Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

or we could just buy new coffee filters

Story #1, The Mystery of the Hand Warmer:

This past Sunday Handsome and I took Klaus to Oklahoma City for the Open Streets festival. Despite the dark and chilly afternoon, we had so much fun! My parents and local sibs and beautiful nieces were all there too, and I loved every minute. Easy family time. We just enjoyed walking up and down the venue, meeting the vendors and jumping rope badly (me) or great (Angela), letting Klaus sniff each of the seven thousand dogs. (He was extremely well behaved. We were proud dog parents.)

And we showed up in a photographer’s public gallery, so we’re famous now, right??

At one point in the exploration, I was walking with Chloe, my sister Angela’s second born. She is a girl with sharp wits. A biting wit, you could say. Her mom bounced up to us and we traded updates about our meanderings. Then she remembered a free giveaway token in her pocket and showed Chloe. “Look, I got you a surprise, you’re gonna love it!”

Some background: Angela is very good at selecting personal gifts, big and small. She has a talent for showing you that she gets you. I love that!!

Anyway. The surprise was a single use handwarmer, the foil-wrapped kind, provided by one of the festival vendors. Chloe had been cold and it was so sweet and funny.

Then it got really funny.

Chloe asked aloud, “How do they work?” and everyone started offering their ideas.

As if none of us adults had ever successfully used a chemical hand warmer before.

Like ever in our very mature lives.

The possibilities of how they might work seemed endless. Who knew the secrets of these tiny packages of sorcery?! Perfect little modern miracles!! Angela and I got more excited and cracked up by the second. We knew it was ridiculous but couldn’t stop. (We also just didn’t know.)

“I think you break it like a glow stick!”

“No, I think you just squeeze it, I’ve been squeezing it a lot in my pocket already.” (Like a picnic condiment, probably.)

“Do you cut it open?”

“Are you sure it’s not electric?”

And so forth.

Imagine a calm but simmering middle school girl fluttering her beautiful eyelashes and collapsing her posture just a little more than it already was. Imagine her sighing so loudly we could hear it even above our cacophony of brilliant ideas.

“Or… you could read the directions???” Freckles sparkling on her cold cheeks.

We busted out laughing so hard and looked. Yep, sure enough, the foil wrapper was printed on one side with clear instructions which were, I am sad to say, not remotely close to any of our theories.

Oh well.

This reminds me of another Chloe story. I am pretty sure this took place last March when our whole group was in town for Grandpa’s funeral.

That photo above is me with my four siblings, March 2017. From the left, not in birth order, is Gen, then me, then Joe (Joey ok PLEASE), then Ang, and Phil (John to his coworkers and to my confoundment). My joke for this moment is that it looks like we had just cut a Beastie Boys cover album. The truth is, we had.

Story #2, Coffee Filters:

Ok. Three generations were crowded happily in Mom and Dad’s living room, talking about lots of irreverent things, things that were especially irreverent considering the somber reason for our gathering. One of the conversations was centered around suitable emergency substitutions for coffee filters.

I don’t remember exactly how this started, but it took off like widlfire. Considering ourselves a clever and resourceful bunch, the list grew by the minute. People suggested clean socks or tee shirts, paper towels, tissue wrapping paper, flour sack cotton, and much more. No one claimed (or admitted) to have ever tried any of these things, mind you; but we were in an unspoken contest to one-up the previous suggestion. You have siblings. You know the drill.

This whole time, Chloe had been playing a video game with her slender back to the room. She had so far contributed zero to this lively exchange. Out of the blue, she said, “Or we could just go buy some more coffee filters!” Dripping with both sweetness and acidity.

We all lost our minds from laughing. 

And that is the end of my story today.

A straight line is the shortest distance
between two points.
XOXOXOXO

 

 

 

 

there’s no crying in blogging!!

It has been brought to my attention that so many of my posts lately are, however appreciated or readable, so sad that a very special person in my life can no longer read them at work for fear of crying at her desk. So I am dedicating this post entirely to her, and it will contain only funny stuff. Three stories.

Also. She and I are embarking on a new book, reading in tandem The Radium Girls by Kate Moore. We will explore these 400 pages across time zones and while juggling very different lifestyles. I can’t wait to discuss it with her! And I will post a review when we finish.

