of something special. Plenty of people never have that chance. That season is certainly the highlight of my time in high school. I didn't have a girlfriend. All the excitement that comes from that experience came when I was in college. I had a mediocre social life. I was obsessed with getting to college. I wasn't very complex (not that many high schoolers are particularly complex). 

It's startling how quickly my mindset reverts when I reenter that time of my life. I wonder what all those people I went to school with would judge the life I've built. These are people that I brushed life with for a couple of years. I only went to that high school for two years. The opinion those people have of me have absolutely no bearing on my life, but I wonder how my achievements would stand up to the other people in my class. Wny is this where my thinking automatically goes when I mentally go back to that time of my life? We're all out here trying to do the best we can. I know the outcomes of a few people from that football team. One is a pilot for Southwest after being in the Navy. Another is a teacher and coach at a high school not far from my Virginia house. I was the right tackle. The left tackle passed away several years ago. The guy who played guard next to me recently retired from the Army. He was a green beret. Our quarterback was a coach for a while. I think he's an administrator now. He got divorced and has remarried. 

I guess that shift to the old comparison mindset is about the fantasies I had about my future back in those days. I just wanted to be impressive. I didn't think much of myself so I was looking to add ornaments to make myself look better. That's why I played football. Being on the football team carried a social load that I would have struggled with had I just been another face in the crowd. I was looking forward to other things that would have added to my prestige. I stepped out of the prestige game to live in a pleasant climate. That's assuming I was in the prestige game to begin with. The truth that a high school student fails to see is that most people don't give two shits about prestige games. Once you're out of the fish bowl of a 1990s era high school, prestigious accomplishments have limited meaning outside of a subset of people playing the same game. Tell another chemist that you have a paper is JACS, they may have an idea of what that means. Tell somebody about that at a high school reunion, you'll get a blank stare. 

So unless you're famous, most people won't be impressed by what you're doing unless they're in the same game. We don't have games under the lights on Friday nights where people can see you out there doing your thing. Even then they're probably just watching Damon Boone cut through the defense. Nobody gives a shit about what you're doing unless it helps them feel better about their life. Eventually it just becomes a question of who is still around to attend the reunion. Eventually, nobody can show up.

Get Serious

I've been wondering if it's time to get serious about my fitness and reading. Yes, this is something I've been saying for years, but pushing things into the future is less and less of an option for me. I have a birthday coming up next week. That's always a good time to reset some visions. So what does getting serious look like?

'

Really prepare for a marathon. I've registered for the WDW Marathon in January. I was significantly undertrained for the same marathon this year. I'm not so worried about my time. The DIsney race isn't about time. I just want to do all the training runs and get the distance. I've tried adopting the run easier approach in my runs this week. I'd like to build up some aerobic capacity and be ready for the 15+ mile training runs that are part of the plan I've followed for my first 3 marathons. Longer runs take time. I will need to get up early, which will require going to bed on Friday night. If I'm going to run a marathon, I might as well go in all the way, right? Cross training (mostly rowing) and a better commitment to lower body and core strength would be part of this as well.

Finally read books I've been saying I'm going to read. My commitment to my Bookshelf Zero project is wavering, but there are plenty of books that I'm still looking to read. My wife left her copy of War and Peace here. I would be happy to give up all my volume goals to finally read that. There are plenty of other worthy selections. I haven't used my time alone to read much (my pace is pretty consistent with how much I read when I'm not living alone). Is it time to stop messing around with random books to read something really significant?

Safe Zone

I was all set to write a post about my crisis of confidence (like this is some kind of novel insight into my state of mind). Of course I've written a post with just that title. July 18,2014. Guess I've been dealing with some issues for longer than I realized. My 2014 crisis was rooted in my uncertainty in a new role (that sounds familiar) and a frustration with my commitment to fitness (where have I heard that before?). I speculated on the lack of ego fuel in 2014. No more classes, no more LSAT prep, no more lab experiments.These self selected rite of passages provided a sustained beat of achievements that I relied on for valuation and assurance that I was worthy. Look what I did! I did this too! Here's another one! 

