5 days to 5K

Just five more days to the 5K. Over the weekend, my friend "suggested" that perhaps I wasn't pushing myself hard enough when I was training. Oh really? What a surprise! I'm sure it is too little too late, but tonight I did make a concerted effort to push myself more than normal. I completed the 5K in 46 minutes. I realize this is still slow slow slow, but considering that six months ago I wasn't even attempting to run that distance, I feel it is at least sort of kind of respectable.

Onward...

The first song on my treadmill playlist...the Boss:

"...cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run.."

Couch to 5K to .... just stay on the couch

I'm seeing a pattern in my life, and I'm not afraid to admit it. I'm kind of a quitter. It started way back in 3rd grade when I quit Brownies, followed in 6th grade when I quit piano lessons. Then, after junior high, I gave up volleyball and track, and after freshman year, I quit basketball. Finally, after junior year, I quit band. I quit three different colleges before I finally got my bachelor's degree.

I don't know what I was thinking when, earlier this year, some co-workers convinced me to run a 5K with them. They assured me that all I had to do was follow the Couch to 5K program and it would be a breeze. In just 8 short weeks I would be running a 5K like a pro. I bought into the hype...and assumed it would be totally easy since, at the time, I had almost 20 weeks until the 5K.

Hold up, dawg...if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is! First off, how many DD track stars do you see? None...I rest my case. In fact, I just googled "female Olympic runners with big boobs" and the first hit was "Why do women athletes tend to be flat-chested?" Followed by a story in the Orange County Register that begins, "For some women, the path to athletic excellence seems to be blocked by overly large breasts, ..." There you have it, I am doomed.

Then, there's that whole BMI business. Yes, I'm obese according to the charts. About a week ago, Sherri Shepherd tweeted, "Just figured out my BMI (body mass index) ... and it turns out I'M OBESE! WHAT!!!!" I feel your pain, Sherri. Something about that chart just ain't quite right. 

Then I googled "fat people running 5K," and you'd be surprised at how many entries there are about that. 

I tried to be a runner once in college. I took off with my roomie Cathy out of Burge Hall. I made it down the hill on Dubuque Street, before I had to stop...after that it is kind of a blur...I think I managed to cross the Park Road bridge and head back up the bike trail, crossing the Hancher Foot Bridge before ending up on the back side of Burge, where I promptly fell out on the ground and yelled for my other roommate to throw me down a beer and a cigarette.

Where does that leave me now? Well, the race is just 10 days away on Sunday, October 2. Race information can be found here. The mission of the race is to raise funds for individuals unable to afford breast cancer screenings and other support services and to educate individuals on the importance of early detection. ALL PROCEEDS from the race go to the Especially for You Fund and are used locally to provide breast cancer screening and other support services for individuals in need. My family was touched by breast cancer. My sister-in-law succumbed to this horrible disease at age 38, leaving my two nephews--ages 6 and 9 at the time--without a mom.

I should be able to endure a little pain and discomfort in honor of all the women, and men, who have fought breast cancer. (Shout out to my friend Donna in Texas who is also a survivor.)

The Couch to 5K program was going along pretty well for me until I hit a plateau at Week 5, when I was supposed to go from walking/running intervals of 5/8/5/8/5 to just 5/20! What the heck...running 20 minutes without stopping? I've been stuck here for weeks. Let's face it people, it takes a lot of energy to propel a mass like this through the atmosphere.

I mapped out a 5K route by my house. I "ran" it for the first time tonight. OK, mostly I ended up walking because it was hot and the concrete almost instantly gave me shin splints. Oh, how I long to just quit and say, "they already have my money...I don't need to show up for the race." But, alas, I will persevere. I probably should have signed up for the 5K WALK, which is more my speed.

Stay tuned. I'll post an update after the race!

Life in an Instant

I've been thinking a lot about the fragility of life the past few days. How you can wake up one day thinking it is a normal day and by day's end your world has been turned upside down.

An instant -- an infinitesimal space of time; especially a point in time separating two states.

A former co-worker, just 44 years old and the father of three young boys, dies of a heart attack at work during a team building activity. It was his boys' first day of school. A young woman, set to begin her senior year in high school, dies when she loses control of her scooter. Some say she was momentarily distracted by a friend who honked and waved at her. Her mother, suffering from pancreatic cancer, dies just ten days later. A young man and father of a baby girl is shot to death in circumstances that are not yet clear.

In each case, one moment these individuals were full of life and hopes and dreams for the future. In an instant, their lives ended leaving spouses, parents, children, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, and friends mourning their unexpected loss and questioning their own faith, future, mortality, and why a loving God lets things like this happen.

