Committed

i was slowing down and then i fell of a cliff. i keep asking myself what happened. what happened?



well, i have chosen to blame 2007. you remember, right? it started out with me not feeling so well and ended with surgery that had me asking a giant polar bear to step in for me. It slowed me down a little but six months later i decided it was time to make a comeback. how would i make i comeback, i wondered? not by trying to do the things i could do before my surgery. no, that would make too much sense. i decided to run a marathon. and, well, i did it. and i came out on the other side - invincible!

and so there i was, strutting to my check-up, three months after the run. i went in fully expecting them to tell me i didn't need to come back anymore - i was strong, i was back on my feet, hell, i was a runner. instead, two doctors walked into the room. lesson learned: if one doctor comes in to talk to you, all is well. if there is more than one, the news won't be good and they need protection, in case you lose it. so, first there was the standoff, and then there were more tests, then another doctor came into my life. so, i went through the process again, pretending i wasn't nervous, having doctors struggle to find a vein in my arm (at one point, there was a person standing at each arm, slapping them to try to scare one out of hiding) and then waking up to a voice saying - don't panic.

and so it began again. this time i was missing a piece of my stomach muscle and who knew that the stomach muscles control so much of everything we do? certainly not me. and why do allergies strike when sneezing is most painful? another unanswered question. but, no time to dwell, i needed to get back to it. more realistic about things this time, i signed up for a half marathon this time. granted it was in beyond-hilly-san francisco but, you know, it was a more reasonable challenge. and... i did it. more importantly i survived an inescapable gas chamber!

and with that, 2009 neared its end. and with 2010 coming, i decided that i needed to catch up on things that i had put on hold since 2007, when this all began. so i signed up to take intense preparation courses and then i signed up to take accounting exams soon after. i decided i had to commit or it would never happen. everything was signed up for in december. then i got into the new york marathon and so i declared 2010 my year of running (sorry knees). to make sure i kept running through the year, i signed up for a couple of half marathons and joined a team of women for a 180 mile, 24-ish hour relay. i shall be running a total of 19.5 miles.

so, you know what happened right? my busy season at work is from november through march, my first exam was in april and my second will in may. i ran a race in january, a race in february, a half marathon in march. in april, last weekend actually, i had a 3 hour exam on saturday and ran a half marathon in the cold rain on sunday morning. i have the relay in 3 weeks and a second exam in 4 weeks. i wake up at 5am and try to be in bed between 9 and 10pm so i can run, study and work. i shall have to share the tales of frostbite and other running-related dramas but the greatest tragedy?

brain death.

apparently being in a state of semi-wakefulness for months on end leads to auto-pilot brain activity which has killed the writing. and more than that, it seems to have killed the reading. i feel i am cheating myself and those who put so much into the fantastic posts that keep me going if i come to them less than whole. but maybe i should come to them so they can make me whole. i need to remind myself that, when my hope and energy are flagging, the pictures, the words, the music are like an oasis in a desert.

so now i must make another commitment. i committed to the running, i committed to the work, but now i must commit to pandave. before pandave herself is committed