I haven't found a replacement for those challenges. I could change a few details to match my current situation and that post would basically be what I planned on writing tonight. I'm almost 46 (yes, I have not updated my age in my little bio box for several years) and I'm still trying to move beyond the coping mechanisms that I developed when I was a teenager. Not that this is in any way an unusual state. I would guess the vast majority of people keep repeating the same pattern for their entire life. There is a strong pattern of doing very little to put myself at risk in all of my various ego boosting efforts. I'm not one to choose a course of action that would jeopardize my self-image. It's easy for me to look back on how certain girls treated me when I was a teenager and recognize that I was being invited to make a move. Making a move was way too big of a risk in that particular moment. Rejection was way too risky. The risks of failure greatly exceeded potential benefits from taking some chances. 

Rejection is always way too risky. Failure must be avoided at all costs. I repeat the pattern of taking on efforts with enough challenge that I can derive a sense of doing something worthy but with very little downside (as defined by my complicated mental scoreboard). I can take a pretty good measure of what is hard enough to take some work but is still well within my abilities (have to stay in that safe zone). The consequences of (highly unlikely) failure must also be fully assessed. Nothing really bad can happen if things don't turn out as expected. 

I'm struggling to describe the thought process (well, feeling process is more accurate) in the abstract. Let's look at various career choices I made in the five years or so after grad school. It is very clear that the path to positions on influence flowed through the formulation track. If I had been serious about getting into a more influential position I would have switched over as soon as possible. I would have worked harder to endear myself to my superiors and demonstrate that I shared their concerns and would protect their interests. I would have played the game. That's not what I did. I wasn't honest with myself and told myself I wanted more responsibility while doing all that I could to avoid it while trying to convince myself that I was doing what I could to get there. My ego wanted me to be important, but I didn't really want to be important. I wanted to be competent and respected, but I didn't want to give up what I liked or sacrifice my life for a company (well, other managers really but let's just say the company). I wanted what was safe, higher paying role, while failing to acknowledge that I really just wanted to make a contribution and learn something new and interesting. 

Marathon #3

I achieved my primary goal at the 2022 Walt Disney World Marathon. I
finished. Yes I had fun and enjoyed the experience. I really hated
life during my other marathons. I made the decision around mile 15 or
so to just walk hard, try to run when it made sense, and avoid
emptying my tanks all the way. I think it was the right decision. I
have my medal and I will be able to start running again after giving
myself time to recover (especially the chafing on my thighs, brutal).

The last time I ran a marathon I wrote a whole post about what I
needed to improve the next time I attempted the distance. Fielding was
a big topic in that post. I definitely noticed a pick up in energy
after I ate something. If I had only been better trained to actually
take advantage of that insight. I knew that I wasn't physically ready
to take on the distance in a way that would be consistent with how I
like to think of myself as a runner. I frequently forget (or choose to
ignore) that running identity is based on running accomplishments that
are years in the past. My 10K PR, my sub two hour half marathon, my
first sub 5 hour marathon. Those are four or five years in the past.
I'm not that runner anymore. I looked at the times of the YouTuber who
passed me on the course, the guy who hosts the podcast I listen to
(that I found when looking for podcasts about runDisney), and the
people who were in course pictures with me. The version of me who ran
the RIchmond Marathon in 2017 would have beat all of them. I still
think I'm that guy. I'm not.

Yes, I'm older, but the 2022 marathoner didn't put in the miles needed
to be competitive with the 2017 version of myself. I was probably in
the best shape of my life when I did my first marathon. I ran the half
in 2:06 at the marathon. I will acknowledge that I went out way too
fast, but I was only 3 minutes slower than the Patrick Henry Half I
ran in 2015. I probably could have put down a 1:45 half if that was
the target distance. My first half was in 2013. That was 9 years ago
(well, more like 8.5 but let's not get too picky). What I could do
doesn't have anything to do with what I can do now. I can't just coast
on athletic achievements from the distant past. I have to be someone
who runs like this, not someone who ran like that.