Admittedly, I have many doubts about faith, and "God's Plan," and the idea that those we have lost are in a "better place." I think of loved ones I have lost and quite honestly think the best place for them would be here, among the living, with their family and friends who need them. My Catholic upbringing leads me to believe that we will all be reunited some day when we all raise up and that if we have led a "good life," we will be rewarded in heaven. I try to believe this, but really, how do we know that we just aren't dead? That's it...the show is over.

Some say that God doesn't give us burdens more than we can handle. Well, I've honestly seen a lot of people I know and love brought to their knees by the unexpected and untimely death of a loved one. I don't think we can always handle the challenges we face. Sometimes, it is just too much.

To me, death brings a void that can never be erased. Time may lessen the raw pain of the loss, but the loss is still there. Memories and moments of life that will never be made.

Death, except for those who have lived a full life, will remain a mystery to me. I found this poem by Maya Angelou. It sums it up beautifully.

When I think of death, and of late the idea has come with alarming frequency, I seem at peace with the idea that a day will dawn when I will no longer be among those living in this valley of strange humors. I can accept the idea of my own demise, but I am unable to accept the death of anyone else. 

I  find it impossible to let a friend or relative go into that country of no return. Disbelief becomes my close companion, and anger follows in its wake. I answer the heroic question 'Death, where is thy sting? ' with ' it is here in my heart and mind and memories.'

Rest in peace Drake Morris, Jr. You will be missed.

Life Goes On...

Suppose God is Black

On my way home from work tonight, there was a story on NPR about a speech Robert F. Kennedy made in South Africa in 1966. A new documentary, RFK in the Land of Apartheid: Ripple of Hope, is set to air on PBS later this month.  

Whenever I hear speeches made by the late Senator Kennedy, I marvel not only at his engaging speaking abilities, but am inspired by the thought provoking and forward thinking ideas he espoused during the turbulent times of the 1960s. Kennedy opened his speech at the University of Cape Town with these words:

I came here because of my deep interest and affection for a land settled by the Dutch in the mid-17th century, then taken over by the British and at last independent; a land in which the native inhabitants were at first subdued, but relations with whom remain a problem to this day; a land which defined itself on a hostile frontier; a land which has tamed rich natural resources through the energetic application of modern technology; a land which once imported slaves, and now must struggle to wipe out the last traces of that former bondage. I refer, of course, to the United States of America.

Later, in the speech to anti-apartheid students, he stated:

Each time a man stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope; and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

You can read the entire story at:

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/12/139449268/remembering-rfks-visit-to-the-land-of-apartheid

The story also references an editorial that Senator Kennedy wrote for Look magazine that was published on August 23, 1966. That article was entitled, "Suppose God is Black?" Senator Kennedy poses this question to South Africans as he engaged in dialogue with them about why blacks should be given equal rights. Forty-five years later, this question is still valid.

During the same drive home tonight, on the eve of the straw poll in Ames, there was a news story about the impending entrance to the presidential race of Texas governor Rick Perry. I don't know a lot about Governor Perry, but I'm immediately turned off -- and downright frightened by -- a politician who makes claims like this:

"I think in America that from time to time we have to go through some difficult times, and I think we're going through those difficult economic times for a purpose," he said. "To bring us back to those biblical principles: Not spending all of our money. Not asking for Pharaoh to give everything to everybody and to take care of folks because at the end of the day, it's slavery."

I feel very conflicted by politicians who claim they want less government yet want to insert their religious, often conservative Christian values, into how our country is governed.

Our country is facing difficulties never before experienced. I don't proclaim to know what the answers to resolve these issues are. What I do know is that if I am faced with excessive debt and am struggling to meet my obligations, I have two ways to alleviate the situation: (1) reduce my spending and (2) increase my income. I don't see these as mutually exclusive. Any credit counselor will advise someone with excessive debt to seek additional income by obtaining a second job. I do not understand why raising taxes is an option that is completely off the table as a way to address our country's debt problem. I'm willing to give up a little to help the country out. There are many inequities in our tax code that could be rectified to increase income. And, you can't tell me that the likes of Oprah, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, or Mark Zuckerberg can't afford to pay a little more. 

It's only August 2011, a full 15 months before the next presidential election, and I am already sick of all the politicking that is going on. I'm so disillusioned that I may not vote at all. Or, I may vote only for candidates who are not incumbents.  

I Still Hear the Sounds of Summer Fun...

I took the parents on a little Saturday drive today. Neither of them had been up to Lake Delhi in years. I'm talking like 35 years, maybe, since we stopped boating in Delhi and started boating on the Mississippi.

