The 12 minute Mile.

     All my life I have felt overweight.  I have two siblings, who are both tall and skinny, I was always tall and rounded.  I have memories of middle school and high school dinners, feeling frustrated that both my siblings could eat more then I could, and still be so skinny.  I was the only kid in my family to do sports consistently in high school.  Track and Field meant that I was exercising daily, working out and practicing, and I felt fit.  I didn't mind my big thighs because I knew I could leg press 600 lb, which was helpful for shot put and discus competitions, but not so much for self confidence. The bane of my high school fitness was gym class fitness test. Every year they asked students to run a 12 minute mile. It felt like they tortured students with this, threatened that they would fail gym class, and be unable to graduate. For a straight A student this always caused anxiety, and yet somehow, I never was able to do a 12 minute mile.  I would get close, but never cross that line in time.  Somehow despite not completing a 12 minute mile,  the whole threat was empty, and I still passed gym class with an A.  But I never forgot the feeling of failure, being 100 meters away from the finish line when they called time.
      College was physically a struggle for me, because somehow when looking for colleges, I didn't want to be defined by sports, so I turned down scholarships for shot put after competing at the state level in high school, so I wouldn't feel pressure from sports when I wanted to focus on academics.  In college I did crew for a semester before they wanted me to move to varsity, but I couldn't bring myself to work out at 4 am.  After that I started neglecting my physical fitness.

     Fast forward to now. I've got three beautiful daughters, who are my world.  And for the last 10 years I have further ignored my own health.  I've gone on and off of every diet I could find.  I've gained and lost the same 50 lbs more times then I can count.  At some point I get frustrated with the plateau, and I stop trying so hard, and I tell myself "I'd rather be fat and happy, then miserable and always dieting."  I've never been able to stick to any consistent exercise because it always felt too hard, and I could never motivate myself.

     My eldest daughter came home from kindergarten with a Mother's Day card for me.  There was a form when each child got to fill in information about their mother.  The line "she likes to" was filled out with "sleep and watch TV." And "she always" was filled out with "take care of us." This hit me remarkably hard.  How can I care for my girls, and not care for myself?  I don't want to be remembered by my kids as being someone who is never active, and who doesn't have real interests in life.  I began doing more research on healthy food choices instead of diets.

     Right about that time Team 1DOS showed up in my life.  I work with their founder, and just happened to see on Facebook that they were starting a new 6 week challenge. What's your point? a challenge to help you figure out why you want to make changes, and a group of people willing to support you as you make small changes at your own pace.  Having a group of people cheering me on has been more helpful then I could have imagined. For the past 6 weeks I have exercised for 40+ minutes at 4-6 times a week.  And what surprised me more, is that I'm enjoying doing it. I always hated running, so I started with walking on a tread mill.  After a couple weeks I had a big challenge to face, when I went on vacation, and there was no tread mill to keep me in my comfort zone.  So I jogged and walked outside, and what I found was that I could do a 13 minute mile.  Something in me that has been feeling disappointment since high school, decided that I

wanted that 12 minute mile. And I wanted it bad.  So I started pushing myself, shaving off 20-30 seconds a mile.  Today for the first time in my life, I ran a mile in under 12 minutes!  I wish I could tell the high school version of me that it was possible, I just needed to believe in myself.

Pictures Up

I finally loaded a bunch of pictures into My Picasa. I tried to limit the number I put up to about 30 a day. I think in total we had more then a gig of photo's so, it's been cut down quite a bit, but it still gives a really nice scope of the trip.

