Same Team?

 #1 - I rejoined the fitness center near me. Monday I tried a new class, it was ok.  Today I returned to a barre class I knew I enjoyed.  I was concerned when I left in the spring it would be discontinued as typically there were so few of us there.  Today it was at least triple the size.

#2 - I had my second visit with a new family I am working with. They were in the backyard when I arrived so we did the visit outside which was nice to have that option.

#3 - I was going to do the visit right after the aforementioned barre class, however they asked to switch our schedule again and I'm glad we did, otherwise I would have felt rushed.

#4 - Another house I visit can really be a handful/bursting with energy.  I often wish we would go outside. Today though everyone was subdued and patient and the kids waited for the mom to carefully take out the new pretend medical kit I brought.  She even got a marker to write their names on the doctor coat.

#5 - Relationships require a lot of communication, compromise and remembering that you are on the SAME TEAM.  I was reminded twice today of this.  Relationships can bring immense support, stability and comfort, and that can be missed. However, when I hear and see how remembering we are on the same team/compromise isn't working well for people, it can be nice to not have that struggle.

Two Neighbors

 #1 - One of my upstairs neighbors has more than 1 adult/vehicle and only 1 parking spot.

Right now some of the parking spaces have been blocked off because they are re-shingling the roof. So I just sent a message that they are welcome to use my assigned space while this is going on.  She responded with a big thank you.

It's an effortless thing on my part, and to think it all began because...you may or may not remember my first interaction with them a year ago. One of them left an unkind note on another neighbor's car, about using the unassigned parking spaces instead of his assigned space...

#2 -  I went outside and the neighbor right above me was unloading a bunch of plants.  "Wow," I said, "You just bought this many more plants?!"  (I have long admired all the green I see in his windows when I come home and it's dark).

He explained that these were actually plants he's had but had put in his parents yard for the summer to get some extra sun.  "Do you need any plants?" he asked.

"I don't need any, but I always like more plants."

"The pathos plants work well in low light."

"My friend told me to get some pathos to put on my kitchen cabinets. I was waiting until I get a window in my door though so they'd have more light." I replied.

He then said he was making some more baby pathos and would pass one on once he got it established.  

#3 -  "Don't let this darkness fool you

All lights turned off can be turned on."

 

 #4 - I heard about the hospital in Gaza that was bombed on the radio this afternoon.

Early this evening I took a mountain bike ride at a nearby park.

At the end of my ride I decided to double my monthly Doctors without Borders contribution.  The contribution is so minuscule I neither notice it nor even recalled what the amount was.

"What motivated me to make this change?" I reflected.

It wasn't just hearing the devastation on the news, the devastation didn't motivate me.

It was combining the knowledge of the devastation, with an action (biking) that filled me with beauty and strength.  It's the old adage about how you can't fill from an empty cup.

When I got home I tried to look on my statements to see how much my current donation is. I found nothing.  I looked more and found the last deduction was in June.  I recalled that I had gotten a new card because of some potential fraud, so my monthly donation hadn't occurred the last three months.

I called and fixed that.

#5 - "You can bomb the world to pieces

but you can't bomb it into peace."

Michael Franti

 

Mental Health EXPERT: How to Work WITH Your Anxiety to HEAL Your Life wi...

Last night in bed I realized I forgot to post this conversation as one of my gratitudes. Conversations like these between men give me hope for a different male energy, one we so desperately need.

My Father's Daughter

#1 - I was planning on doing a radon test in the home we bought...so I guess that is why I did a radon test in my condo. I didn't think there would be an issue, there isn't a basement and the bathroom fans in this complex run 24/7.

To my surprise the short term test came back 4.0 which is equivalent to 8 cigarettes a day.  So I took a long term (90) day test and that came back 5.0 - worse.

I had one mitigation consultant out here last week.  He really didn't know what to do and if it would work which was definitely discouraging.  It's hard to know if I should contact someone that works with multi-family buildings or single family.  Obviously I live in a multi-family building, but I wouldn't be paying to mitigate the whole building so the guy I spoke to who only does multi families wouldn't come out here.  He did talk with me on the phone for quite a while though and gave me a couple other names to try.

One came out today, I told him I thought the constant fans would mean there wouldn't be an issue but since then the research I've done has taught me the opposite. "Not only that,"he said, "but your hot water heat means air isn't circulating."

These are conversations I would have had with my father.  He would be so interested in all of this.

#2 - Paths of least resistance.  I made an offer, which I lost, on an upstairs unit in this complex before this one.  It was gorgeous like organic magazine living gorgeous.  My unit, on the other hand, felt like a rental, which it was.

I'd take my unit any day over the one I lost though because as a lower unit it has a door directly to a patio outside.