So how do I go about reclaiming my former prowess? Realizing my run
1000 miles resolution is a good step in that direction. A big part of
running is volume. I will get on my 5, 5, and 10 plan next week. Those
numbers are just guidelines. That's the minimum I need to hit on my
primary runs to get to 20 miles a week, which will get me to 1000
miles. The volume is just a part of it though. At the end of the
marathon I ran for short spurts. I focused on my form. There was a
difference. I've been so much slower this year. I just can't get down
to the times that I used to run. I have no doubt that my mechanics are
playing a role. Better knee drive, more open stride, better push off
or something could all be a factor in my pace. I will pay better
attention to my form as I ease back into my regular running routine.

This form thing isn't just idle speculation. I did some intervals on a
treadmill where I got the speed up to a point where I had to really
concentrate on how I was running to keep up. My next run outside was
much faster than previous runs (and the runs soon thereafter). My
effort didn't feel any harder, but I was moving much faster. That
should have been my cue to really dig into form and find a way to make
that kind of effort a permanent part of my running. I didn't. I just
kept on doing the same old thing.

I'm proud of finishing this marathon, but I want my running reality to
match what I have in my head. (That's actually a pretty good summary
of all my goals). I just got a very real (and accurate) picture of my
current fitness level. I know what needs to be done to make my
imagined reality my actual reality. Lots of sweating in Florida
humidity while staying aware of what my knees, hips, and arms are
doing (and building up the strength of my lower body and core when I'm
not dripping sweat).

Marathon #3 incoming

It's going down Sunday morning in Walt Disney World. In a way, my
entire distance running effort has always been aimed at making it to
this race. I was running regularly before our first trip to Disney
World (as parents anyway) in 2015. I'd done the Patrick Henry Half
Marathon in 2013 (injury got in the way of me running it in 2014, damn
calves). That 2015 trip was the weekend after marathon weekend. I had
never heard of the Dopey Challenge before that weekend. I read about
the races while laying in bed after we turned out the lights so my
kids could sleep. I wasn't so sure about the Dopey Challenge (I don't
really have any desire to do it, getting up that early 4 days in a row
would be brutal), but I was very intrigued by the marathon. I ran the
Patrick Henry again that year (I was actually just recovering from the
injury that prevented me from doing the PH in 2014 while during that
Disney trip). I wasn't as fast as the first time I ran it, but I felt
like moving up to the marathon was the right next step.

I ran my first marathon a couple of years later, the RIchmond marathon
in 2017. I just looked at my Garmin data from that race. I ran a great
first half but really struggled in the second half. I was reasonably
well trained but had no idea what I was doing and really struggled in
the second half. Tiffany and I did the half marathon at Disney World
in 2018. It was a great trip to Disney, but the race was less than
stellar. It was very cold when we were standing around for a couple of
hours waiting to start the run (in the middle of the night) and
Tiffany was not really in half marathon shape. The race was very
stressful. It was not the experience I really wanted. My big lesson
from the 2018 WDW half was that it pays to submit a time to get up in
the starting corrals. Lots of people do a run/walk combination at
those races. That's not really my style so I always planned to make
sure I had a good qualifying time to ensure that I could get out of
the mass of run/walkers if I did another runDisney event.

Getting a good time for the marathon sounded like a good idea, but the
logistics were a bit of a challenge. I ran my second marathon, the
Marine Corps marathon, in 2018. I paced myself better, I didn't
collapse until after mile 20 versus about mile 15 for the Richmond
marathon, but I did not fuel very well. I just had nothing left in the
last couple miles of the race. I was very grateful for the snack boxes
that they handed out at the finish line. My time was just over 5
hours, which really wouldn't have done me any good for the WDW
marathon, but I left that race really wanting to figure out how to
complete a marathon feeling strong. The logistical challenge for
getting a time for the marathon was the timing of these two marathons,
which are the marathons closest to where I used to live. They are both
in the fall, October for the Marine Corps and November for Richmond.
That is after the deadline for submitting times for the Disney race.

