Oof, I’ve been out of it. I haven’t posted in four days, which is apparently the length of time I start to feel rul guilty about it. But I have an excuse: I have a small cold! Boo-hoo. It’s just a sore throat and an occasional sniffle and sneeze. I started feeling it the day after Christmas, I THINK as a result of being around so many kids? None of my nephews were sick, but the last time I got this same thing, I had also just been around my nephews a bunch. I don’t know how parents even survive raising kids. Your immune systems must have to be made of steel.
The good thing is, I have off from work this week, so I’ve been able to sleep more than usual. I haven’t been running, which I am trying hard not to feel guilty about. My throat’s just been too sore – it almost feels irresponsible of me to run in 15-20º weather (which is what it’s been here on Long Island), as if it might do my body more harm than good. Luckily, I’m not bedridden, and I’ve been well enough to do some strength training. So as not to have any lapses in my daily workout schedule, I’ve been managing to focus on weight training for the past few days. I may be an anal idiot, but I’m a healthy anal idiot.
I ran on Christmas Day, doing 7.3 miles around Northport. I don’t normally run the day after a long run (I had done 10 miles the day before) but I wanted to burn some extra calories for all the food cramming I had been and would be doing. And I felt fine. No soreness or pain or anything. Which makes me realize, yet again, that I often underestimate myself and can handle more than I sometimes think I can.
I remember running on Christmas Day of last year, going down the mostly-closed-shopped Main Street and back up again towards home for what was probably a 4.5 mile run. I had just moved back to Northport only 12 days earlier – my plans to live with my mom as she battled cancer somewhat indefinite as, at the time, nobody knew what stage she was in or what her future held. We had been optimistic. She hadn’t even known she was Stage 4 yet. She wouldn’t learn that for another few months.
At the time, I thought I might just be on Long Island for a short while and then head back to L.A. in the spring. Of course, that didn’t happen.
I wouldn’t have known at the time that my stay at my mom’s house would turn into over a year, I would get a job in television that I loved, I would improve more than I ever thought I could as a runner, and that my mom would lose her battle with cancer. A mixed bag of a year, you might say.
Anyway, both Christmas Eve and Day this year were a delight – both festivities took place at my sister’s who lives just minutes away. No long travels for me, thank god. I’ll include a few of my favorite pics in this post. I always try to bring my “good camera” to holiday events. My older nephews love when I do, especially the oldest. At only six, he’s become quite adept at taking pics with it himself.
In the coming days I hope to write a few posts that both wrap up the past year and look to what’s to come in the next. I have a lot of big plans for 2018. I hope you’ll continue to read along as I tackle them, one by one.
I hope everyone’s holiday, whatever it was, was fun and festive and food-filled.
Now here are a lot of pictures of children you don’t know!
My Body Is A Machine 