Suitability

[greenstorm]

I'm halfway through training for a half marathon I mysteriously signed up for that'll take place in February. I didn't think I'd ever be a runner, mostly because mom is one, and I still don't think I *am* a runner... but this sort of exercise regime suits me down to the ground. In building physical capability the basic idea is to do low level stuff for awhile to build a "fitness base" or basic capability, then to add intensity for while (in my case, distance) in small increments. So I got through the part where I built a base by running and walking various proportions of 2-4 miles for awhile, now I'm maintaining the base by running 4 miles twice a week and adding distance by running a long run every weekend.

Every weekend I add 1 mile to the distance I ran last weekend. A half marathon is 13 miles. My previous longest distance run ever was just under 5 miles.

So right now, every weekend, I run further than I ever have before in my life.

This is amazing and motivating to me. I may try to keep running as a sometimes-hobby-thing, not at this level of intensity, but I don't really like running. I do like something where I top my personal best once a week in easy-to-understand numbers (5 miles! 6 miles! 7 miles!). It's great.

Semester has also started; I'm two days in today. I don't know how it's going to turn out, but a couple of my classes seem to be going better than expected from the weird start-up stuff around them. We had a lab today that was tromping around the botanical garden looking at plants and I don't think the instructor thought much of me (I didn't need to look at a hemlock, I can ID it at all scales from a distance) but before I could feel too antagonistic towards him he mentioned that he has ghost tree moments on campus -- moments when he'll be in the middle of a building, or a road, and be aware of how not too long ago there were huge silent forests there, maybe a tree on that very spot. I feel that all the time, and I haven't met anyone else with that awareness, so it's hard to be antagonistic now, isn't it?

I also have a class that's four or five people, mostly masters students I think, and we're going to sit around and talk about the politics of land tenure in forestry and its effect on the environment and especially on different groups and also about the history of it. How great is that?

So we will see. I'm definitely too busy, but my first-ever student loan is coming in to fix that (I think) and I'm starting to get a handle on how my time will flow this year. I'm applying for summer jobs far and away, and making bits of time here and there to be social, and that's about it right now.

It's not perfect, but it is pretty good.

Comments

[dillen-dagen.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the update. Good to hear from your neck of the woods.