Okay. Three short stories, all painfully true:

  1. False Alarm: After a good speed workout at my favorite four-mile loop, that one at a nearby reservoir that is so well patrolled by both local police and the sheriff’s department, I was stretching near my car. Really stretching, and actively celebrating a good run because I love my tendons and ligaments so much right now. A police officer with whom I have a hand-waving acquaintance sped over and circled up alongside my car. Kind of in a startling way. I thought for sure I was being arrested. (You know, for running too fast, ha!) He asked if I was ok, I confirmed that I was great but had I done something wrong officer, he said it looked like I was flagging him down for help. That, my friends, is some over-achieving stretch work!
  2. Zero Upper Body Strength: One afternoon this past week Handsome and I took Klaus to a nearby park to romp around and sniff things, two of his best hobbies. I spotted a small monkey bar and had no choice but to attempt an old-school penny drop. This was a staple back in childhood, something my neighborhood friends and I did from the swingset hundreds of times per day and eventually perfected so well that we often hosted backyard performances for Mom and Dad. Once they even brought popcorn and lemonade and offered us scores. It was like the Olympics! It was also the era of Mary Lou Retton, okay? We nailed all the landings back then.Well, back to 2018 and I am 44 and my penny drop days might be far behind me. Despite some recent efforts to lift a hexagon weight here and there, I could not even hoist myself up to the bar without a phenomenal, crawling and moaning, very awkward full body effort. The difficulty was stunning, especially compared to how buoyant and energetic I had felt all day. When I finally got my knees hooked over the bar, my fancy Old Navy workout pants made the whole situation so soft and slippery that my husband said something like, “Don’t break your teeth!” To which my brain added, “…again!!“SoI dismounted (that’s a gymnastics term, don’t worry about it) and aggressively scooched the purple compression fabric up over my knees, hoping some skin contact to the metal would help. It did not help, but it did summon happy memories of raw skin and summertime. Also, I am 5’8″ and the monkey bar was built for children, so once I stretched out upside down, my head almost touched the ground already.


    So I dismounted again but didn’t exactly nail the landing. Really a fantastic anticlimax. Then I spent several uncomfortable minutes working to un-scooch the compression fabric back down to my ankles. It had sort of cut off the circulation at my knees.
    A penny drop did not happen that day, but now I can’t stop thinking about it. Do I want this more than I want to beat my brother in a half marathon? Maybe.

  3. Staple Gun Drama & Marriage is Hard: Yesterday, just before the weather turned cold and ugly, I wandered outside to see what kind of protection the gardens would need overnight. So much has broken dormancy and has been growing well this month, I didn’t want to lose anything to the predicted frost and freeze. I carried to the raised veggie beds a large sheet of landscape fabric, buckets, and my husband’s staple gun. He offered to help me with the staple gun but I took such great offense to him obviously thinking I was too dumb and incapable to operate it myself that I said something sharp and refused all assistance. He went back inside, wounded a little but mostly stunned I think, and I proceeded to deal with the project at hand all by myself thank you very much.Guess what. I couldn’t load staples into the stupid staple gun. But rather than ask for help I went to my little tool cabinet and brought out a hammer and box of finishing nails instead.  I hammered that white fabric to the wooden boxes as quietly as possible, tap-tap-tap, glancing furtively over my shoulder the whole time, lest my temporary opponent might hear the banging and feel victorious.Ok, as you might have guessed, he definitely heard the hammering and also saw through the upstairs window that I had abandoned the staple gun.Later I apologized for snapping at him and explained why my feelings were hurt but that I knew he had good intentions, is only ever trying to help and obviously he knows I am a genius. Obviously. He nodded enough to satisfy me then said that, actually, he had seen that I was trying to use a broken staple gun. Apparently, we own two. The End.

Sometimes life is easy-squeezy-lemon peasy.
Sometimes it is difficult-difficult-lemon-difficult.
XOXOXOXO

six short stories on saturday night

#1: A few warm, sunny days this past week really got my heart going pitter-patter for springtime, however far away it might truly be. The hens are laying again, the honeybees have been buzzing around on fresh breezes, and my first seed order should arrive soon. I walk around the farm every day and still see lots of dry, sepia winter scenes, but in my mind’s eye, everything is verdant already and bursting with kaleidoscope color, vibrating with new life. As I type this paragraph we are bundled up in the warmest room of the house, debating the wisdom of hot coffee so close to sunset. Which is becoming later each day, I have to add. 

