Darkness Falls

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Let me just start out by saying - it was dark, ok?

It. Was. Dark.

It was dark because the gym that I go to has what they call a “Cardio-Cinema” room. This is basically a big room filled with treadmills, stationary bikes, stair climbers and elliptical machines that all face a giant movie screen. So while you’re getting your cardio in for the day you can be inspired by Dr. Benjamin Gates racing through solving Masonic puzzles in National Treasure, or millionaire Tony Stark hammering on a big metal suit in Iron Man.

Basically watching the movie helps the time pass and helps to take your mind of how much you hate to exercise – which is pretty much why I go there.

Actually I don’t really hate to exercise that much but I do have a hard time being consistent with it. I guess because I need the distraction, I like to hike in the mountains – through the trees, by the river. But it’s hard to find the time on a daily basis to drive up the canyon to hit the hiking trail. Plus it’s not really all that safe for a lone woman to traipsing through the woods alone. Plus, sometimes the weather doesn’t cooperate (like today when the high temperature will barely make it out of single digits). So, even though as you see, I have a list of readily available reasons that I just can’t workout – I actually do try and go to the gym a few times a week.

The one I go to is close to my house, but it’s also close to the local University so the average age of my fellow gym-goers is maybe 22 and all the girls seem to wear the same outfit sported by that girl on that commercial about the shoes that make your butt look better (long legs, short shorts – your basic nightmare). Happily there are a few stalwart retirees that mix in with tight and taunt which is good news for me and makes me feel less conspicuous. Although having said that I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes about feeling conspicuous:

In your twenties you worry about what people think of you.

In your thirties you don’t care what people think of you.

And in your forties you realize people weren’t thinking about you in the first place.

So anyway, the gym makes a useful alternative, plus they have a big movie theater to help me through the pain and, as I’ve mentioned, it’s dark in there which helps with the “conspicuousity” factor.

So one bright sunny day a few weeks ago I talked myself into working out and drove down to the gym. As I said it was a beautiful and bright sunny fall day. And since I was at the gym I like to travel light so I took off my sunglasses to leave them in the car along with my bag. I walked through the bright sunshine filled parking lot, through the gym doors, scanned my card and turned into the Cardio Cinema room. As I walked into the darkened room my eyes struggled to adjust as I looked towards the screen to see if I could tell what movie was playing. “Ah…James Bond. I can walk along the beach with Daniel Craig for awhile,” I thought to myself as I moved along a row of treadmills, picked out an empty one, still looking at James Bond on a Jet Ski, and stepped onto it.

The next moment my feet flew out behind me and I went face and shoulder first into the treadmill rubber. The stupid thing was already moving!

A series of declaratives, questions and I don’t mind telling you more than a few curse words flew through my brain (and out of my mouth too I have to admit). Why was it moving when no one was on it? How many people saw me make a face-plant on a treadmill? How long will it take the skin to grow back on my nose and elbow from treadmill roadrash?

Well, this was embarrassing and to be honest more than a little painful. I can’t help but wonder how they make people fall on treadmills on T.V. and in the movies because man! It really hurt! I kind of crawled pitifully over to the wall, leaned up against it slowly rotating my shoulder and trying to decide if I had permanently damaged more than just my pride. It was at that moment that one of the twentysomething gym employees bounded up to me, asked if I’d had a good workout and would I be interested in a personal trainer? I gave him my best Fortysomething withering stare and stumbled out of the cardio-cinema room and back in the bright sunshine to my car.

I was glad to see that my 17-year old son E-bay was home when I got there because I was in need of a little sympathy. “You all right Mom?” he asked me as I limped into the house. “No!” I told him and explained the whole sorry mess. To be fair Ebay took it pretty well. He expressed an appropriate amount of concern for my road rash and applied his EMT training to helping me judge the mobility of my sore shoulder. But he also had that certain look on his face. The look that says that while he’s holding it together on the outside, he's bursting with laughter on the inside. I recognize the look because it’s the same look I get on my face when my own mother tells me that she’s locked her keys in the car and left it running for the third time in the same week.

I stared him down.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he answered lips twitching suspiciously.

“WHAT?” I asked again glaring at his smug 17-year-old face.

“You really fell off a treadmill?” He asked.

“It was dark!” I barked back.

“But it was moving!” said Mr. Twitchy Lips

“IT WAS DARK!!”

Well, he held it together as long as he could – bless him. At my last outburst he started laughing and has pretty much been laughing at me ever since. It’s become an excuse for everything at our house:

You didn’t put gas in the car – it was dark.

You put the empty milk carton back in the fridge – it was dark.

Have you seen my keys – It was dark.

The road rash has cleared up and I can pretty much move my shoulder in all the ways a shoulder should be moved – but I’m still going to be hearing about this one for a while.

Yeah....I don't know what's happened to my life.

Where Are You Christmas?

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I was at the end of my rope.

I finally had all of the Christmas decorations ready to be set out, the festive music of the season playing and the tree purchased and waiting to be wrapped with strings of colorful lights. I plugged in the lights for their annual test-run and sighed. Only one strand was working.

Two of my youngest kids were rummaging through the box full of ornaments which sat beside me on the floor. "Careful, guys!" I warned. "Lots of those can break." They moved to the piano to admire the nativity.

I sat, cross-legged on the floor next to the tree for nearly 2 hours, painstakingly removing and replacing each light in an attempt to find and repair the one bulb which was preventing the others from glowing. As I did so I reflected on the lack of Christmas spirit I was experiencing this year. Where are you, Christmas? I wondered. The beginning verses to this song seemed to play over and over in my head and I found myself growing more melancholy as I worked. I had 3 colors working on one strand and 4 on the other but the dead bulbs detracted from what I wanted to accomplish. Again, a sigh. After 17 years it was time to purchase new lights for the tree.