Logistics for getting to the Disney marathon got much easier when I
moved to Florida. The parks are a 2 hour drive away now. I can work
all week, like I did this week, and head to the resort on Saturday for
the marathon. No flights, no day long drives. Just a short drive and
I'm there. It won't really surprise me if this doesn't become an
annual thing. It's just so close. My running is always better when I
have something to train for. The big block for me in marathon training
are the long runs. Anything over 10 is just a real struggle. My
primary motivation in signing up for the WDW marathon, aside from it
just being a long standing bucket list race, was to get back to
training runs longer than 5 miles. I've accomplished that so I have
achieved one marathon goal. Having a marathon in the distance will
give me a reason to put in longer runs every week.

My goal for Sunday's marathon is simple. Finish. I would also like to
avoid injury. If those things happen, that's a win.

2022 - a look ahead

The year kicks off with a bang as I will be attempting the WDW
Marathon. This will be my third marathon. I am significantly untrained
and unprepared for the distance. I barely did a half today and I was
struggling at the end. There will be lots of walking. The primary goal
of signing up has been realized, I'm back to double digit training
runs, but I will consider the entire thing a failure if I don't finish
the race.

Regardless of whether or not I will have a new runDisney medal after
the marathon, I plan on using the momentum of my training effort to
keep up the double digit runs. I'm going to revive the run 1000 miles
goal. Reaching this distance will require an average of 20 miles a
week. Two 5 mile runs during the week and a weekend 10 miler will get
me there. I've been doing this for my marathon training so this is
realistic. The challenge will be getting in the long run on weekends
that I'm not in Florida. Or I could just bump up the distance on other
weeks to cover the lost miles. We'll see. I just want to maintain a
consistent cadence of long runs. I'm not planning for any races. If
something fits into the family schedule, so be it, but races will not
be a priority.

I will keep lifting. I want to be more intentional about doing lower
body and core exercises. I've been doing the lifts I enjoy just to
keep me moving and to get the emotional benefits of lifting. The
Crossfit workouts have exposed the weakness of my lower body. Getting
my legs and core stronger will benefit me now and well into the
future. Air squats and occasional lunges will get me going down that
path. I will add in more as it makes sense over the course of the
year. I will be adding in my daily ab work as well. That fell off a
cliff once COViD started. TIme to get it going again.

The danger of the Book Shelf Zero project is that I feel like a
failure if my to be read pile doesn't get smaller every year. I still
feel it's a worthy goal, but I need to figure out a way to cleanse it
of the negative energy that is growing around it. I bought a bunch of
books at the end of the year. My total is up to 169. I'm close to
finishing a Drizzt book so it will be down to 168 in the next day or
two. I've already decided to set prioritize reading for at least 30
minutes every evening. The trick of getting this habit to stick will
be selecting pleasant to read books for the first couple of months. I
need to find the books in my library that fits this specification and
stick to those, but still celebrate every book that I read. My book
list projects are nice in that they are static. The lists don't get
longer. I read books from each list this year. I own many books from
all three of them so I will de facto make progress on them if I am
reading books I own.

Year in Review - 2021

A year like no other. So much has happened. Tiffany said that I am
giving her a new life for Christmas. That's not hyperbole. Where
things stand in December of 2021 were nowhere in evidence in January
2021.

I'm slowly accommodating myself to the shape and feel of this new
life. Accepting the new has been easy. Letting go of the old has been
the real issue. For all my hesitancy and doubt, I knew that second
guessing my decision would be part of this process. Second guessing
isn't constructive or helpful, but it's also very difficult to build a
new life while wondering how things may have turned out if the other
choice had been made. The shadow of my old life fades with each day.
Looking ahead instead of constantly peeking at what lays behind me was
a big 2021 accomplishment.

Acknowledging that my life was about much more than checking arbitrary
goals from a list this year is where a review like this has to start.
What I set out to do at the beginning of the year was cast aside to
pursue a new job in a new state in a totally new living situation.
That became the focus. Running, reading, and getting healthier
remained important parts of my life. They just didn't look quite how I
thought they would when I took this look back at the end of the year.