#2: Jessica spent the past few days with us at the farm, and she blended in so naturally. She has a way of making the gorgeous weather even more springlike. It felt like the old days, but better. On Friday she and I spent many hours together between the kitchen and the barn and the possibility-filled gardens, talking and laughing about everything old and new. She and Klaus became seriously good buddies. She and Handsome discussed car purchases and adult life. She and I (mostly she) produced a big batch of delicious soft pretzels plus a cozy family dinner of salmon cakes and all the good sides. We all watched a movie together and studied for her upcoming exam. This beautiful girl-now-a-woman has exciting plans and is brimming with all the best things about being twenty years old. We are just thrilled and grateful to be included in her life right now. Overnight, our weather turned frigid cold again, bringing us a grey and dull Saturday morning, but her presence in this house warmed it up. Her boyfriend joined us all for a late breakfast of waffles with all the trimmings, another meal which she made perfectly. We really enjoyed his company, too, and is there anything more fun than seeing your child in love? All of this beauty, and still bigger miracles are growing up around us. Things I will write about soon. 

Have you made these yet?

#3: I have for the second time cracked open A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson and am, well, in love with it all over again. Her preface gripped me this time as though she had written it, especially for Jocelyn. (Thank you for your continued prayers and the gentle stream of love notes, friends.) In a few weeks, I will join two wonderful girlfriends to listen to the author speak, a miniature book club reunion and really just time well spent with two stellar human beings, absorbing some magic together. 

When we were born, we were programmed perfectly. We had a natural tendency to focus on love. Our imaginations were creative and flourishing, and we knew how to use them. We were connected to a world much richer than the one we connect to now, a world full of enchantment and a sense of the miraculous.

#4: Have you winterized your salad bowl yet? If we cannot yet enjoy watermelon, let’s definitely feast on big, luxurious bowls of leafy greens topped with roasted vegetables and some protein. No dressing needed. Warm those bellies and keep them happy with complex carbs! This past week I met my sister Angela for lunch in a faraway place called “Oklahoma City, Northside” and we shamed ourselves at a magical salad bar. Have you heard of Salata? Oh man. 

#5: One of our local Hansons mentors posted this quote today, and it is perfect: “The genuine marathoner is a rare breed indeed, half athlete and half poet. Part rock-bottom pragmatist and part sky-high idealist. Completely, even defiantly individual and yet irrevocably joined to a select group almost tribal in its shared rituals and aspirations.” Fair warning, friends, if you check in here on Monday. I had a week of non-running and have lots to say. Many lessons to solidify!

#6: My husband’s new favorite dessert is kind of a surprise to me. It was a throw-together layered shortbread-and-ganache idea from a brownie mix I picked up at Aldi. Should I make it again for Valentine’s Day this week? Or should I make the very top secret thing I was already planning? Or should we have multiple desserts to finish off our traditional heart-shaped ribeye dinner? Like a small chocolate festival of our own? Okay, yes, that.

Stay cozy, friends! Read great books. Eat the best food you can find. Expect miracles and do not for one day give up hope. What if we did? Look what we would be missing already. And tomorrow hasn’t even happened yet.

“Never underestimate the power
that one good workout
will have on your mind.
Keeping the dream alive
is half the battle.”
~Kara Goucher
XOXOXOXO

 

friday 5 at the farm: yoga mantras by adriene

Hey friends, happy Friday AGAIN. And happy first Friday of a brand new month. And Happy Groundhog Day! According to tradition, we are supposed to expect six more weeks of cold weather. However. If you’re curious about what the Almanac has to say, read this. Our long-range forecast sounds ok.

Either way, it doesn’t matter. Time flies so quickly that all we really have to focus on is making the most of Every. Single. Day. If we fill them with enough Love and good things, six weeks can pass as beautifully as two.

Carpe the Diems, warm or cold, rain or shine! Gratitude in every circumstance, right? Count it All Joy as my husband says. 

Okay. Speaking of gratitude, I just wrapped up that luscious month of daily yoga practice with Adriene, having completed her new series called TRUE, and I adored it. She teaches, inspires, and just invites you to promote your own well being in deeper ways.  

For a Friday 5 this week I want to share some of my favorite mantras she offers on repeat.

  1. “Tap into that inner smile.” This is better than faking happiness. It’s a private affirmation, and it can be a wellspring of energy, especially on days when it seems easier to be down. There is always joy available.
  2. “Breathe in sync with your movement.” For me, this has everything to do with mindfulness as I work around the farm. It helps me continue praying while staying connected to the animals or the task at hand. It also helps a lot with running.
  3. “Set your hands with a particular kind of love.” This calms me down when I try to do too many things at once. It reminds me to focus and be deliberate. 
  4. “Find freedom in the form, escape the pose.” Such a friendly, healthy nod toward individualizing any plan, any structure in adult life. This also serves as a reminder to pursue the marrow of any project, the deep meaning and essential benefits, not just the outward appearance of completion.
  5. “Find what feels good.” Probably the line for which she is best known, and with good reason. I dare you to find an aspect of daily life where this doesn’t help.  

