Patience; the new endurance sport.

I ran first 2 11 m/m and then 2 10 m/m and then 1 9:40 mile on the treadmill.  I really feel I've turned a corner with the blood sugar thing.

I am feeling stronger than I have in 4 years.  The hamstring and the knee still ache, and I do get post-run arthritic stiffness--but for the first time in a long time I feel like my liver/gallbladder/pancreas is processing/storing/sugar correctly.  I think it was the years of pro-biotics.  I don't think it was the cysts at all.  I think the overuse of pro-biotics changed the way my liver processed gycogen.  Since being off pro-biotics since 2012, and drinking Braggs and water a couple times a week, I have felt a huge difference.  By body still isn't in shape per se, but the possiblity of rebuidling strength without passing out is real.  My blood sugar post work out today was still 75!  

Canyon water fountain, vintage park.

I was in Portland and Arch  Cape, OR last week for Spring Break with my boy (s) while my girl was in Washington DC on a student governement visit.  It was heaven to run at sea level, and in the clean air and humidity.  It was a bit rainy the first days, but I always carved out a time to run when it was dry.  Running the on the loney cold, flat sanded beaches with rolling waves as far as the eye could see, surrounded by cliffs and mountains is nothing short of majestic.  The trails in the mountains along the coast are heaven.  There is nothing but the quiet padding of your own feet along pine needles with the sound of the ocean somewhere distant.  The beauty, the green, the clean air refreshed my soul.  The days just before or after ski season are painful, frustrating depressing ones for me.  They are filled with dreary days, not yet one season or the next.  Oregon renewed me as I  rested my eyes upon the greenery and the misty, mysterious clouds clingining to the mountain tops. There is nothing compared to running on the coast of Oregon.  In the year 2000 I had a conference for work at a resort at Mount Hood.  There was a 5 mile loop around the mountain.  I will never forget how cold it was in July, and how many rasberries I ate along my run, or how the sound of a rushing river was never far.  I know a lot of wacked out  weirdos live in Oregon. But when I'm done raising kids, I think that's where I'm headed.  

Temple loop x2 rock canyon

I am in love again with running now I don't wear my Garmin or care how fast I'm going. A small handful of dry oatmeal and glass of water is enough to get me past 60 minutes of running. I can't wait for school to get out so I get back my favorite morning hour to myself. Today one kid had driver's ed at 6 a.m. the other had seminary.  So I got to go out at 6:30 which reminded me how much I loved running once.  I really started running in earnest the spring of the year 2000.  My son was 8 months old and my daughter almost 20 months.  I bought a double stroller and ran 5 miles every morning on the bike trail.  I ran only during the weekdays leaving weekends free for my family, and I never ran more than 5 miles.  I also never ran during the winter.  I treated running as a celebration of good weather.  Those were great days of pushing my kids in that stroller.  I pushed those kids until my girl was 8 and my son 6-- near 100 pounds of kids in that thing.  I remember the first days I stopped brinning them along and felt so liberated not pushing the stroller.  That's when I started running-running for real (races and marathons).  Those were also great days also, until they were not. But I'm feeling liberated of my own expectations. Running is becoming that thing again I always loved.  Time to myself, time outside, time to reflect, excersize.  

The guy who has been my assistant at work for the past 2 years has moved on, necessitating my return to full time. It's a big bummer. I loved that guy, but with all admin positions the shelf life is 2 years max. So in anticipatioN of my reduced daily energy level. I'm going to run less, or for shorter amounts twice a day, can't wait for a nice Saturday run.

Ran 3 in the a.m. And 2 in the p.m

Provo Canyon/waterfountain.

I ran into Cath on road.  I do miss my running buddies.

Last Tuesday, a girl I ran with for about a year in 2006, Amanda Davis, her husband was hit by a car.  This is the 4th person within a year I know of who has been critically injured or killed while excersizing (running or cycling).  I've almost been hit myself while running with Josse and Ericka one morning.  A driver turning right on a red light stopped for them, but rolled right on through as I trailed just behind them.  The car's bumper pushed into my knee and I fell/jumped onto the hood of the car (attempting to preserve my knees). The driver just stared at me as I slid off the hood and kept running.  

Amanda Davis's husband Derek died today.   I ran daily with Amanda in 2005 & 2006. She and Derek and I ran the Ogden Half Marathon (Amanda's First half marathon ever) and then trained with her for the Wasatch Back Ragnar, some time before they moved in 2007.  I am in shock. Derek was just 37 years old.  He was hit while he and Amanda were running together at 6:30 a.m. while using crosswalk. The driver, an 18 year old high school student, who accidentally ran a red light.  Derek was in critical condition, in ICU last week and seemed to improve until yesterday when he took a turn for the worst.  He passed away just a few minutes ago. It seems inconceiveable that you could lose a 37 year old husband and father of 4 to a jogging accident.  I am heartbroken for Amanda and their children.  Just heartbroken. 

I was able to get out the door at 7 and watched as the sun rose over the valley from the shoreline trail.  I will never get over, how the sun rises the day after a horrible tragedy-- indifferent to the suffering and seemingly end to our individual worlds.  The year or so that Amanda and I ran together each morning was so important to me.  It was when I was taking care of  my invalid and clinically insane father the year he died.  That was a lot of road therapy. We talked about everything important to two married women with small children and strange family histories.  My morning runs will now be tinged with sadness for quite a while to come.  Both Amanda and Derek ran, they were running together the morning he was hit by the car last week. It is incomprensible to me how much my friend's life is changed in just a few days.  We are neither the author of our beginning or our ending which leaves us free to create the narrative in between. 

9:54 AP (9:24/10:22/10:20/9:18/9:39/10:13)

Temple loop 2.1. Rock canyon bowl 1. Home 2.2

I spent my run thinking about Amanda burying Derek today. I wish I was in NC to do the evening memorial run tomorrow. I've always taught my Kids to make eye contact with drivers while in a crosswalk and to watch for cars making rolling right turns, and cars behind them turning in from the left hand turn lanes. People are distracted while driving and with the increased number of bikes and runners in the road it seems worse than the days of mothers against drunk drivers.