I stood to stretch my cramped legs and noticed that the nativity scene had been rearranged into a small cluster on the piano. I placed each piece back into its proper position and went to the kitchen to set up Santa's Village. When I was finished I collected the now useless lights in a grocery sack and placed them near the door. I went to grab my purse and noticed the nativity, once again, all pushed into a corner. I knew this was the doing of my 5-year-old boy, Hubba, as I had seen him push the nativity together numerous times already. As I rearranged the pieces I wondered if this was all worth it; setting everything up only to have it moved around so that I would need to organize it all over again and again and again. "Hey, everyone!" I announced as I left to purchase new lights. "I'm leaving! Keep the little kids away from the piano, please!"

I ventured out onto the snowy roads, found the lights as well as a few Christmas gifts I needed, waited in a long line to make my purchase and then headed back home. As soon as I walked through the front door I noticed the nativity again, all crowded together. Again I moved each piece where I wanted them to be. I noticed Hubba peeking at me from around the corner.

"Hubba!" I scolded, exasperated. "I asked you to leave these alone. Why do you keep messing them up?"

"They're not messy, mom. They like being in a circle."

Frustrated, I turned to look him in the eye. "They do NOT like being in a circle. The wise men want to stand over here, the shepherd and his sheep want to be over there, and the angel wants to stay right here," I told him.

"But I thought they all camed to see Jesus," he said to me. "It's Jesus' birfday, and they want to see him. I was just helping them see him more better. 'Cause that's Chris-mis, right mom?"

And that's where I found Christmas. Right there on my piano, in the middle of a cluster of nativity figures. The reason we celebrate and decorate and give gifts and sing carols and promote peace on earth, good will to men all December long. I just needed Hubba to rearrange the nativity - and my way of thinking - so I could see things more clearly.

Yes, Hubba, that is Christmas. Thanks for helping me remember.

Pop Rocks

Pin It I ventured to the store not that long ago, and saw Pop Rocks at a display by the check stand. I couldn’t help but grin, remembering this candy from when I was a kid, taking a whole envelopeful and dumping it in my mouth.

The sizzling, popping sound, as well as the electric tingle on my tongue was indescribable.

I reached into the bin and sifted through the various and sundry flavors.

Strawberry.

How could one go wrong with that?

That’s exactly what I thought.

So instead of writing a long, detailed post today, I instead decided instead to make a short video.

I present it without further ado…

Superwoman

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The tagline on my blog reads something like "finding the other side of yourself after you've already tried to be Superwoman." This refers back to my younger days, when I foolishly thought I could and should do it all--teach full-time, be an amazing mother and wife, be THE Church Lady (not the "isn't that special" SNL Church Lady, but the one who taught Sunday School, directed VBS, and coordinated a whole slew of other things I'm just not even going to embarrass myself with now), scrapbook my children's lives in living Technicolor, reign as amateur journalist supreme, be faculty advisor for an award-winning literary magazine...I can't quite remember every pie I had a finger in, but I'm pretty sure there was one for every finger and probably a few toes, as well.

I'm pretty much over that now. Yeah, common sense has asserted itself and I have discovered worth and peace in doing...nothing. Or at least, doing only a few things. I quit the full-time job in order to mommy and wifey full-time instead, and discovered that they tend to fill my time in amazing ways. Who knew. I still write the occasional article for the business journal, but it's not a pressing concern. It's more of a..."can I handle this right now and is it fun? And can you give me six weeks to get 'er done? Okay--sure." And I've whittled the church activities down to those I feel prayerfully called to do, not those I feel are a result of the tyranny of need and desperation of a small church. I still volunteer at my children's school, but it's important, I think, to show my kids that's it okay to give freely of yourself and your own resources--to help others when they need it.

Despite this hard-fought and incrementally won battle (hard-fought because it's not easy to change who you fundamentally have been for thirty-some odd years, and emerge somewhat victorious), I have recently backslidden. Some of you may have noticed that I have been a SLACKER on my blog for the last...ummm. Month? Something along those lines. This is because I have suffered from temporary insanity and forgot that I am not Superwoman, and have been engaged in all sorts of home improvement projects during the last month or so. Oh--and celebrated Autumn's birthday on top of it!

• We have painted. A lot. If I never see another paint brush I'll be happy. But wait. The dining room's not quite finished...
  
  
• We have packed up 75% of my house and moved it into the remaining 25%. Don't ask me how, mathematically, that works, because the answer is: it doesn't. It. Does. Not. Work. Surfaces, such as tables and counters, help. (I discovered during this time a fundamental difference between my husband and myself, btw. I am a "sort it out, clean it out, throw it out prior to packing it up" kind of person. Duane is a "dump it all in a box and take care of that later" kind of person. Just a little fyi: these two personality types need to be kept far, far away from each other during the pack process. Truly, they do.)
  
  
• We have had new carpet installed on a Sunday in that 75% of the house. Our cat, who may soon meet with an accident, marked his territory on Sunday afternoon.
  
  
• We have been meeting with counter people for estimates over the last couple of weeks...a decision on those will be made this morning and we will set in motion a two week carnival ride that will (hopefully) result in new countertops by Christmas.

I don't know what I could've been thinking. Painting a house, laying carpets, and installing countertops all in the two months prior to Christmast? Psh. No problem. I was freaking Superwoman in another life.

To Get You In The Christmas Spirit...

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