If you always raise your head and look straight ahead, you will avoid stepping in dog poop – James Hom, my dad

I don’t know what it is, but tonight’s run was my fastest in the past two months.  My body ached, my legs are tired and yet I had a very strong run.  As always, lots of thoughts ran through my head tonight including the quote above which is something I randomly remember my dad telling me as a kid after I came home with dog poop on my shoe.  All kinds of things still run through my head after a run and I always scramble to get them down on paper.  It is when my thinking is the clearest and least conflicted.  What else ran through my head?  My cousin, Jenkin ,who died 15 years ago at the age of 45 from a heart attack was on my mind (probably because I need my physical next month) , Chad Moutray and his daughter (as he wrote me today on Facebook), and of course the economic crisis that our country is dealing with (yikes taxes are due and so is my real estate ptoperty tax next month).  Everytime I run and these thoughts flood my head, I feel compelled to write them down before I go to sleep and forget them. 

Why do I write this?  My dad was a pretty private person. I don’t remember thinking that my dad was such an open book.  There was always some mystery to me about who my dad was.  I for one remember following my dad one night to see where he went (he went back to his office to put together some models for someone’s teeth).  I mean I did know him, but not his inner thoughts.  In Chad Moutray’s book he does a great job of sharing his wife’s feelings and hope with us through her notes and his interpretations.  I feel like I know what she is like even though I never met her.  I want my spouse to be able to read these thoughts and know what I was really thinking.  Sometimes we are running around so much that we never sit down and actually communicate. 

The quote at the top was quite appropriate yesterday as I drove to work.  The sign in the Niketown window read: “Hope Rides Again” in reference to Lance Armstrong riding in the Tour de California bike race.  The sign had been up for a couple weeks but I finally had my head up and was watching. It was like a  big message for me the last couple days.  Kind of like in “Field of Dreams”….”Ease his Pain” and “If you Build it, he will come”.

Maybe my mind was cluttered by my concern for my wife.  They found some swollen nodes at her last pre-operative check-up last week.  We were wondering if the cancer had come back.  They took a biopsy and fortunately we got the results today that it was all clear.  Whew!  My wife had told me not to worry, but what was I to do!?  You try and distract yourself and forget, but you can’t!

At least her visit with the Plastic Surgeon went well. She really likes him so that is what is best.  It will be a little longer than the original hour projected so they will have to put her under again more than just local sedation.

(I’m going to finish this tomorrow as I need sleep)

Ah Friday.  I’ve been terribly efficient today and need to be given that this weekend will be spent as a chauffeur between Little League and Basketball playoffs.   A good excuse to get outside I guess. 

Not sure why Ididn’t just end this post last night as I fell asleep watching “Survivor” on Tivo so I will end it now