I told myself in the upstairs unit, that it wasn't far to walk downstairs outside to some picnic tables. This is true.

But it is also true that would reduce the amount of meals I took time to eat outside by at least half.  Today's dinner would have surely been one of them.

#3 - And because I ate dinner outside I thought, "I'd like to go for a walk." It's easy for me to have that thought here. As I started my walk I once again reflected on the magic or grace that brought me to live here. Homes in this area were well out of our reach, so it hadn't been an area I was considering.

About 3 blocks into my walk I saw an office chair with a "free" sign at the end of a driveway.  I have an office chair but I sat on it and it seemed more comfortable than mine.  "If it is still here at the end of my walk I'll get it," I thought.

When I returned it was still there.  Rolling it down the street was really loud though and I thought I was disturbing the whole neighborhood.  There was one guy walking his dogs and he was glad I was taking the chair (it was his).

#4 - When I got home I decided the chair is actually about equal in comfort to mine, however, definitely more stylish. And I have a little desk like/junk mail area by my entry that I have a cushioned folding chair now, but maybe I'll just use this instead and keep both.

#5 - Before I left for my walk I thought about calling my cousin whose birthday is tomorrow to see if she wanted to walk with me. I knew she was camping with her boyfriend the last couple nights and maybe she was still there. But then I figured, "No she's probably returning from camping still, or hanging out with him."

As soon as I got home I got a call from her. She is still there and she asked me if I wanted to go for a walk tomorrow!  So after work I will see her then.

P.S. I'm adding this song which is on repeat tonight.  I wonder why it resonates so much, I don't relate to many of the lyrics, but the emotion, yeah I connect with that.

Resilience

I woke up at 6:00 this morning to drop-off my college roommate at the starting line of the Twin Cities marathon.   She had been awake for a half hour already, when she learned via her phone that the marathon had been cancelled.

To everyone in MN who prefers the climate to change, rather than have to move to a warmer one, you are now a winner.

People texted my friend other marathon options...that included added costs, travel and scheduling conflicts. 

Last night when we talked about her "why" for running. She had decided she was running this race to learn about resilience.  She was anticipating physical resilience, or mental perseverance, not that the race she had trained for months for would be cancelled.

This is a different kind of resilience.

Life is tricky.

After a few hours she decided she needed to get out and walk or bike.  I asked if she wanted to run at all. She said no, she didn't have water to take with her (she planned on water en route). I asked where she wanted to go, by me or on the race route.  She said she didn't care. So I decided we'd just walk from my place.

But then I thought about it and decided we should go to the race route, there would probably be other runners out there and it would be good for her to be with others sharing her disappointment.  

We drove to the route, parked and started walking.  There were other runners and there were still people cheering, some people were passing out water, and there was music.  

"I'm wanting to run," my friend said.

"I figured you would," I responded.

"I don't have my brace."

"We can go back to the car and get it,"

"I don't want to go back."

So she started running, I went back to the car. Then drove ahead and tried to find her.  

It is tricky because they decided to cancel the race for the heat, yet people were still running and the route wasn't marked as well and there was less support for runners, certainly no runner tracking.  I almost gave up on finding my friend and then I spotted her.  I parked a bit ahead, stopped her and she put some supports on her legs, grabbed some gel packs and kept going with her cell phone.

She started running at mile 4. I drove to mile 10 and waited with my sign for her.  I really didn't think this would be that fun, but I was really surprised to feel the opposite, even with much fewer runners and supporters, I got caught up in the energy.  She hugged me at mile 10 and continued.  I dropped her stuff off at her friend's near the end of the route, and then I went to play soccer.

I don't know how far she got.  I'm sure there are people who still pushed themselves today, without the medical support the marathon provides. She had her adult children textable to pick her up, as well as the friend who lived later en route.  So I just hope she was able to feel her resilience without endangering her health. 

Just writing this I started worrying about her in the heat.  I went to get my work cell phone.  I got her 17 year old's number (who was one of the people picking her up at the end of the race) last night.  I was going to ask, but there was already a text from him 20 minutes ago,

"She finished."

I'm not sure if that means she made it to the finish line, or that she completed the whole 26.2 (since she started near mile 4), but it does mean her family knows where she is and she is breathing.

And I'm so, so, so grateful that we didn't just sit inside all morning.  I'm grateful she eventually wanted to go for a walk.  And I'm grateful I listened to my intuition that she should be around other runners.  I couldn't imagine planning to run 26.2 miles one day and then

not running at all.

I thought she needed something, even if were less, to still feel an accomplishment.

However she finished, she did it with less institutional support and less fan support.  There wasn't a race app that people that loved her could follow to find her.

Yet she kept going.

I guess resilience is the word alright.