5,4,3

yesterday the skies split wide open and let the sun pour over our valley, and many people went outside and played.
not me.
I thought about it, considered it, rejected it, mainly because of this pain-in-the-neck cold I have. it's actually a pain in the chest and throat every time I cough, and I decided the bundling up against the cold/sweating/freezing aspect of riding outside in 43 degree weather was probably not the best thing I could do for my body.
so instead I went to class.

I went early to get some good medium heart rate zone work in, which was a good thing because the class itself was a little shy on that.
the workout was, after a 15 minute warmup,
5 minutes in zone 4A (lactate threshold place) at a fast climbing pace (75 rpm)
4 minutes in zone 4B (halfway between lactate threshold and ventricular threshold), same pace but standing,
3 minutes zone 5 (VT), 85-90 rpm, seated
3 minutes recovery,
repeat,
repeat.

well .. .. .. when one works in zone 4B and above, it really helps to be able to breathe fully, easily, without restriction.
a chest cold can comprise one's breathing, just a bit.

4A was fine. and 4B was fine for the first two minutes, and then I found I couldn't pull breath into my lungs well, and I decided I was stupid--yes, stupid--to try to force it. so I backed down to 4A and stayed there until the zone 5 phase was over.

round two: 4A was fine. 4B was okay, and I found myself in zone 5 at least a quarter of the time. decided not to push to zone 5 for those 3 minutes, stayed in 4B. I'm not stupid.

round three: 4A was fine. 4B was fine. decided to go for zone 5. did it. don't want to discuss level of stupidity.

I think I was correct to stay indoors for my workout. but it was disheartening, especially as I watched cyclist after cyclist spin past my house all afternoon.
today is warmer, even, but windy and gray and I am not called at all to go tool around outside.

being sick sucks. there's no other conclusion to be drawn.
I sit inside, typing, writing away, being productive, but wishing the cough away.
sigh. maybe tomorrow I'll wake up healthy.
I wish the same for you, for us all, actually.

namaste.

subhakamana

if you are gifted with a bright sunny warmish day in these next few weeks, I hope you hop on your bike and think of me.

a friend found the above greeting and passed it along to me for my upcoming globe trot to nepal tomorrow (and the next day): it's meanings are good luck, good health, best wishes . . .

I offer the same to you all during these next few weeks, and if all goes well, I'll be back shortly before Christmas.

namaste, and salud!

nocturnal attack

sometime in the dark hours of last night I got hit.
hard.
it started when I realized it hurt to swallow.
then I discovered my head hurt.
next I sniffled.
and came completely awake, stunned.
I was getting a cold.
correction: I'd gotten a cold.
it had me; it was wrapped all over me.

sigh.

sniff.
moan.

I don't do sick very well.
and here's perhaps where I should turn some spiritual wisdom upon myself:
what you resist, persists.

okay, I have a cold, it's the pits, I'm disappointed, and I'll take my tylenol and pray it goes away soon.

sniff. groan.

sigh.

addiction

I had brunch with my handful of female friends a while back, something we do much too infrequently. we are connected through former employment and our children's schools, and the seven of us bring amazingly different backgrounds and life experiences together in a beautifully successful, crazy quilt kind of way.
two of us are from michigan, two have lost sons, one has lost a husband. five of us worked for the same company years ago, and four of us have children who have attended the same schools. two of us married boys they dated in high school, and one is currently dating a boy she went to the prom with. one just returned to college, three have graduate degrees, and between us we've given birth to nineteen children. one has a sister with addiction issues, and one has an ex-husband with addiction issues.
while we are all healthy, a few of us walk, a few run, a few own bikes, only one of us is as committed to cycling as I am. yep, that would be me.

one of us has a son who died of an oxycontin overdose five years ago.
his mother has fought for years now to spread the word about this dangerous drug, to warn others, and to have oxycontin banned.
so some of our conversations are about addiction.
and at brunch, it turned to other kinds of addictions, and suddenly I was addicted to cycling.

now, certainly, people can say that, think that, even believe that.
I can get defensive, I can agree with it, or I can try to put it in perspective by understanding their perspective as one who doesn't live inside my skin.

I begin with a definition of addiction. the following is the most relevant one I could find, as most definitions focus on the use of drugs or other habit forming, harmful substances:

a recurring compulsion by an individual to engage in some specific activity, despite harmful consequences, as deemed by the user themselves to their individual health, mental state, or social life. (the infamous wikipedia.)

so . . . compulsion? well, I do feel compelled to move. (I think we're supposed to do that. doctors tell us to, and God gave us all those muscles and capabilities for a reason.) I just happen to like to move on a bicycle as opposed to walking or running. but I also love my books and my couch.
harmful consequences? like . . .? a healthy heart? toned muscles? a boosted metabolism? not sure I can find a harmful consequence. I manage to balance responsibilities and social activities with my cycling. and my mental state is mostly improved by biking.

some say we get addicted to the endorphins, and push ourselves to keep experiencing that high.
well . . . I think I grew up learning that a "natural high" was what we were to reach for, to "get high on life" as opposed to alcohol, drugs, food, shopping, and on and on.

