Ironman Texas 2024 - Becoming Their Own Heroes

   Ironman Texas will happen in the morning.  All these brave souls will face into the sunrise, look off into the water, take a deep breath, and begin a long hard day.  Just to get to one of these starting lines is no Sunday stroll. Most are motivated people with lots going on in their lives.  They had sacrificed things, tried to balance the roles, and still get in the training.  Many will wonder if they did enough to get through what they are about to enter into.  They are facing their fears to live their dreams. 

No doubt, this is going to be a collection of some of the best people our species can assemble in one place.  They have got up and raised their expectations for themselves above what most expect of themselves.  They are becoming their own heroes and with good reason. Who wouldn't want to be counted as among these brave souls? I know I do.  God bless them all tomorrow.

Sustainable Joy

 There is no sense pretending.  Trying to run or ride from being yourself is not sustainable for long without negatively impacting the quality of life.  

 I believe that about sustainable joy:  "Be the same person all the time."  Sounds simplistic.   And I guess it is, but, to me, it defines a form of self-respect that encourages you to be who you are, not an actor to please the relational environment.   Being an actor is stressful.  A term once used for actors was "hypocrite."  Not being a hypocrite, not playing a role to please others, but being yourself, fosters an authenticity and integrity which is bedrock for any chance of sustainable joy.  

"Ah, there's the rub."  This requires real courage.  It can be so easy to fall into a camouflaged lifestyle.  It can be so easy to follow the herd.  And, it can be so hard to remain true to ourselves, when all around you say, "Change, fit in, don't make waves.".  To fit into this waveless world  we let the slow steady hum of normalism define  who you should be and what you should be doing.  Fighting the gravity of the deep rut requires courage.  

It is a great temptation to take the safe, easy, and comfortable path rather than trod the hard path to stand against the storm of convention.  But, you can't make memories to smile about later from the things you didn't do because you subscribed  and consented to playing a role to fit in.  For me at least, good memories and impossible dreams are the wheels that drive to achieving sustainable joy.  

There is a quote from "Self -Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson,   "To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment."   

And that "great accomplishment" can bring  sustainable joy. 

Thanks God.

Training in the Dark

 

By now I see that I won't ever stop training.  Life events have taken most of the opportunities to compete but I seem to get up and go after training each day like there was a good reason for it.  I am training almost with the same purpose and intent as when I trained for events.  And I wonder: what is wrong with me?  

Perhaps there is a part of me that won't give up completely.  Maybe the training is the holdout in the process of complete surrender, and I just don't want to go there.  

And perhaps training has become so much of who I am that I can't give it up if I want to.  Perhaps it is my tattoo that I won't have removed no matter what.  Maybe age and circumstance have taken all except this, but I think I have drawn my line in the sand on training  Till death do us part, so to speak.  

At the same time, when I finish my workouts and feel proud and grateful to God for this ability, I am still saddened somewhat that I can't take the results of my training anywhere anymore.  Its strange but training makes me glad and it makes me sad, at the same time. No matter.  My gratitude outweighs my sadness.  And, I thank God for all the events and training I have done in the past and ask Him for more health and opportunity to train in the dark. 

Light My Fire

 One match, lit and placed on a piece of tissue paper - small flame, almost flickered out, caught on a little, flickered in doubt a moment, and grew.  And I thought how small a start and this little flame will build upon itself, and eventually ignite this huge pile of brush I want to burn down. And it did.  

We are no different.  Sometimes we find ourselves little more than soft, fluffy tissue paper. What we need is one small, simple, flame to ignite the fire within us into a roaring fire.   This is the benefit of community within a passion.  We all have our soft, fluffy moments when passion and commitment are at low ebb. We all need someone to strike a match for us to ignite the fires in our lives, to become more of what we are capable of, rather than what we have degraded to. 

So, shouldn't I be inclined to give what I want to receive from another member of this endurance sports community?  We can do this. Light my fire.  I'll light yours. Let's "run the race that is set before us."

