Hard Lessons

Sunset off the coast of Northern California.

I finally was able to run last Tuesday after eventually recovering from learning some very important life lessons the hard way. A few weeks without running and my mood was getting dark, seriously.

It's hard to run when you leave home without running shoes for one. That was just one of the many mistakes I made on this last trip but I'll spare you the details of that here- you can read it in my book later. I've told the story enough times recently to refine the way I want to write it so for now let's just say running is super important in my life, it's right up there with the one thing I need most of all- sleep.

It's amazing how we can take so many things for granted until we don't have them any more. I didn't really realize how important sleep is to some very basic functions in life, especially when under stress and without the option to run off the fight or flight adrenalin. There's not really time for me to get into the details today either but it's been too long since I've created a blog post so I had to write something.

Just a quick update, I'm doing the recreational division Padden Triathlon tomorrow. Then all my energy is going to be refocused on training for the half Marathon coming up on July 22nd in Australia. A lot is on the calendar between now and when I fly out on July 15th so time is limited but I will try to write more. I'll be instructing Youth Keelboat sailing at the Bellingham Yacht Club for the next few weeks which will possibly give me more good reasons to make sure I take time to run to de-stress.

You'd think that being on the water is relaxing but I can assure you that depending on the conditions it can be very physically, mentally and emotionally taxing, especially when you're the most (and possibly the only) experienced person onboard. I wouldn't have thought that experience would give me the kind of background to know that sometimes no matter how cautious and careful you are the unexpected can happen. It's the unexpected that gives me anxiety and I will continue to play it as safe as I possibly can. Getting enough sleep will be a main ingredient in the upcoming weeks.