Can't Believe I'm in Texas

Yee Haw! We're experiencing life as a member of an ethnic minority. I can't say that we've experienced any negative reactions to our vampirishly pale skin, dark hair and, of course, 'funny British accents'. No, I suppose the main response from people here is to treat us like novelties, persistently asking us to speak so they can hear that 'overseas talk'. Going through the supermarket today our friend's eldest, Samantha, stopped at two boys she knew. Without looking at us she said to her mother: "Mom. Make them talk British."
In today's Global community this quaint fascination in this town with the Brit factor is as fresh now as when I first visited Texas 23 years ago.
The supermarket encounter made me question what other things have remained the same since that first visit. This thought was further fuelled by the news that during our trip I would be going back to Dallas, the city where I lived, worked and even had a minor car crash (!) when I was 21...not far off the age that Samantha is now. How would life as a 20 year old Texan, born and bred in the state, compare to my memories of being a visiting student?
We'll see.
After only a day in Pampa, situated in the barren, windswept cowboy country of what is known as The Panhandle, I have been reminded of so many of the things that I realise many people, including fellow Americans, hate about Texas but which I love.
The Texan drawl, the 'Y'alls randomly thrown into sentences like we Brits throw in swear words.
Then there's the enveloping heat and the 'traditional' heavy interior design (no Ikea here).
But these are superficial things. I'm here to investigate, absorb and analyse the many more deeper differences from health, diet and fitness to schooling and, of course, politics.
I get to Texas on average once every 4 years. I'm in my element not chilling on a beach holiday but consuming culture (sometimes literally) and absorbing the way of life and I am privileged to have like-minded friends in the Kellys who see the huge benefits of being able to expose our children so deeply to another culture. It's not for everyone but it sure is for me and hubby...y'all!


....more to come

Can't believe I ran a marathon 8 months ago

I always feel in a slump after Christmas but on January 1 my mood changes and becomes what I can only describe as 'optimistic'. No matter what has gone before and no matter how much it is purely psychological I do feel like a New Year is a metaphorical new page. Just like many people, I make my New Year's resolutions and they tend to always read the same.
1. Lose weight and/or eat healthier
2. Get fit
3. Commit to church regularly and/or a bible study
4. Take on a new project to completion...usually one of the books I've started writing.

So no change this year in any of these items on my list.
I stepped on the scales, ate a salad for lunch, dutifully went to church on this New Year's day and opened my Dropbox file on my computer to the notes of my latest book project. But it was that 'other' item on the agenda that has me really challenged...getting fit.

I can't believe I ran a marathon 8 months ago. Not just any marathon at that but THE London Marathon.
And yet, here I am pledging once again to 'get fit'. I have no idea what happened following the amazing high I experienced after the London event. I just ...well...lost the desire or will to run. I've tried...with friends, without friends, with the pressure of a race, without pressure. I've tried forgetting running and getting on my bike instead. I've even tried forgetting about fitness altogether, taking a break over Christmas.
Slowly, during my 'break' I have felt stirrings of desire. I've found myself wistfully craning my neck out of the car window to watch other runners.
Last night I read an article on the Internet about Burn Out...true burnout...when you have over trained and pushed yourself into a sport so much you develop an aversion to it. And the optimistic conclusion to the article was...all is not lost. The general prescription was for remotivation?

So today I added 'running' to my fitness resolution and, furthermore, resolved to find a way to REmotivate myself.
I started small...really small. I made three decisions...
1. To start from scratch and learn to literally love the experience of running again...no pain and no intention to gain
2. To blog my journey because, after all, writing is my most consistent motivator so I reckon to combine it with running will help
3. To run with an aim...not a race or an event or a time or distance schedule but purely to run as part of my daily life...

Here's my first blog (check objective 3). I started with my firt 2k run (very small) but felt every step....the cool, wet air, the darkness that I once loved to run in, the music that helped me when I started and, with today's Deuteronomy passage 'Choose Life' echoing through my head I ran to my friend's house and back to feed her pet for her before my healthy tea.

Tomorrow is another day.