The Last Day

Sunday 6/28/09

Today was lovely. We started late, so we had brunch instead of breakfast which we picked up at the corner store. We ate on the bus on the way to the Dublin Zoo. The Dublin Zoo was a lot more fun then I anticipated, and we ended up spending most of the day there. By the time we got back to our hotel it was already 5pm. We considered a quick nap since both of us were tired, but I ended up reading for a bit, and then taking a nice long hot shower to ease some of the tension in my back. I really miss my bed. It’s all nice and soft, it supports my back, and very importantly it doesn’t sag in the middle. Sigh, I guess I’ll have to wait till tomorrow night to get a good night sleep. Later tonight the plan is to grab a slice of pizza for dinner, and then to pack so we’re ready for the early start in the morning. We have to catch a bus to the airport at 7am, so we’ll be waking up considerably earlier then we have been all vacation. I have to say that this vacation has really been better then I imagined it would be. After 3 weeks of travel I thought I would be exhausted beyond reason, and would need time to recover once I got home. Like a vacation from my vacation. I still feel like I will need time to adjust when I get home, but I’m more concerned about the new things at home like starting my new job, and less concerned about recovering from our trip. I’ve been quite happy with our decision to bring our lap top along on the trip, it has enabled me to journal, and keep track of our wonderful, and sometimes strange experiences. I look forward to being able to re-read this journal at some point. To all those who have been following our assorted adventures, I hope you have enjoyed the narrative. I’ll see you soon, back in the states. Good night, and God bless.

Dublin

Saturday 6/27/09

Sleeping in has to be one of my favorite things. I love waking up without hearing an alarm clock. Morgan and I have started staying up a bit later, and getting up a bit later in preparation for Monday when we’re going to have to switch our body clocks back to east coast time. Today we spent most of the day walking around down town. We stopped first at Trinity College, where Morgan was very excited to see the Book of Kells. Then we went on a tour of Dublin Castle, and Christ Cathedral. Our walk through the city was interrupted by the Dublin Pride parade, which is apparently an annual event in June. Not exactly what I had envisioned for our day in Dublin, but none the less it was memorable. Plenty of drag queens, and lots of people dressed like the village people… such a strange parade to stumble across. In the evening we attempted the pub scene again, but were somewhat disappointed by the smoky atmosphere and the sky high prices, Dublin really is an expensive city. So instead of the pub we hit the grocery store again, since we don’t have a kitchen here it was sandwiches and yogurt for us. We did a little reading, and once again it’s time for bed. Tomorrow we’re going to try to get out of the city a little and head over to Phoenix Park, maybe take in the zoo. Hopefully the weather holds out for us. It would be nice to have a nice last day in Europe.

Dublin

Friday 6/26/09

Today has been a very long day. It started early at the B&B, we had a last breakfast in the roof top garden, grabbed our things and headed for the airport. We had to take the subway to the main station, and then catch a bus to get out to the airport. Similar to last time, Ryan air didn’t fly out of Rome’s main airport, they flew out of a ‘smaller’ airport outside of the Rome city limits. Unlike in Glasgow where the smaller airport was about the size of Albany International, in Rome the ‘smaller’ airport was closer to the size of LaGuardia. So we got there and were relieved to see a sign for Ryan air up in one of the many check in lines. We hopped in line, and checked the screens to see that our flight was still planning on leaving on time. We figured out that it was leaving out of gate 22, so we knew where to go after checking in. Things were good. Then we got to the front of the check in line after waiting about half an hour. The woman at the desk told us that we were in the wrong line. It would seem that we had misinterpreted the Italian writing on the display screen, the flight wasn’t leaving out of gate 22, we needed to check in at desk 22. Great, so we run over to gate 22 and there is another huge line. So now I’m getting really worried, because we have less then an hour till our flight is suppose to leave, and Ryan air states clearly on their website that if you don’t check your baggage at least 40 minutes before the flight departs they won’t guarantee that it will make it through with you to your destination. So we waited, and waited, and at 20 minutes before our flight was scheduled to leave we finally checked in. The woman at the desk was unconcerned however, and seemed to think there would be no problem with the baggage. We got through security, and got to our real gate (#4) and were ready to leave. Our departure time came and went as we waited in line, finally they let us board. Twenty minutes past our departure time they finally closed the plane… and then we sat there. For another hour, we sat there captive on the runway, until the plane finally left. Then it was another 3 hour flight to Dublin. Sigh, despite all the potential issues, we made it to Dublin in one piece, and our baggage managed to make it with us.
The first thing that registered in my mind when I stepped out of the airport was that I miss Italy already. It was cold, and overcast here, and it was starting to sprinkle. We caught a lime green double decker bus from the airport to a stop near our hotel, and checked in no problem. Our room is a little odd. I thought we were getting a standard double room, with either a double bed, or two singles. Turns out that we got both a double bed and two singles, so our room is a little more crowded then it needed to be, but is otherwise comfortable. Once again here it seems that “wifi in every room”, translates to “pay us an unreasonable amount of money and you can use the wifi in your room”. Fortunately there are a few internet café’s nearby that charge very little to use the internet, so we will most likely try to post from there tomorrow. We went for a walk after getting into the hotel, just to get a feel for the city… it started to rain. We tried to go to a pub for dinner, but they didn’t serve food, only beer. Morgan got his first Guinness in Ireland, and I tried a bit, still tastes horrible even when it’s Irish. We had planned to stay for some entertainment, but the smoky atmosphere drove us out. We went back to the hotel, picking up sandwiches on the way. I’m really quite tired, so I’m gonna call it an early night. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