My Grandpa and Grandma Scherrman had a cottage on Lake Delhi, or Hartwick Lake as it was once called, since the early 1930s. We have lots of old photos of my grandparents, my dad, and my two aunts up at the cottage swimming and boating. It was a family tradition. Every Sunday in the summer, rain or shine, we would go to the cottage. For a number of years, we would also spend a week there. That was our version of a family vacation and the closest we ever got to camping. The cottage was pretty bare bones. It had running water (just cold -- no hot) and an indoor flushable toilet and electricity. But, that was about as far as the luxuries went. It had an old cast iron pot belly stove that you could fire up if we got a sudden cold spell in the summer and the temps dipped down to 50 degrees at night. Oddly, we have hardly any pictures of our summer days at the cottage. I suppose my mom was busy enough trying to corral five kids and a dog most of the time to try and be all Ansel Adams or Annie Liebovitz.

Going to the cottage seemed like the quintessential childhood summer.

• Swimming for hours and playing on old tractor inner tubes for flotation devices. Of course, swimming was allowed only after the requisite hour had passed since we ate!
• Eating hot dogs cooked on the grill.
• Attempting to fish (the boys...not me). Jerry, mostly, he got particularly frazzled one summer with a bullhead that kept showing up on his hook time and time again.
• Sleeping 7 people in one bedroom.
• Going a week with no shower! Well, we did spend most of the time in the "clean" lake water.
• Lighting sparklers on the dock.
• Running around with my cousins, who also spent Sundays at the cottage.
• Hearing the Cubs game playing on the black and white TV that barely got reception. Grandma Scherrman was a die-hard Cubs fan.
• Ignoring my Grandma's friend Meta (an old spinster) who constantly yelled "Don't slam the door!" The cottage had one of those old wooden screen doors on it with a loose spring. Of course, we would push it open and bolt out...letting it slam against the wooden door frame at least 50 times per day.
• Packing up our life jackets, inner tubes, and toys in the "brooder house." Yes, my Grandpa, the farmer, repurposed an old chicken coop to be our storage shed. (Maybe that's where I get my MacGyver skills.)

It was a good time. But as we got older, and the lake got busier with more and more boat traffic, my dad decided we would move our boating adventures to the Mississippi. I can't remember exactly when we last spent the summer at Delhi, but I think it was the year after Tim graduated from high school, which was 1976. 

Fast forward to 2009. Thanks to Facebook, I started conversing with my cousin Mary Jo. Her family had continued to go to the cottage every summer. She and her husband bought the cottage next door to my Grandma's, and her daughter Rachel and her husband bought the cottage that was originally my Grandma's. Jerry and I went to visit Mary Jo at the cottage in September of 2009. They had already taken the boat out for the winter so we weren't able to take a cruise on the lake that day. We promised to come back in 2010. 


The "cottage" - it looks so small
from what I remembered 



The chair Grandma listened to the Cubs
in - now recovered and looking (almost) like new.

The view from the cottage - it's one of the
best spots on the lake.

Mary Jo - Jerry - Me

On July 24, 2010, after nearly 10 inches of rain fell in Delaware County, the Lake Delhi dam failed. The lake that was the home of so many summer memories for so many families disappeared. A week after the dam failed, this was the view from the cottage.

After the levee broke - July 2010

I didn't have my camera with me today, but there is even less water flowing through the Maquoketa River than in the picture above. And, where you see sand, you now see weeds that are over your head. It's a long road ahead to restore this area to its former glory.

There is much debate about whether the dam should be rebuilt at all. Of course, I am biased because I know what the lake has meant to my family. Although a private association had control of the dam, the lake was open to the public and had several public areas. The now missing dam has closed a county road because a 30 foot gorge now stands where a road once crossed over the dam. The surrounding areas are negatively affected by the non-existent recreation dollars that were once spent in local businesses.

I have seen some criticism against rebuilding that the lake catered to the upper class. I take issue with that. In fact, I think it is quite the opposite. Sure, in recent times, some large gorgeous homes were built along the lake -- I guess you could call them nouveau lake people. In my opinion, the lake association was built by common lower and middle class folks, like my family, who weren't able to take fancy vacations to California or Europe. Instead, we spent our summer vacation in a little two-room cottage without hot water or a shower. We ate hot dogs and roasted marshmallows, and the bigger the tractor inner tube the better. No, the lake was designed for people who spent time with their families enjoying the simple things in life and who passed on that tradition generation after generation.

I, for one, think Lake Delhi should be restored so that generations to come can have the same memories of innocent childhood fun that I have. Besides, Mary Jo and her husband Todd still owe me that boat cruise from one end of the lake to the next...and I'm holding them to it!

We Call it Maize...

Corn -- glorious corn. You know, it was actually corn that inspired my very first blog. 'Memba that commercial from the '70s about maize...well, actually for Mazola Margarine:

You Tube: Mazola Commercial


I had my first sweet corn of 2011 today...it's one of the pure joys of summer in my opinion. There is simply nothing sweeter. 