To Die as an Athlete

 Yes, I am old by most standards.  The call is to stay down.  Life can really beat you up at this age.  Hide out, take your meds, and take it easy.  Live out your life quietly. But I don't take any meds.  Am I going to have to get sick and go to the doctor and get on meds to be normal for my age?  How else can I live a camouflaged old person's life?   Isn't this the American dream: to work all your life to build a comfort nest in which to have nothing important to be or do and rest yourself to death? 

I am an old athlete.  It is not important but it is what I do and who I am.  God led me to this and I haven't heard Him holler, "Quit, stay down, too old."  I still feel like an athlete.  given my choice I want to die like an athlete as an athlete.  

I guess I will never grow up.  I still love the labored breathing of a hard effort, the sweat dripping off my forehead, the euphoric feeling moments after you have done your best. God willing, I can continue to do this until I die, - as an athlete.

Get Up and Be

 Done a lot of doubting lately.  Worst of all is that I start doubting myself, whether I have it anymore to pick myself up and face again, the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune."  I would imagine it was that same heartbreak that Lee suffered when he surrendered, or Santa Anna had to surrender to Sam Houston. Short version:  surrender is a heartbreaker. 

What about those who didn't surrender in the face of overwhelming odds?  The men at the Alamo didn't surrender and died deaths true to their school.  They "died with their boots on" so to speak even if their boots may be stolen after they were dead.  And they were all dead, literally a dead end. 

The Texan at Goliad were a lot smarter.  They saw how fruitless and futile it would be to try on so they surrendered.  They were killed anyway. Surrender was a dead end too. I have often wondered if those poor Texas as they lined up to die, wished they would have fought on even to death 

 So do I do an Alamo or Goliad?  In those last moments the result will be the same.  But until then, life won't be the same and  those last moments which inevitably come, it won't be the same.  Knowing who I am, I realize I won't be the same either.  

Today, I hear the call that I surrender to age and circumstance, to give up triathlon and serious training.   Today, this moment,  I will answer with a cannon shot from my walls.  Today, this moment, I want to make life climb the wall and come and try to take me.  

Proud words.  Now to get up from this table and fight the good fight. 

Finding Oneself in the Garden

 For years I had a garden.  Every year was a process of pulling up all the old plants, taking out the weeds, tearing up the soil, and row up to plant new seeds for the new crop.  I have found that life is a lot like that. Sometimes the old and bug-eaten variety of ourselves is not bearing fruit and the only rescue is to pull up the old and plow for change in the new.  

I tested positive for COVID-19 again today.  This is 10 days, now.  I feel good but it's not enough.     

What about my quest? What about the half-ironman?  What about serious training?  I don't like going through this, can you tell?  I haven't had a cold in 25 years and this hasn't even had the symptoms of a mediocre cold.  I am so blessed to have it this easy but I can still search diligently and find a reason to complain, I guess.  Yeah, I am so human.  

My self wants to complain. My faith says "All things work together for those that love the Lord and are called according to His purpose."  Romans 8:28.  God seems to intimate to me that like the torn-up old garden being replanted for spring, something will grow from what you are going through, and it will be you.

If You Want to Make God Laugh----

 There is a saying:  If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans. Now about 4 days into a  light case of COVID and with training derailed, the phrase gives pause to ponder.  Another big push, another quest, doesn't hold the same value it had even a few days ago.  The cause isn't certain, but the miles of the journey have brought me to this location in life attendant with all the lessons this recent situation can teach.

Time will tell if I want to get back on this horse again and do another ride. Back in my drinking days, I had a practice of not making any serious decisions on a Monday.  So, no new announcement.  I am circling the airport waiting for instructions from the Life Traffic Controller.

"One of the hardest decisions you ever make in life is choosing to walk away or try harder."

Go Die on the Mountain

 My 80 years have not been lived without learning something.  I haven't been asleep in my recliner all these years, you know.    Now, to add to advanced age, snail-like run pace.   Unstable and often painful knee, no road experience in over a year on the bike, and on and on, ad nauseam.  

Now, to discourage me further, and send me off to permanent retirement in reclinerville, to become and a fearful follower of the media, here comes COVID.  My wife and son are down with and having been exposed, I wait my turn for a little more misery. 

