Life in the slow lane

I'm about a month into my experiment of trying to become a runner. I've experienced some success and learned a lot. For example, I quickly progressed from run-walking to exclusively running. Yay! I've determined that, like most people, running outside is much preferable to slogging through a workout on the treadmill. I've learned all about what it's like to go out for a run on an upper-30s morning wearing a fleece, hat and gloves only to wish that I could shed all those layers about five minutes in. I've discovered the pleasure of the calmness that settles into your bones resting after a run.

All of the progress I've made feels nice, but a great deal of this foray also has involved a considerable amount of pride swallowing. You see, I'm competitive. I want to do well at this, but the truth is, I'm slow. Going into this with very little knowledge, I thought 10-minute miles would be a good, respectable place to start. But I'm simply not there. Right now, it's more like 11.5 minutes for me, and to my ear, that does not sound very good.

Naturally, I set about comparing myself to other people, beginning with my husband, who's just better at this than I am - and who's been at it a good two years longer than I have. Next, I progressed to a friend, who also lives in Menasha but whom I'm routinely shocked to see - when I'm out in my car, natch - running crazy distances - Memorial Park, Kohl's in Darboy. "I'm curious," I said to her. "How fast do you run on the treadmill?" "Oh, I usually start at around 7.5 and try to make my way up to 9," she said. Yeah, I'm more comfortable around 5.5, and I cannot maintain 6 for more than two or three minutes.

I asked Google, "What's a good pace for a beginning runner?" I came across a lot of forums (or is it fora?) that discussed this. Most contributors responded helpfully to questioners: go at your own pace, starting slow is fine, try to work up to running 30 minutes without stopping. One smart a$$, however, cautioned that if you ran your 5K doing 11- to 12-minute miles, you'd be "finishing with the grannies."

I'm sure I'll get faster as I progress, but I'll never be, you know, fast. I think I need to be ok with that. So when I run my first (and maybe last?) 5K, the Sole Burner, in two weeks, I guess I'll just have to settle for finishing with the senior citizens. Maybe I'll find it within myself to sprint past a couple grannies the last 100 yards.

Gus, my little paradox

Life with Gus tends to be predictably one step forward, two steps back. Potty training has been just one example of this. We began in September and had fairly quick success with getting him to pee on the toilet, at least sometimes. But as I've written, No. 2 was an entirely different story. It was a months-long process to get him to his first time pooping on the toilet.

Even after Gus had begun to poop on the toilet once in a while, it was by no means smooth sailing. We vociferously cheered his successes, bought him rewards, but try though we might, we could not get him to go on the toilet consistently. We even stationed a little potty seat in the basement, his chosen place to hide out and poop. It worked for a while, but soon enough the novelty wore off, and he was back to having accidents.

My youngest is just a breed entirely his own. Accepting that he's a little trickier, more demanding, and yes, sometimes maddening, has been a life-long process - specifically the three years, eight months and four days he's been alive. Each day, I have to remind myself to proceed with realistic expectations. I've been reading "Raising Your Spirited Child," and a lot of what the author outlines describes Gus perfectly. Spirited kids are just more - more everything - demanding, sensitive, loud. Yup, that's him.

Gus's penchant for getting what he wants and making mischief is endless. If, for example, he wants a snack and I'm in the bathroom, he doesn't bother waiting for me. I'll hear the tell-tale sound of chair scraping across floor, and I'll know exactly what he's doing. And let me tell you, the boy does not like to be ignored. One day I decided to do an intensive clean of the basement. He wandered upstairs and made a mess of putting lots and lots of toilet paper into the toilet. Another day, while I was working on something, he climbed onto the counter and dumped out a whole container of cinnamon sugar. It doesn't even surprise me anymore. Pulling out a whole box of tissues, unrolling TP, "Come on!" I want to scream. "This is 2-year-old stuff! You're better than this!"