I've stated this before, and I still hold it to be true: I am not addicted to cycling, nor am I even obsessed with it. I am someone who finds peace, joy, and a way to be healthy, all on my bicycle.
and on those days (weeks) when the phone doesn't ring, the editors don't respond, and orders for my work are nonexistent, riding my bicycle is a way to keep my sanity.
I train hard for the events I choose to participate in, and I love feeling strong and capable, but the meditative aspect of cycling is probably the most important piece of all.

a beautiful bit of advice I once heard was this: don't explain, don't defend.
so to even write about this is difficult, as I don't want to be one who doth explain too much.
I am firmly committed to my mental health, to my physical health, to experiencing joy in our world, and to being a peaceful, loving, helpful member of our shared planet.
riding my bike dovetails perfectly with my goals, and for as long as it brings me health and joy, I will continue to hop on ruby and pedal away.

you can call it addiction if you'd like, or even obsession. but I know the truth about me, and I'm okay with it. I've got a fabulously healthy heart, and I've got my sanity.
works for me.

restoration

last thursday night my car battery died.
it died in a most unusual way for a battery to die: it committed suicide.
now maybe this isn't a strange thought for most of you, but for me, it's just not up there in the "what I expect a car battery to do" list.

thursday night I went into my garage to get something I keep stored there. I opened the door, flipped on the light, and immediately heard a kind of a clicking noise. I paused, my eyes and ears searching the garage for what it could possibly be. I saw nothing unusual, but continued to hear this rhythmic sound, which seemed to be coming from the northwest corner of my garage. there were two cars in my little garage, so everything was packed in tightly, and I wiggled my way over to that area, where I listened even more carefully. my ears finally told my brain that the sound was coming from under the hood of my car. hmmm.
now I have to backtrack and tell you about the ghost in my car.
I bought this car (I just can't bring myself to admit it's a minivan, so I will continue to call it a car) four years ago, from a nice couple who had been its only owners. I should say, at the time of purchase I thought they were a nice couple. I have since decided that I need to qualify that statement, and perhaps call them a usually nice couple who were more concerned about unloading the vehicle than they were with being completely upfront about its history. which is probably how almost all of us are when we're trying to sell a car.
I hadn't had the car long before the ghost made its presence known. I was driving, on my way to one place or another, on the freeway. suddenly the electronic locks clicked, locking the doors. then they clicked again, unlocking the doors. then silence, as my mind raced around, trying to understand what had just happened. then, click. click. click-click, as it did a quick lock-unlock sequence. click-click.
then nothing.
I smiled. it had to be a ghost.
to keep to the point of the story, I won't go on and on: suffice it to say, there were numerous times my car decided to unlock itself. or lock and then unlock itself. the ghost in the machine.
so, back to thursday night: my first thought was just that the ghost was just back at work.
and then I opened the door, and saw a feeble little "door open" light come on and weakly flash in time with the clicks.
uh-oh.
I tried the key: dead. nada. muerto.
three males later, we found a fuse that was playing mexican jumping bean, causing the noise. we pulled the fuse, the sound stopped, and I still had a dead battery.

yes, there is a point to this story: when the AAA guy came the next morning, he explained to me what had happened. apparently a battery recharges as you drive. if you don't drive a lot, the battery can find itself living in half-mode: carrying a charge, but never recharging itself completely. the mechanic told me this will ruin a battery. so what the car does when it detects this situation is to set off an event that will drain the battery completely, because a completely drained battery has a better chance of new life than a battery living forever in half-mode. (can you tell that these are MY words, not his??).
so my really intelligent car made this fuse go crazy, in an effort to drain the battery and thus, heroically, save its life.
wow.
and I'd thought it was just my silly ghost at work again.

the moral of today's story:
we humans are just like car batteries. it's destructive and sometimes deadly to live in half-mode. it's not okay to just partially recharge ourselves. we need to engage in activities that fully recharge us, on a regular basis, otherwise we risk living in this dangerous half-mode.
our bodies, like my car, when pushed to that certain point do have "suicide plans," and that's when we end up hospitalized or in some kind of treatment facility. and those are best case scenarios.
I have lived in half-mode. there is a saying about "filling the well," that you can only keep giving to others as long as your well has something in it. and therefore, you must find ways to fill your well. enough sleep, proper nutrition, exercise, laughter, joy . . . all of these contribute to a full well.
but I have reached points where, like my car battery, whatever things were recharging my battery were only doing it partially: I never made the long-enough drive that recharged me completely. and I lived in half-mode. which is an exhausting place to be.

this past sunday morning I went to yoga, and during the warm-up phase our instructor asked us each to set an intention for what we wished to gain during our hour of yoga practice. I thought of a friend of mine who often attends a class called "restorative yoga." I like that idea, and thus I chose restoration. I chose to be fully restored by that morning's yoga class. I had had a run-around, sit-and-watch-my-kids kind of day saturday, and the rest of sunday would be busy as well, so I decided that I would leave yoga class restored. and thus I did.

and these two events are why I decided to write about restoration today. because without being restored ~ check in with any old house you see ~ we absolutely fall apart. in little ways, in insidious ways, and in great ways.

I choose to walk ( and ride ) a restorative path through the rest of my life.