Laura’s Imperfect Blog

No large topic to write about, so just a “data dump” of things going on around here.

I just have to mention this interesting event. Whenever I lie down to take a nap (which isn’t that often), I somehow trigger the coffee grinder and other loud noises in the kitchen. There is some suspicion that Anthony is involved in all the noise making as soon as I lie down, but I know he would never do something like that when I’m trying to sleep.

On a related note – when your spouse snores or your neighbors have a pool party, a white-noise machine is a wonderful thing. Don’t be afraid to turn it up loud!! The only thing it won’t do is stop the cat from walking over you or nibbling at your fingers to get some attention.

To the family with the weeping willow that drapes out over the sidewalk – thank you for trimming it! Running is so much easier when I’m not dodging willow tendrils.

I got an iPhone, finally. I have had a rather old but good phone with the unique feature of being able to time the silent mode. I could tell it to go silent until 12:15 and then I don’t have to remember to turn the sound back on. If someone calls at 12:16, it rings out loud. I really really like that feature and think all cell phones should have it. But every time Anthony upgrades his iPhone, we spend a few minutes talking about whether I want to get one too. I finally succumbed. The iPhone has lots of benefits to it, including a keyboard (I admit texting my nephews with my old phone was a struggle), a calendar that syncs with my desktop, email, and a complete address book. But none of that was enough to give up my timed silent feature. Finally, I realized that with the GPS and the RunKeeper app, I could map my runs and know while I am running how far I have gone and how fast I’m running. It isn’t a huge deal, but it was enough to tip the scale this time and I now own a nice shiny new iPhone 4. It is pretty cool! Now we’re talking about giving the old one to my Mom so she can have some of those same benefits.

Recently a friend recommended The Complete Book of Running by James Fixx. It’s over 20 years old but the fact and advice are still solid. And the description of society’s health and nutrition state is sadly still accurate. I’m not sure we’ve learned much in the years since he wrote this book.

I did find the book encouraging as he described some of the same struggles and blahs I have, while reiterating the positives that got me out there. I’ve had a very good few months of running and that has lead me to revisit why I run. I have had a classmate and pastor mention they run to lose weight and I pass that fact on to my husband who has some pounds to lose. While I wouldn’t mind weighing just a few pounds lighter, I don’t run to lose weight. (Which is good because I haven’t lost weight with all my running.)

I’ve heard some people comment that running or working out is just too much work and if they can watch what they eat and stay trim, they prefer to do it that way. But again, while watching what you eat and having a reasonable weight is all good, that isn’t really the only reason to run.

As I stated a year ago, I started running because my cholesterol got over the acceptable limit. Exercise, and some strenuous movement are know to be good for reducing cholesterol. I, of course, have also modified my diet to add more good things and remove more bad things. But this is about exercise.

Over the years I have watched the old women on the streets of Brooklyn hunched over and shuffling down the sidewalk, I’ve seen friends and family  reach the age where their excess weight and/or lack of exercise caught up with them – the strength fails, the legs and lungs give up, and moving around gets much harder. I am rational enough to know that there are things I should be doing now to combat that. And at the age of 40, time is running out to get started and build a foundation.

One year ago today I went out for my first run/walk. I covered 1.9 miles in 27 minutes (that’s about a 14 minute mile). It wasn’t my first walk or even my first attempt at running, but it was the start of a new commitment. Today I ran 5.3 miles in 60 minutes (that’s about an 11 min mile). It isn’t all about the distance and it doesn’t have to be an hour, but it’s been fun to push my limits a bit to see what I’m actually capable of.  I’m most proud of the consistency as I have run almost every week, usually 2 or 3 times a week.

We have also started a second round of P90X, doing the strength training workouts mainly. It took us a week to get back into the rhythm, that month off really made more of a difference than I expected, but we are still further along than when we first started it in January.

I’m running for my health, for the discipline, for the sense of accomplishment. I’m running because I can.