On the flip side is everything that's great about Gus. Our lives surely would be much duller without him around. He is most likely to make anyone in this house laugh. While Ben and Paul tend to be shy and reserved around people they don't know, Gus is charming and gregarious, sticking out his hand at the peace greeting at church, calling out to people, "Bye! Have a nice day!" as we leave the Y. Grandparents receive huge hugs and kisses from Gus. The spirited child book encourages parents to look at their kids' traits in a more positive light, and that totally makes sense to me. Without Gus, we'd be a group of four fairly quiet people, and what fun would that be? Besides, just when I think something like potty training will never end, a breakthrough happens. Gus has, unprompted, pooped on the toilet three times since last night!

Oh, if only I could go back in time and advise poor Jessie Ceman

I'll dedicate this post to Becky, Michelle and Michelle, whom I met for dinner on Wednesday and got me thinking about this in the first place. When you get four MHS Class of '95 alum together, there's bound to be some reminiscing, so naturally, we did a lot of that. I was reminded that it's been a whopping 17 years since we graduated. I don't know about other people, but the second 17 and a half years of my life have whizzed by much more quickly than the first, which at times felt interminable.

Part of the conversation with my friends centered on people who made our lives miserable back in school. For me, the worst years by far were junior high. Is there a worse time in anyone's life? You don't quite fit into your body, hormones are surging, and particularly if you're a girl, your peers probably have reached the apex of their viciousness. Me, I certainly felt that I faced more than my share of adversity. I don't know what exactly it was like for my brothers to go through school carrying the name Ceman, but I pretty much can guarantee it's much harder for a girl to live with than a boy. My classmates were very creative, let me tell you. My hair was very fine, and even though I dedicated much Aqua Net and curling iron time to the task, my bangs would not form into a becoming poof. Add to that an unfortunate letter R speech impediment that took me until high school to shed, and I had a social nightmare on my hands. I wouldn't say I was bullied. But I was teased. Mercilessly.

I was desperate to fit in at Butte Morts, or at the very least simply be ignored. I tried out for, and by some miracle made, the eighth grade cheerleading squad despite the fact that I was hopelessly uncoordinated. I think the coach must have taken pity on me - and I think about 12 people tried out for six spots. I was predictably awful, and something that I'd hoped would increase my social currency only diminished it further, my pathetic attempts to kick in sync with others giving my classmates more reasons to taunt me . It's funny to me now that I even wanted to do that, as it is so not me. That's the whole point, though, isn't it? Assimilating.

High school was incrementally better for me, but I think in a lot of ways school just did not suit me very well. My socials struggles continued to dog me a bit, but I didn't thrive academically either. I was like two different people in my classes. If someone would have asked my history and English teachers what kind of student I was, they would have said I was bright and hardworking. My science and math teachers? The opposite. I never thought higher math and and science would be of the slightest use to me. Now almost 35, I can honestly say geometry and the balancing equations of chemistry have yet to come in handy for me. But I know now that it's about more than that, and I wish mightily I would have tried harder in school. As it was, I walked away from my graduation none too sad to leave it all behind, except of course for my circle of friends.

I don't think it was until I got to UW-Oshkosh my junior year of college that I truly found my stride. UW-Fox Valley, where I spent my freshman and sophomore years, was a microcosm of Menasha High in a lot of ways, plus all those math and science general ed classes. I was able to take classes that truly interested me. As a result, I excelled in school for the first time in my life. Finally I was able to shed the social strictures of middle and high school and find something closer to my true self (yes, that sounds incredibly cheesy).

Watching the trailer for the movie "Bully" recently brought this all to mind for me as well. I was in tears watching the struggles of the kids, especially the two who committed suicide, those beautiful boys. I wish I could take those boys and girls aside and assure them somehow that life does get easier.

My point in all this waxing nostalgic isn't to be all "woe is me." It took me a long time, but I've finally realized that in many ways the middle and high school years are hard for everyone. The people who made my life miserable probably had their own miseries, and their actions toward me were just a different manifestation of the very same insecurities I had. It's tempting but fruitless to hold onto animosity. Besides, maybe I'm the lucky one. I like to think of my struggles as character-building, and look at it this way: I never had to drop the crutch of popularity.

