Reset Run

Wow.  Has it really been an entire week since my last post?  Well, I promise I have a really good excuse.  See, I'm getting married in less than two weeks!  And I still have so much left to do, including a lot of secret crafting.  And since the nature of secret crafting is that it is secret it makes for some really boring blog posts.

As you might imagine, as the wedding draws nearer I become more and more stressed.  I'm not sleeping well if at all, I've got the jitters more than you could possibly imagine, and I just can't seem to keep my emotions under control.  I really am excited to be getting married and to have many of our close friends and family be with us for the occasion.  I am thrilled with how everything is turning out, even if a lot of it is much more last minute than I would hope.  But for some reason I end up irrationally upset with no clear cause.  It needed to stop, or at least slow down a bit.

Recently I have been reading Mile Markers, Kristin Armstrong's published collection of her blog posts over at Runner's World.  In it she talks often about the concept of a "reset run".  A run that helps her to transition from mother to woman when her kids leave to spend time with their father.  Along with blogging, I stopped running over the past week because I had just too much to do.  On Thursday I decided that I'd finally had enough.  I skipped my zumba class and waited out a thunderstorm to go on a late evening run.

As I pushed myself to go the rather paltry distance I felt the worry and stress start to slip away.  Steep inclines and fast straightaways forced me to take my concentration off of everything and focus on breathing, on pushing myself just a little bit more. And then I started to notice things outside of myself.  The route I run follows a creek behind a neighborhood, now swollen because of the rain.  The sound of the water had changed as it gushed over rocks rather than sliding around them.  Several rabbits came down to join me at various points.  Showing no fear and shying away only when I got too close.  I met a sweet older gentleman and his doggy friend Meghan, who was so enthusiastic that I stopped for a few scratches behind the ears.

It started raining again as  I came back, but I welcomed the moisture, rather than muttering grouchily about wet shoes and potential headphone damage.  I was just plain better.  My room may still be a chaotic mess of boxes anticipating our new home, my to-do list may be a mile long, and my thank you notes may be woefully neglected.  But I came back a better version of myself.  I left a week's worth of stress and anxiety out on the pavement and came home raw and sore, open to receiving and enjoying this new experience.   It is something worth remembering next time the idea of music selection threatens to cause a nervous breakdown.  When the crafting just is not relaxing any more it is time to lace up my shoes and reset myself.