Running:
I started the year recovering from a mystery knee ailment. I have no
idea why my knee started clicking and slipping last October. The
injury (if that's even the right word) worked itself out by the end of
January, but my running volume didn't get back to pre-injury volume
until I moved. I'm a few weeks from a marathon. I'm seriously
undertrained, but I'm trained enough that I can start the race pretty
confident that I can cover the entire distance. This is no small feat
given where I was as late as June. My runs were only a few miles. I
can look back and say that I was doing the absolute minimum for
running from late January, when my injury was behind me, up until I
started increasing my mileage once I was in Clearwater. I wasn't just
unmotivated, I was depressed. I was miserable in my job, mired in
remorse for work mistakes made over a year ago, and fed up with the
performative COVID restrictions (which included my kids remote
schooling at home). I was squeezing runs in right up until I had to
start work. I didn't give myself time for anything longer than a few
miles.

Overcoming that depression is the true accomplishment of 2021. A Kanye
song came on as I was writing that last paragraph. Listening to that
song and every other track from Yeezus was a big part of my spring
runs. I remember how I felt on those runs while listening to that
song. My self-doubt was intense. I was overwhelmed and stressed.
Emerging from that negative space is a big part of my sense that this
choice was right. I would have descended deeper into that hole had I
stayed my previous course. My fitness is still not where I would like
it, but I'm not spending runs trying to talk myself into finishing the
run.

I wisely avoided setting any running goals at the beginning of the
year. I wasn't sure how long it would take to recover from the knee
thing so I didn't know what was realistic. No sense planning for a
race either as there was no indication of when in-person races would
come back. This year was definitely a drop compared to previous years.
As of now, December 22, my total mileage for the year stands at 580
miles. I expect that I will be a bit over 600 miles by the end of the
year. This is my lowest total since 2016, which was also an injury
plagued year. My mileage total would be much lower if I had not
registered for the Disney Marathon. My primary motivation for signing
up for the race was to get me to increase the distance of my training
runs. I wanted to get back to where I could do a 10K or 10 miles
regularly. I'm back to that point. I guess I can say the marathon was
a success no matter how I do at the actual event as I have
successfully increased my training run distance. I would not have
increased the distance without the marathon. Running in Florida is not
the most pleasant experience. I would have skipped runs or cut them
short if I was just running rather than getting prepared for a
marathon.

I did expect to have more time to run once I was living down here by
myself. I thought I would be bored and looking for things to keep me
busy on the weekends, but that has not been the case. There have been
15 weekends since I started working at my new company. I have been
back in Virginia for 3 of those weekends. I'm not going to take two
hours on a Saturday or Sunday morning to run while I'm at home. We
were in Disney World for another weekend. That leaves 11 weekends open
for long runs in the Florida sun. I was moving one of those weekends.
I ran, but it was a short run. So I really only had 10 weekends for a
run of more than 10 miles. The number is really smaller than that when
you consider I needed a month or so to build back up to that distance.
So I really have 7 or 8 chances for a long run. My first weekend to
kick things up past 7 miles fell on one of my trips home. I did 8.5
miles the week after that (this was October 16). I broke 10 miles for
the first time in a very long time on October 23. I moved the
following Saturday. Instead of getting up to 11 or 12 miles, I ran
6.26 miles. I weaved all over my new neighborhood to get 13 miles the
first weekend in November. I took a break around mile 8 to get some
water and eat a snack. I took my car to get an oil change the Saturday
after that. I had a less than stellar run on Sunday. I got to 10 miles
and called it a day. We're up to November 20 now. I had a good 15 mile
run on the Pinellas Trail. I maintained a consistent pace and felt
good for the majority of the run. I should have taken more nutrition
at my last water stop, but I was pleased with the effort. I was 3 days
into a trip to Disney World with the family the following weekend.
Some people may be able to do 10 mile runs on property. I can't. I
flew back to Virginia the following Friday. No long runs over the
weekend. I decided that I could get in a long run on Monday, December
6. I did. I ran 13 miles, but it was broken into two runs with an hour
or so between them. I was still home the next Saturday, we're in early
December at this point, so I just did another shorter run. Last
Saturday, December 18, was my only Saturday at the Florida house in
all of December. The marathon is getting close, time to get in a
quality long run. I did a long run, 13.25 miles on the road with
another three quarters of a mile on a gym treadmill. The run was a
struggle. It was hot and I just was not feeling good. It was a bit
dispiriting to struggle at such a relatively short distance so close
to the marathon.