I am not a big movie-watcher. I like movies, but I’d rather curl up with a good book. But watching movies together is my husband’s idea of good together-time, his love language. So, I watch a few movies that would never have been in my personal watch list.

One we recently watched is from 1982, a movie I don’t think I had even heard of as a teenager, but it was a big movie for my husband. Tron is about computers and video games – of course it was huge for him. Well, there is a sequel coming out this summer and he keeps showing me the trailer – a sure sign that I will be watching the movie with him at some time in the future. I mentioned that it would probably be a good thing to see the original before we see the sequel so I’ll have some clue what’s going on. That’s all it took, he bought Tron the next day.

I have to admit, it was pretty good. I had no clue Bruce Boxleitner had been in movies before the tv series Scarecrow and Mrs. King (which my husband had never heard of – how did he miss such quality tv programming? It was also interesting to hear that Jeff Bridges spoke without a speech impediment at all. The effects were old (it was 1982) but not too cheesy. The plot was pretty interesting for what it was. So, now I’m ready to see Tron Legacy.

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The other movie I watched recently was The Hurt Locker. It came out in 2008 and won awards in 2009. It’s about an elite Army bomb squad in Iraq. I think it was fantastic in showing the stress and intensity, being surrounded by people and not knowing who you can trust. And dealing with explosives, IEDs, and bombs all the time. It was powerful and tough to watch.

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Movies I need to watch. I borrowed a copy of Pride and Prejudice that I need to make time to watch. I also have a copy of another movie from the 1980′s, Between Two Women with Farrah Fawcett and Colleen Dewhurst (woman and mother-in-law) who have a changing relationship as the mother-in-law gets ill and dies (oops, spoiler). I remember Farrah Fawcett is a runner in the movie and it ends with her running. My husband picked up a copy for me but I haven’t made time to watch it yet.

It is January after all. Shouldn’t we have resolutions? Or should we talk about the fact that this is just an arbitrary date and Jan 1 is no better or worse a day to make resolutions.

Actually – all of the above is still a reason to have resolutions. Just that we shouldn’t wait until Jan 1 to make them and we should think about them longer than the first few weeks of the year.

The discussion came up at a birthday party a week ago. Some had the usual healthy living/working out resolutions. Some had the good intention to be in the Word more regularly. I am working on those habits, but haven’t actually named them resolutions. Not sure I can explain the difference. I would say something like they are more time-management and priority issues or even that they are more self-centered. But that might imply that spending time in the Word is not as all-encompassing and pervasive as it is.

But. what are my resolutions.

1. I want to be a better friend. I brought this up at the birthday dinner and a few laughed at me, because I am a very good friend to them. But I struggle with other friendships. I don’t make phone calls easily. I have a strong sense of the impropriety of being nosy and interfering with other people. I also let my self-image convince me that I am not someone people would really want to spend time with and that means I require (constant) affirmation that I am wanted. But I take all of that too far and easily let people alone so much they don’t realize I’m their friend (because I’m not, I’m just an acquaintance). I don’t want to invade the lives of everyone I know, but I want to select a few people I think I could be a friend to, where we have things in common, where some overture has been made by them. I want to make quantity and quality time a priority, so that we can become friends and know we can turn to each other.

This also translates to family.

2. To not be offended so easily. This one probably sound strange at first. It is the result of a lot of things. First this quote I found in Not Knowing Where by Oswald Chambers

“We have the perfect right not to insist on our rights, for it is the privilege of a Christian to waive his rights; but we do not always recognize that we must insist on those associated with us getting their rights.”

Also watching friends and people I know and love getting offended and walking away from relationships. Some of that comes from the reading of Unpacking Forgiveness by Chris Brauns. I don’t want to go so far as therapeutic forgiveness, whire I refuse to ever hold on to anything. But so much of what offends me is just a complaint that I didn’t get my way or that I was not appreciated. That’s why I wrote out this quote:

Pride is any way of putting self into central focus. If I complain about myself I am still prideful.

