Blessed to Dream Big Dreams

Wake at dawn and smell the great coffee. Stretch a little on the way to the kitchen to get those hamstrings loose a bit and then that first rich cup of special coffee. Sometimes there are deer outside to watch as they watch us. Besides all the training for an ironman, there is so much to do living in the country. It is different set of obstacles from most ironman competitors, I would imagine. But, something tells me that everyone who lines up for an ironman event has dealt with their own special circumstances to get there. Glad I have the garden tilled.

Now I replant the spinach and plant the kale. We plant potatoes on Valentine's day, so we need to get the seed potatoes cut. Hauled up some more cross ties to make that raised bed for things like lettuce and bell peppers. Then it will be a wheelbarrow and shovel gathering of cow manure for the bed. There is a porch rail for which I need to concrete a post in. The concrete is just laying there on the porch as if to say, "do me next, do me next." There are falling limbs strewn all over the yard from all the dead trees. I need to pick them up - mowing coming soon - but I really need to finish cutting up those other dead trees I felled.

There will be wood to be split, and an hour of that might be called a stength workout. There is something about the crack of an axe, placed well, sounding that true center was struck exposing new wood exposed sort of like placing your heart and energy in the right place to find a new and fresher self. There is something about the clean smell of evening here, the silence of the misty morning sunrises, the hard labor which must be done here to maintain the elements of this lifestyle here in the country. It is many miles to a gym or pool. I make the trip and swim long once a week until the waters in my pond warm enough to swim in.

I have been blessed; blessed by having enough problems, opportunities, burdens, and responsibilies. But most of all I think I am blessed in knowing, and realizing that indeed, I am blessed. And feeling so honored and so blessed, I can have the courage to live large and dream big dreams: dreams like completing an ironman.