Fincel's Sweet Corn - Accept No Substitutes

Fincel's Sweet Corn, locally grown in East Dubuque, IL, can't be beat. It's so popular, they have their own website and Facebook page. 


Fun facts about corn: 

• Although considered by many to be a vegetable, corn is actually one of the few grains native to the Western Hemisphere, where it has been cultivated for centuries.
• Corn is America's number one field crop. It leads all other crops in value and volume of production.
• In the U.S., corn production measures more than 2 times that of any other crop.
• Over 55% of Iowa's corn goes to foreign markets. The rest is used in other parts of the United States.
• Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska and Minnesota account for over 50 percent of the corn grown in the U.S. 
• The "Corn Belt" includes the states of Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska, Minnesota, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, South Dakota, Michigan, Missouri, Kansas and Kentucky.
• Corn is produced on every continent of the world with the exception of Antarctica. 
• The area known as the "Pacific Rim" region (in Asia) is emerging as the world's fastest growing market for U.S. corn. There, most of the corn is fed to livestock to produce food for humans. The majority of the world's population is located in the Pacific Rim region. 
• Farley, IA bills itself as the "Heart of the Cornbelt."  

Corn conjures up a lot of memories from my childhood: 

• Buying produce, including corn, from an old man in Farley--Hank Otting--when we were growing up. We may have been farmers, but we were not gardeners. We let someone else do the work. 
• Picking rows and rows of corn when my brother Dave decided it was a good idea to fill up the corn planter with sweet corn seeds and making 6-8 rows of sweet corn the full length of the field. Helping Pearl freeze the corn was hot sweaty work...and there always seemed to be a bejillion flies buzzing around when we were shucking the corn. 
• Running through the cornfield on hot summer days -- the lush green leaves that retained moisture would feel cool on our skin. 
• Wondering if the corn really would be "knee high by the 4th of July." With hybrid corn, fertilizer, and insecticides, the corn was usually well over my head by the 4th of July. This was true even when I was "grown." 
• Hanging out in the cornfield next to the Farley Park with my friends when we were like 15 years old and splitting a 12-pack of beer among about eight of us. We thought the beer tasted awful, but we thought we were "cool." We probably were buzzed after one beer. 

Every season has its particular rituals. For me, it is eating enough sweet corn in a span of week to not crave it again until next year. Next up...my homemade salsa, concocted when the tomatoes are "just right" and the jalapeno peppers are so hot I think I can feel a hole burning in my stomach.

Summertime...And the living is easy

It's hard to remember that just about six months ago, it looked like this outside:

I don't think the really heavy stuff
is going to come down for quite a while...

We were all bemoaning the snow and the cold and the long dark days of winter. Mother Nature finally gives us a reprieve, and now we are all complaining of the sweltering days and the excessive heat warnings that have been in effect since last Saturday. I'm reminded of a country song that was popular when I was in my "country" phase living in Texas: 

Why do we want
What we know we can't have
Why don't we want
What's in the palm of our hands
Why we always looking
At what's just out of our grasp
Why do we want
What we know we can't have

Isn't it just typical human nature? We are rarely happy with whatever weather we are experiencing. I do my share of whining about the weather, particularly when I'm out walking Bailey in temps that can swing from -30 to +105. But, honestly, I LOVE IT! 


I've blogged before about the awesome power of Mother Nature, and I love the dramatic changes of our Midwestern seasons. Just when we think we can't take another day of cold and snow, the soft rains of spring fall upon us, turning everything green, and the earth comes alive with beautiful flowers and fertile farm fields. Summer brings long lazy days spent lying on a beach or siting on the porch watching fireflies. When we think we are going to melt from yet another hot day, we begin to feel the cool crisp air of autumn. The landscape becomes ablaze with vibrant reds, yellows, and oranges. We begin to think of pumpkins and hot chocolate and big bowls of chili and creamy macaroni and cheese. We await the first snowflakes  with the anticipation of a child on Christmas Eve, and homes and businesses come alive with twinkly lights and big red bows. Then, the cycle begins again with the new year. 


Here's my summer snapshot of Willow Creek Park and my attempts to document the changing seasons in my neighborhood. 

July 2011

"Relish the moment" is a good motto, especially when coupled with Psalm 118:24, "This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it."

So stop pacing the aisles and counting the miles. Instead, swim more rivers, climb more mountains, kiss more babies, count more stars. Laugh more and cry less. Go barefoot more often. Eat more ice cream. Ride more merry-go-rounds. Watch more sunsets. Life must be lived as we go along.

(Excerpted from Robert Hastings, "The Station")