Don’t you love these?

Something funny thing this past month was that so often what she offered as a meditation on any given day happened to really line up with that day’s Bible devotional (I’ve been reading Jesus Calling by Sarah Young). The echoes have been soothing. Fortifying.

Sad to think that so many years ago the internet was filled with warnings about how yoga contradicts Christianity.

How unfortunate to miss out on the harmony between body and spirit.

Morning glory vines doing some refreshing twists… xoxo I am excited to see this green again!

Ok!

If you have ever done yoga with Adriene, you probably have your own favorite mantras, so please share them! Did you follow a month of TRUE? Which days resonated with you, or did you discover a new pose or meditation that was magical for your body or spirit?

Have you decided to stick with a daily yoga practice in February and beyond? I have for sure. Everything about it feels sublime. 

Don’t fret over the groundhog. Just get stuff done and be happy.

And do more yoga.

“Let us be full in whatever posture it is we are doing,
Just as we should be full in whatever we do in our lives.”
~B.K.S. Iyengar
XOXOXOXO

 

marathon monday: why the hansons plan & recapping january

They say to never judge a run by the first few miles.

Never judge a week by how Monday goes, either.

I’m adding to this wisdom: Never judge a training cycle by the first few weeks. Because life is crazy, and sometimes the first few weeks of an eighteen-week plan need to serve other purposes in life, like bouncing back from an especially heavy holiday season.

This has been the case for me lately. While I’m deeply grateful for so much that has happened since life changed in November, it has been physically and emotionally draining. And our family life continues to be filled with uncertainty, so sometimes I lace up to run barely able to walk. 

I needed much of January to feel like myself again, and certainly running helped. But I was just logging slow miles and crying a lot. 

Anyway! What I’m saying is, the warm-up is over. It was good. And I am so glad I didn’t give up yet because this past week delivered a kind of a breakthrough that has me thinking about setting a very concrete and exciting goal for this year’s Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon on Sunday, April 29th. Time to get to work.

Why Hansons this time? In short, because the feedback is compelling. Since last summer I have read so many personal testimonials from competitive and recreational “age groupers” who used this method to become stronger runners who reach their time goals without dieting, without gaining weight, without getting injured, and without feeling burned out. Hansons runners are passionate and openly celebrate not just their success but also their health and happiness along the way. (Weird, right? To do something you love only to suffer unnecessarily along the way?)

Some of these folks I stalked online are competitive racers, which I admit is something fun to think about. But all of these runners want to run well and discover their own potential. That is for sure me already. Remember back in 2015 that I said I wouldn’t run another marathon until I believed I could do it “clean and strong?” No more dieting. No more sloppy, half-hearted efforts. No more hitting the wall and crossing the finish line in tears.

Well, this plan’s mileage already feels great. I’ve been building up that much since late autumn and it is satisfying overall, even before playing around with paces, which really is where the magic hides. I’ll share in the week five recap below, how the method is already helping me see results.

Besides the promise of improvement, I am smitten by the science here. It just makes so much sense. Chapter by chapter, the book explains what happens to your body over time as you provide it new challenges. It details the muscular, cardiovascular, and even cellular adaptations you make from week to week, and why each different workout is useful and important. It helps you visualize the draw of energy and the power of speed, the glide, the transfer of oxygen, and more. It’s beautiful, really. Reading each chapter then recalling key sentences while running, I can almost feel my body responding.

I am following the advanced marathon plan. If you are interested at all, please read the book. It’s fascinating! Until then, here are some key differences this plan boasts over others:

  • Higher weekly mileage, which is fun and satisfying, but most of those miles being easy effort (from 38 on week one up to 62 just before your race)
  • No long runs over 16 miles, even during peak, so fewer days lost to long hours on your feet, plus fewer days lost to extended rest and recovery
  • More “Something of Substance” workouts, which train you for strength, speed, and tempo running
  • Less of a taper, which in my mind mitigates race-week nerves and more  importantly trains you to run under mildly exhausted conditions, called “accumulated fatigue.” This gets your strong for the second half of your marathon. No bonking!
  • Goal-specified training. I LOVE THIS!!! The Hansons plan helps you pinpoint specific paces for a long run (used to be my favorite, that might be changing), tempo run, easy days (surprisingly slow but luscious), and speed intervals (adrenaline!!). And it all helps you approach your race intelligently to finish in the time you want.
  • Race well and discover your potential, above just finishing. That’s the bottom line here.