Can't Believe I'm Fed Up With Eating

I'm doing Ok with the fundraising. Reached my WellChild target of 1500 and already raised £150 for Gloucestershire Young Carers. but let me tell you that I would have raised it all much quicker and then some if I 'd had a penny for every time I' e had the following conversation: Jane to whoever: 'I'm running in the Marathon'
Whoever: 'What? the London Marathon?'
It absolutely floored me each time that happened. What a strange reaction. Is the London Marathon somehow longer than other Marathons?
Anyway, so here I am...sitting on my bed in the hotel room. I got through the injury that wasn't an injury (according to my physio who really didn't feel the pain), I have avoided Max's numerous attempts to curtail my training with various viruses he's conjured up, I managed 20 miles - admittedly in pain and what seems like months ago now - and I've even resisted the temptation to run this week. I got all this way and now only one thing is threatening to hinder my performance....SLEEP. Or lack of it.
for so many years I have dreamed of having an excuse to take myself off to bed for a few early nights and catch up on the sleep that I swear I am owed from the first two years of Max's life. so this week, my chance came. with the family's blessing I went off to bed on Thursday at 8pm. by 9 o'clock I had put my iPod on...bit of music to calm me but, of course all my tracks are running themed in preparation for the big day. So I tried a podcast or two but Ricky Gervais makes me laugh out loud. I eventually turned to my audio bible...not surprisingly I finally drifted off in the middle of Deuteronomy. It was about 10.30 when I hit the land of nod and Max woke at 7.
So I tried again on Friday in the Hotel. neon who has tried to sleep next to two wired children will know that I didn't have a hope in Hell. At Midnight Max stopped flailing around in his sleep...making me fear that I make it to the start line with a thousand bruises. So no joy there.
As I write this I am freshly woken from a 45 minute nap which I opened my eyes from only to find myself thinking 'oh crap. I've forgotten my safety pins to pin my runnernumber on!'
And so my mind works.
But the two things I am loving most about this final weekend are...the commeraderie and, of course, the eating.
anyone who knows me will know that I haven't got through this year of training without a few books to help me. One such book has come into its own this week and is called: Nancy Clark's Food Guide For Marathoners. Firstly, I just like re-reading the title as I still can't believe I am a 'Marathoner' and secondly it is the diet for anyone who has dieted all their life. It is the Anti-diet. Like A Dawkins book to The Bible. Like Ozzie Osborne to Susan Boyle. Basically it says eat as much as you like...particularly the stuff you like for a whole week and if you put on four pounds by Marathon day then you are doing it right. Now this is what makes running a marathon worth it. And I have to say that as I sit here I find myself full and actually craving salad! I've eaten chips, bagels, pretzels, bananas, biscuits and consumed carb drinks...and I ate a bit like that yesterday too. It's fab.
Now all I've got to do is miss a meal tomorrow! Oh ... And run 26.2 miles. Keep forgetting that!

I Can't Believe I'm Lying on a Rolling Pin!

Well it has happened. I knew it was going too well - 2 years of running, up to 18 miles and 3 and a half hours on my feet and boom! Injury!
At the end of my last 18 miler (God did I really say that?)I felt a deep ache in the top of the outside of my thigh. Well only to be expected when you've been running for 3 and a half hours eh? So I thought nothing of it. Ran the rest of the week short runs - no worries. Then I'm out on my 'long run' aiming for my one off 20 miles. The last big push before the BIG DAY. At 7 miles my thigh aches. At 8 miles it's getting quite bad. At 9 miles I phoned Colin to moan to him. But I kept going - if I was going to have to quit I wasn't quitting before 10 miles - a respectable amount of mileage.
It's at this point that the dilemma occurs - should I stay or should I go.
The thought of phoning for a lift home in the middle of a long run seems as shameful as Dad turning up early at a party to take you home.
Failure is the first word that springs to mind. I haven't reached my end goal. For at least three miles I battled with my own misgivings. A veritable argument going on in my head - I can do a few more miles surely? - I can run through this throbbing ache can't I? It's not debilitating is it? But then the angel on my shoulder is whispering ... but what if it is injuring you long-term.
I've had an injury only once before - right at the beginning of my 'running career'. Crap shoes and inexperience led me to complete a 30 minute run with an achilles problem - I ended up out of action for a good couple of weeks.
I can't afford time out now. Only 6 weeks of serious running left. Panic is setting in. What if I injure myself and can't run at all. What if this happens 10 miles into the Marathon. Oh Crap!
So limping across Plock Court I admit defeat and Colin comes to pick me up.
The journey home is miserable. I find myself crying...frustration, disappointment, fear.
And then I find myself still amazed ... sports injuries, prospect of physio? Who is this person? When did I become someone who talks about illiotibial Bands?
So Sunday morning I find this unfamiliar person texting a recommended physiotherapist.
And today a good friend sends me a link to an hilarious You Tube video that promotes rolling around on a swimming woggle or rolling pin to 'release your illiotibial band'. And today I will be shifting my training to a rowing machine...