Last day in Italy

Thursday 6/25/09

Today was once again relaxed. Morgan and I seem to be getting tired more easily these days, and I feel like it’s related to how long we’ve been away from our normal routine. It’s not that the things we’re seeing are any less spectacular, it just seems like it’s harder to soak up the volume of information that we’re seeing. We slept in this morning, after staying up later then we should have getting through the ‘good part’ of our respective books. We had a leisurely breakfast out on the roof, and then went out exploring. We saw the Roman Forum, Palatine Hill, and the Colosseum today. Our three stops took most of the day, they were packed full of tourists, and the heat of the day seemed to zap our energy. We both got a little sun burnt as well. We came back to the B&B a little early wanting a reprise of last night’s dinner in the rooftop garden. We got another bottle of local red wine (which is quite literally cheaper then water around here) a seafood medley and some pasta… we weren’t disappointed. We had a fantastic relaxed evening. Now we just have to pack, get ready for bed, and wake up early ready to say goodbye to Italy.

Rome/Vatican

Wednesday 6/24/09

Today was packet full. We started our day with breakfast in the roof top garden. It was fantastic… the garden I mean, the breakfast was toast and coffee. Our first stop of the day was the Vatican. Somehow things were very different then I remembered them from 10+ years ago when I had seen them before. Everything was much more crowded, and security seemed even more lax, which seems strange post 9/11. I remember having to go though customs to enter Vatican City, I even have the stamp in my passport to prove it, but this time we just walked in, no security, no checkpoint. We had to go through a metal detector for St. Peters, but that was the worst of it. We saw the Vatican museum first, going fairly quickly through the exhibits, so we only spent 3 hours there, including our time at the Sistine chapel. The Sistine chapel was packet to bursting. People standing shoulder to shoulder with barely room to breath. I felt bad, because this was Morgan’s first time seeing it, and it’s not as spectacular if you can’t sit back and just look at it for a while. Next we went to the Basilica, after waiting in line for 45 minutes we were allowed to enter. It was impressive, but somehow after our recent time in Florence it just wasn’t as impressive as I had remembered it. Morgan was impressed, but again a little overwhelmed by the crowds. People in large groups get a little overpowering, but odor isn’t everything. Next we walked to St. Angelo’s castle but didn’t go in because the entry fee was a little ridiculous and we’d had our fill of castles. We spent the rest of our afternoon wondering through Rome visiting the Pantheon, Trevi fountain, and the Spanish Steps. We finished the day by stopping at a grocery store and getting pasta and a frozen seafood mix to put over it. We also picket up a couple bottles of wine. Believe it or not, it seems Italy has made a convert out of me in the wine department. I have decided that I really like red wine. So tonight we spent the evening sitting in the roof top garden, enjoying wine, a little sun, a lovely dinner and some much needed time unwinding. Morgan and I have both been delighted to find that school has not completely stamped our desire for leisure reading. Both of us have been spending evenings devouring books the way we did when we were kids… it has been really wonderful, just like I’m on vacation.