So what's my takeaway from this tedious review of my weekend runs? I
think I did the best I could with the time I had. The first trip home
came right as I was really building good momentum. That slowed me down
a step. The move was another derailer. I had to get out of my
apartment in one weekend. I was exhausted by the time I had everything
in the house. It sounds minor, but losing my running routes at the
apartment was something I had to overcome. I was just settling into
the area when I had to establish new routes. I still miss easy access
to the trails for the long weekend runs. I had that great 15 mile run,
and then I had a stretch of weekends where family came first. The
Disney trip was followed by two weekends at home. That was prime
training time that I readily sacrificed to family needs. There is a
pattern where I have a good long run and then I hit a derailer. I have
no idea how this fragmented training will show up in the actual
marathon. It will be my slowest one so far. Not that it matters. The
primary goal was realized. I just need to make sure I don't regress
and go back to 3 or 4 mile runs on Saturday mornings.

Reading:
I started the year with a few clear reading objectives. I accomplished
one of them by reading the very mediocre Riftwar Saga. My unrealized
goals boil down to me buying too many books and spending time doing
things other than reading. Starting a new job and moving to Florida
were also pretty hard to overlook factors. I set my reading goals
before I knew I would be moving, but I thought reading would be one of
my main activities after I moved. Wrong. I forgot that I actually have
to live while I'm here. My days weren't as empty as I had anticipated.
Shopping, cleaning, and all the other small tasks of living add up.
There would still be plenty of time to read if I made the effort. I've
been paying more attention to how I'm actually spending my time. I
don't ever prioritize reading. I did a small experiment where I set 30
minutes each night for reading. It made a difference. I always enjoy
reading (assuming the book is good) once I get started. It's just the
getting going that can be a challenge. Reading is always something I
will get to eventually. If I'm serious about wanting to read all these
books, I have to make reading a priority. I have plenty of time to set
aside for reading. I just spend time doing other things instead.

Lifting and other fitness goals:
This was the best year for lifting I've had in a long time. The amount
of weight I'm lifting always seems to plateau right around 270 for the
bench, but I was at that point for a pretty big chunk of the year.
Going to the gym is one of the things that gets prioritized over
reading. It's a big part of my life. I feel better when I lift.

The rower isn't with me and I don't have the time or motivation to use
the rowers at the gym. I need to row. It's the best way that I have to
get lower body work (at least right now). We'll see how it fits back
into my routine once it's back with me later in 2022.

My weight has floated between 220 and 230 all year. That's how it's
been for years. I enjoy eating too much. Will that change soon? Maybe,
but the odds are not good.

I could go on and discuss professional things, but this is already
long enough. The professional stuff is so extensive that it could be a
whole series of posts. Maybe later. Maybe never. Maybe I'll just read
instead.

Rearview Mirror

When do we move beyond the past and live our life in the future? Let's
be honest, that should be when do I move beyond the past and start
living my life pointing toward the future rather than gazing into my
past. I was lying in bed this morning, my alarm having gone off, when
I felt a familiar clenching in my gut. My new friend anxiety coming to
pay a visit. Anxiety can't just come and hang out for no reason. There
must be something that I am dealing with in my life that is making me
anxious. I don't remember what issue I started to fixate on, but I
stopped and asked myself if the thoughts were causing the feelings of
anxiety or was the physical sensation that I have come to link with
anxiety making me find something to feel anxious about? I never really
had the physical sensations that I was experiencing before the bad
January of 2020, when I took a large load of work stress with me on a
trip to Disney World. I spent the entire trip in knots about a couple
of decisions that I had made. They were risky decisions that were not
panning out and I worked for a company that worked hard to protect
itself from risky decisions. The situations were resolved and my
reputation with some people was damaged. I thought that was a big deal
and those few weeks hounded me for months. They still do. The decay of
that impact is asymptotically slow. It lingers. It's why I had that
clenching in my guts this morning.