I Can't Believe I'm a fitness fanatic

I distinctly remember giving running a go when I was in my early 20's. My effort comprised a brief explosion of effort which took me 5 minutes up a hill near my student flat in Sunderland and then ended in me collapsing in a breathless, crumpled bundle on the pavement. This episode of youthful effort came back to me today upon passing my 19 year old student friend Ben at the local gym where he was admirably attempting to get fit through weightlifting. The worthy image of him pushing at a reluctant bar on a bench press was juxtaposed later in the day when I visited his facebook site to see a gallery of photos which all featured him drinking and, in no uncertain terms, 'partying'. Ah the memories came flooding back. So what has now changed my attitude so drastically? Is it wisdom, the sudden awareness of mortality, lack of cash or time to go partying or just one last desperate attempt to 'get fit' before I pass the point of no return? Who knows, but what is for sure...The 19 year old self which never seems to have left me is looking at me now in wonderment and disbelief as I run miles on road and treadmill, do squats until I can't walk and abstain from alcohol and overload on protein with my sights set on an unimaginable goal...and I whisper to myself again...'I can't believe I'm going to run a marathon!'.

I Can't Believe I'm Running in Blizzards...

So I was obliged to do a 'long run' today....at least 12 miles. By sheer coincidence I had promised a bunch of army lads that I would join them in their 24 hour Row/Cycle to raise funds for Glos Young Carers (as you do!). It all seemed feasible in theory. Well I wasn't going to row for 24 hours - just half an hour. Then I woke up. No, literally - I woke up to a frost covered world, -3 degrees temperature and a very heavy white sky. Still....I'm training for a marathon. I'm hard as nails innit?! So off I trotted up through Upton and on into oblivion. 20 minutes into the run I hit freezing sleet. 40 minutes into the run the ground is like glass. 50 minutes into the run the sun is shining and there's no sign of snow on the ground or in the sky and then at 1 hour and 30 minutes I was running through the arctic - snow 2 inches deep and driving into my face!. How can one small city have so many micro-climates?! But the height of fun came when I slowed to drink from my freezing water bottle and happened to take off my glove. I reached up to adjust my hat and felt something prickly near my neck. I jumped thinking I had a tree branch in my hair but then quickly realised it WAS my hair - snow white and frozen solid. Obviously my first thought at this point was 'I really must get a photo of this...' and I duly did the old 'run and snap' to reveal a photo of an 80 year old woman. No. That was me with frozen hair. OMG! I panicked for the next 10 minutes wondering if my hair would actually snap off..this thought then entertained me for a further 10 minutes especially when I remembered I had to appear in a photo with the said army boys to 'launch' their challenge. I duly succeeded in completing my 12 miles - rushed upstairs and jumped in the shower. AAAAAARGH! If anyone has gotten into a shower with freezing cold thighs and experienced that fast warm up that comes with training the hot shower on them they will understand my scream. I pulled on fresh training gear, dried my hair (which hadn't snapped off thank God) and then drove up to Tesco's where I jumped on the rowing machine for half an hour. Never has a cup of tea tasted so good that lunch-time. And never have I felt so bloody crazy.

Can't believe I haven't run today...

So what happens when you don't feel like running? I've only run once this week. I'm beginning to feel the guilt, the fear that it will thoroughly set me back. The pressure. So why doesn't all this make me go out and run? Mmmmm....mind over matter. I think it might be that after all these years I realise that women perhaps can only think of one thing at once. Oh, hear me out on this....we can juggle a conversation with a toddler, with a chat about Twighlight with our mate while cooking a curry and making a shopping list. That's a synch. But juggling big things...now that's a bit different. I found it really tough to run when I was grieving over my mate Helen's death. I've found it sooo hard to run this week while I've been trying to fit 40 hours work into 20 hours available. I remember this affliction coming on when I was at Uni - y'know how it is....you can diet for a week, lose loads of weight and be really chuffed but as soon as I had to start really working on my dissertation I found that my efforts to write as many words as possible about The Colour Purple seemed to overshadow any efforts to cut back on biscuits....
Or maybe we are just too hard on ourselves. Work, packing and a couple of crisis management jobs have just packed out my head this week.

I'll go and have a pre-holiday glass of wine and give it some thought...