While it is early in this quest that I haven't even explained yet, this certainly is a hope dasher, taking away a lot of the rah-rah that great beginnings often have.  Whatever is trying to stop me is surely making it easier to quit.  But I have found that easy roads seldom lead anywhere really worth going to.  It's the climbs that make the course.  So, when and if I get COVID and, God willing, I recover from it, I'm still going for the climb. One can die on the mountain, or melt away like ice cream on a hot day in a recliner.

Share My Journey

 I hope this lasts.  The feeling keeps coming back:  God is not finished with me yet.  This is just going to be an exercise in faith but I am hard on the trail of "going to be."  I don't see how I am going to do this but with God all things are possible.  The plan is just to give God my best and leave results to Him. 

I haven't even been on a road bike in a year and a half, and I have signed up for a half-ironman event.  I have swam in 8 months.  But there is a peace about it.  There seems no good alternative but to try, to train, to believe.

There will be more in the vein of a formal announcement where I lay out my plans and my hopes and dreams.  Such an announcement will sort of burn my bridges behind me so I don't think losing heart and slinking off will be easy.   I am just a man, subject to all the frailties of our species. Share my journey.  God bless.

You Can Do This

 There never was a better time.   You can do this. Don't look to the right or left.  Put all force forward, one step ahead of the other.  Don't quit; don't make excuses to retreat to ease and comfort.  Embrace the pain.  It's part of life. Grit your teeth. Deal with it.  Don't be humbled by it.  Be humbled only by God and all He can do with even poor material like you.  

Move on, keep moving on; forward.  Accept His help.  Depend upon His promises no matter what today looks like.   Live out your faith in trust in Him to get you through this no matter what happens. Nevertheless.   

You are tempted for lesser days on every side by family, friends, social media, and mostly your own lack of courage and laziness.    Get over yourself and your comfort and conformity addiction.  Move on.  Your prayers have been answered with "Trust me."  You can do this. Praise God and keep moving forward.

Cold Thoughts- For the Good Days

 Ice on the steps and I am wondering when the power will go off.  With all the high-tech new and improved plastic everything, I wonder why, more than ever, we have trouble keeping the power on. So, I am stuck in the house, thankful for a fireplace and the hope that winter won't last forever.  

I did a couple hours on my trainer bike last night which left me hopeful.  Today, I am living the old man in me, and need to get moving.  I haven't done much but read, check my phone, and take a nap.  If this is a normal day for an 80-year-old, I really won't make that turn in life well.  I don't know how people do it.  Maybe they just feel worse than I do? Maybe illness and disability over time have taken the stinger out of the bee in their lives.

And two, I don't see how folks live up north where this weather as normal winter fare. So I have sat here, thought about it, and written myself into feeling blessed.  

I am blessed I have that hot coal in my heart that wants more, that is intensely dissatisfied with lethargic living.  I am blessed to live where I do, where this kind of raw weather will pass into beautiful days; days for good training; days outside with good people who care for me.  God thank you for the hope within in me - for the good days, now and every more.

Ironman Waco 70.3 - Silly Me I Think It Will be OK

 How can this be?  A new beginning and the first fresh day of a new year and I forgot to do my strength and flexibility regimen.  I also messed around until it was too late to do my indoor bike ride. So, the New Year's question is: am I really that committed to going all in for a half-ironman event.  It doesn't look like it from here, today, no, not at all.

And I don't seem all spun up over my negligent behavior.  Maybe I really don't want this bad enough?  Maybe I know I am over the hill and realize that this is all one big facade where I try to act like a younger man without significant injuries?  But it is most likely part of the wisdom that comes with all this aging stuff.  Silly me, I think it will be OK.  

Of course, I did run on my trails for the first time in a few weeks.  Painful but tolerable, not bad.  Glad I faced that one down for now.  Plus, I did about 40 minutes of good mountain bike riding.  I split firewood for a spell and worked with my tractor before coming in for the night.  So, the day wasn't a complete waste.  I ate clean today and feel good as I ready for bed.  I am at peace about my half-Ironman 70.3 training, as it is months away.  And I gave all this to God, win, lose, or whatever, a long time ago.  Since it is essentially out of my hands, Silly me, I think it will be OK.