If emotions are just the labels we put on physical sensations, that
incident back in 2020 taught my system to treat a certain kind of
feeling as the anxiety that comes from regret about past actions and
the fear of what those actions may have on my future. I need to
reprogram that sensation and teach myself a new way to interpret those
sensations when they emerge. It's like my body got in the habit of
feeling that way for a few months and finds every opportunity to
recreate that experience. Disney World has been linked to that
episode. The complete release from reality that I used to experience
while on property has been replaced by this bracing for something bad.
Sitting on the porch at Riviera taking a call about what was going on
at PDI remains a vivid memory. It's like a part of me wants to go back
to that moment. I'm not in that moment, but I continue to experience
the fear and helplessness that I lived with during that entire trip
every time I step back on property. I will continue to relive that
bleak time until I fully confront that issue and put that period
behind me.

That's a very poignant and sharp instance of where a moment in the
past provides the lens through which to experience my present. That's
not the only one, even if it is the one that I dwell on the most. My
obsessive record keeping started as a way to track my progress. It
looked very future directed to me when I started, but the practice
roots me deeper into my past. I'm in a constant struggle with the
previous me. I'm not battling with my fear of The Edge or finding ways
to propel myself to new levels of performance or achievement. I'm
training for my next marathon in the context of my training for my
previous marathon. It's not about what I'm doing this time, but how
this time compares to what I did the last time. The objectivity of
training run distances and times has always attracted me to running,
but the ability to go back and see what I did last time is not really
helping me get ready for my next race. The cold clarity of the numbers
obscures the context in which those numbers, both present and future,
are produced. The question of whether I am doing all that I can to
prepare this time is muddled with how much running I did last time and
the impact that has with how I managed to perform on race day. I'm not
training for my next race. I'm retraining for a race I've already run.

The record I keep of how many times I've been intimate with my wife
reminds me of how things have changed in our life. Seeing trends go up
and being able to do more of what you enjoy is fantastic. It's easy to
read that as I must be doing everything right. It also makes it easy
to say that I must be doing things wrong when the numbers go down. The
numbers need to be seen in the proper context, but digits on a
spreadsheet don't say very much. They are clear about a very specific
event, but they say nothing about what was going on in every other
part of my life.

This rooted in the past orientation that I've been in for a couple of
years is really an issue of poor data interpretation. I hit a dip in a
few measures and started obsessing over the fact I hit a dip rather
than incorporating that trend into a broader time frame. I never dealt
with anxiety or similar feelings before that January, at least not to
the depth and duration that I hit in January 2020. I had always been
able to engage the problem and move beyond it. I wasn't able to do
that so much in January. I didn't solve my own problems so they kind
of lingered. I accepted the lessons and made some changes in how I
approached work, but the stress and anxiety stuck around. The world
didn't help, but I didn't really help myself either.

Bookshelf Zero keeps me pointed towards my past too. My books have
always been something that I enjoy having around. If I read them
great, if not, that's fine too. I made some choices to buy books in
the past, the choice to read that book was a choice for the future.
Bookshelf Zero makes reading all those books a sign of progress. A
year I read more books than I buy is successful while a year in which
I fail to achieve that goal is a failure. That's a 100% self-imposed
performance metric. Should I celebrate reading a book, no matter how
it came to me, or chide myself for reading a book that I just bought
or some book I got from the library rather than clicking another book
off my shelf? There are good reasons for both, but I feel like this is
also a question of data interpretation. It's the story I tell myself
about my reading habit that matters.

I feel like I've kind of built my own emotional prison (a bit
dramatic, but it was the first thing that came to mind). I put myself
here, I have the ability to get myself out. Let's start now. I saw
that a former colleague has a new title. He's in the space where I
used to toil. I felt a small pang that he was having that success that
I'm not, but then I had to ask myself why that matters. I made the
choice to leave that organization. I'm doing something new now. That's
what matters. I need to stop revisiting places where I used to do
things and put my energy on where I am now. I'm building a new life.
I'm sitting outside, by my pool, writing this entry at 11 pm on a
Monday night in December. In short sleeves. And it's super
comfortable. This is what matters now. The fact that Jim is a Team
Lead is great for him, irrelevant to me. I miss my old organization,
but that organization is dead. It's time to look ahead.