All of this brings me full-circle, to my own boys. My hope for them is simple. I want them to have a few good friends, to be neither bullies nor bullied. I hope for them to come through school as unscathed as possible, but if they do struggle, maybe my experiences will be able to help them in some way.

Plotting out the summer

Will it be this?

Or this?

I think this past week of spring break was a mini preview of summer, a way to suss out what the dynamics may look like when it's the four of us together once again every day for a three-month stint.  It's gotten me pondering the boys' activities. And since it's me, I'm obsessing a moderate to large amount about whether I'm making the right decisions about the volume of the kids' summertime daily doings.

The way I see it, it's a little complicated finding the right balance. It's an intricate dance trying to hit on the sweet spot between choruses of "I'm bored!" and "Do we have to go somewhere again?" In addition, there's a stigma about being that mom, isn't there? You know, the one who over-schedules her children. Choose one or two activities, but otherwise, just let them be, some experts admonish. The problem is, my kids get along great. Until they don't, which usually sets in sometime around 8 a.m. or so. Soon everyone, including me, is whiny and crabby. Getting one or two kids out of the house for a couple hours seems a good remedy to that.

Now, each of the boys is different. Ben seems to thrive on being active. This summer, he's got a lot on his agenda. Prepare to think of me as one of those moms as I detail his schedule: two summer schools classes, baseball, kickball, It's Game Time! (exclamation mark included), swimming lessons and a one-week, all-day science program in July. My justification to what you may fairly call insanity is that No. 1, Ben chose the bulk of these activities, and No. 2, while it may sound like a lot, park & rec activities like game time and kickball, and even summer school to an extent, are both inexpensive and rather informal. On any given day, especially with park & rec, I figure Ben can go or not go. And summer school only lasts six weeks.

Paul is another story entirely. He'd rather be at home. I had to compel him to choose one summer school class. Every other activity I offered got the big thumbs down. T-ball? "Nah." An art class at the Y? "No thanks." For my middle son, we're keeping it very simple: one summer school class and swimming lessons. See, I'm trying to meet their individual needs.

So my answer to the question at the top of this post is I hope it will be a combination of both. We'll see in a couple months how it all shakes out. Wish me luck. Here's hoping all of you with kids and I will find that perfect balance between a summer that's scheduled and one that's carefree.

Run

I envy runners. It looks like such a beautiful, peaceful activity, striding through the streets. I love the simplicity of running. Just throw on a pair of shoes (or go barefoot?) and take off. Running doesn't increase the size of your carbon footprint - no need to get in the car and go to the gym. 

The problem is, I'm not a good runner. I was on the track team in high school, and I stank at it. I excelled neither in sprinting nor distance events. I was such a know-nothing dork that I didn't have the sense to wear a sports bra and instead wore my regular bra and constantly pulled up errant straps as I ran. 

Years later, I haven't improved much. I know that at a certain point, endorphins are supposed to kick in, making running feel great. I've experienced that while swimming. I'm often tired swimming my first seven or eight laps, but then I break through and get into my groove. That runner's high, however, has always eluded me. I've never progressed past the point where running hurts and it feels like my chest will explode. I could easily swim for an hour, but run for 10 minutes, and I feel like I'm dying. 

The easy answer would be to give up on the idea of running. But I'd still like to master it, not to win or compete in any races, obviously (so not going to happen). OK, maybe it's a little bit because I'd love to have a runner's toned legs, but really it's just an activity I'd like to add to my repertoire - you know, like I said, the beauty, the peace, the solitude.

Not for the first time, I'm trying the Couch to 5K program. You run some, you walk some, culminating in the completion of a 5K run. I have to say, as I'm doing it, I dread a little bit the moment when the little voice in my iPod breaks through my walking reverie and tells me it's time to run. As of now, I'm no closer to becoming a master runner. Who knows, though, maybe in a month or two I'll be sporting more toned legs and completing a solo 5K run, wearing a sports bra this time. A girl (or pushing-35 woman) can dream, right?