My January so Far: 

My mind and body have needed this past month to recoup. I am grateful for the time and resources to run most days each week, eat good, nutritious food, and rest well. The weeks since January 2nd have been fruitful in many ways. 

Lots of warm winter salads loaded with vitamins, carbs, and healthy fats! Yes, please.

Week One: The plan asked for 38 miles and I ran 34 due to our extended break. Those were all slow and easy miles, letting the emotional holidays drain away. I also joined a luscious yoga series and started reigning in the treats. Shark Week for me was that week, and I complained about that a little in my training log, ha. (Ladies will agree with me that hormones can greatly affect running. That’s a whole topic for another day!)

Week Two asked for 41 miles, which I ran greedily, plus 0.61, haha! More yoga. My body felt better that week, but still no Something of Substance (SOS) workouts yet. This is where the self-compassion comes in, the part where I forgive myself for not pushing it because at least I got the time on my feet (TOF). It’s all contributing to a strong base like I had back in October (passed my 200-mile goal that month). A couple of weeks of easy movement and time to think also helped me shed that holiday bloat and heaviness. Overall I felt pretty good.

Week Three That week I ran 45.77 miles, just almost exactly what the plan called for (45). I did attempt one sloppy speed session of my own design, just a very casual “fartlek,” and honestly you guys, though it was nothing to brag about performance wise, it felt amazing. I had so much fun! Like a little kid, giggling and running and feeling perfectly free and happy. I am always amazed by days like this because so often people talk about how much speed work hurts. Surely down the line, I will learn how to work my body so hard it does hurt. But for now? For now, the speed play is fantastic. Anyway. Week 3 I kept up with daily yoga and focused on eating more vegetables and protein than anything else. Sleeping rough, also lots of bad dreams due to some emotional stuff. I’m looking forward to the gardening season and to cranking up mileage so my body is too exhausted to lay awake at night. 

Week Four I missed one entire day this week due to extreme winter weather (my treadmill is a goner), and another day I did a shorter run than planned due to some special family events, so the prescribed 46 miles got whittled down to 36.31. I forbade myself from making it into a big deal because life is full and good and in the scheme of things, missing 10 miles this early in training is fine. Okay. Moving on. Winter is almost over! : )

A Quick Word About Paces: I hesitated for months to ask anyone for help in pinpointing my correct paces because I felt ashamed of my abilities. It was a lot like discussing weight or age, ha! Which is both silly and a double-edged sword. You will always find running friends who are faster, and you will always find running friends who are slower. So why waste a bunch of energy comparing? It does not matter. Even in competitive groups (which like a dork I have to remind myself I am not in), you have to focus on your own health and your own journey, staying happy and grateful for the current season you’re in.
  When I finally reached out for some guidance, I was pleasantly surprised by how encouraging all my local friends and volunteer coaches in the HMM group were. The concept here is to discover your running potential and make measurable progress for yourself, relative to your own starting point. It’s definitely a long-term vision kind of thing, which I love love LOVE. I love it so much, the promise of running and improving for many years. That said, here is the list of paces I am following day by day for this training cycle. Huge thanks to Paul in our local HMM group for spending his time calculating these for me:

Week Five: Shark Week again. Thankfully my symptoms were mild this month, and for extra credit, the worst of all days happened to land on Wednesday, a planned rest day, ha! So no running. Just lots of rest and yoga and easy housework like ironing my husband’s shirts and sewing a few things. Overall this week, the plan called for 49 miles, and even taking Wednesday off it was easy to hit that number. I ran a total of 52.66 miles, including three true SOS workouts! The highlights of week 5 were running my first speed, tempo, and long run days at prescribed paces (see above). Each effort was completely different, and each one felt amazing. Seriously so much fun. After the long run especially (12.54 miles at a smooth and effortless pace of 9:29) I walked away feeling shocked that my body could move like that, keep that momentum, and feel strong and comfortable the whole time, with gobs of energy to spare. This is not what I am used to, you guys. I dare say this method works.

As I hit publish on this very long post (thanks for hanging in there), I have made a good start on Week Six with six easy recovery miles (41 to go) and some yoga. Whether I commit to the April 29th marathon is still a big question mark, but either way, I will certainly be enjoying the process. And I will post here on Mondays and on IG a little to track my progress.

Have you tried the Hansons method yet? What were your results?

Are you doing any fitness challenges for January? Anything you plan to stick with in February? What feels amazing to you lately? I would love to know. Everyone is different, and it’s so fun to hear how people discover health and wellness.

Take care of yourselves!!

“Comparison is the Thief of Joy.”
~Theodore Roosevelt
XOXOXOXO