In the chapter that he talks about deciding when to let something go, rather than express a need for repentance before reconciliation can occur, I studied and studied to see what he was saying. He says we must start by examining self and look to see if we’re sure we are right. Not just that I am right, but that my way is the only right way and the other person couldn’t possibly be right too. Then ask how important this is. This is dependent on the person, obviously. I’ve seen people get offended by something I didn’t think was very important at all. Then see if the person displays a pattern of this behavior. Not do they routinely go against me getting my way or hurting my pride, but are they sinning consistently.

Since I was a child, I would easily get my feelings hurt. I had a disagreement during my EMBA because the leadership teacher tried to tell me that it isn’t my responsibility if someone else gets their feelings hurt. I know what she was trying to say. Using a condescending tone of voice and a mean choice of words is intentionally looking to hurt someone. But telling the truth or explaining a situation shouldn’t be avoided because the other person might get their feelings hurt. In the past year I’ve decided I agree with her more than I realized. A number of times I’ve wanted to tell people to grow up. And that is what my hope is with this resolution, that I will grow up some more.

At first I worded it to not be offended so much, but I changed it to easily. If I were to change how I live my life, it could be that I would become someone who would draw a particular kind of offense more.

3. To count it all joy. I think I have a big-issue faith. I trust God with the big issues, don’t let the magnitude of the problem overwhelm me, and trust him. But in the small and day-to-day type stuff I don’t always keep the faith. Some quotes from Believing God by RC Sproul, Jr come to mind.

“Whether it is a great burden or a small irritant, our frustration betrays that our hearts don’t remember what our minds know.” p. 99

This is what I wrote last year as I read this book. “I should wake up every morning with the sole desire to be made more like Jesus.  I should count it all joy. I should rest easy at night knowing that the Sovereign God has brought me closer to Him through whatever happened that day.”

We don’t believe that we are at peace with Him. We tend to believe our struggles show either that God doesn’t love us or that God is powerless to help us.

“When we fear, when we grumble, when we complain, we show forth what is in our hearts. We expose our sin.” p. 111

This was another conclusion I came to: “complaining about the situation I’m in is the same as complaining about the person who brought about the situation”. I don’t want to complain. That doesn’t mean it will all be sweet and light, as the world defines good. But it does mean I can stop letting my temper get the best of me, getting frustrated because I don’t get my way immediately. Wow, I sound like a spoiled toddler when I put it that way.

To accomplish this I believe I must be in the Word (there’s where that one comes in) and in prayer and even in study. But I must also apply – I should prepare verses and things to say when I’m on the verge – to remind myself Who I belong to and how I should act.

In past years, my resolution has been to fix my tone of voice, especially when I’m frustrated. But, if I work on resolution #3, the tone of voice should be fixed.

We had a great Christmas dinner last Saturday. The weather did NOT cooperate and the sleet and snow kept some from attending. It also wreaked havoc with the turkey plans. But all the other food and many other guests made it and we had a good time.

My mother says I was a good hostess and made everyone feel very comfortable. That was good to hear because a few of the brothers-in-law might have gotten a curt word or two from me, maybe Mom just didn’t hear it. I loved having my aunts and nephews here. My Aunt Anne brought over a very nice gentleman friend who was great company.

Anthony saved the turkey – it was going to be fried, but I think we thawed it out a day too early. Then weather prevented the fryer from coming, so we were going to bake it. Then the oven went out and what with all the various temperature changes it had been through we were starting to doubt if we wanted to eat it. Anthony took out the breast meat and grilled it – a success!

Tomorrow we travel to Hickory to spend time with the nephews and their family. Then Saturday we travel to Raleigh for time with Anthony’s brother and family. That means 5 of us in the truck for 3 hours there and 3 hours back. (If you are the praying kind, keep all of us in mind

Tonight, we’re off to church service, including an O Holy Night solo. Then to our friends’ house for some merriment.

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Merry Christmas to all of you!