Wednesday, October 20, 1999. Pet the Pill. I was SO ready for riding tonight. Work was exhausting, mentally and physically. So the riding , as usual, is well placed in my week.
I feel bad about always interrupting Pet (his full name is Pet Step) from his post-lesson hay (his owner rides him two classes before me). Luckily, although he usually is a pill to get the halter on, he does put up with getting back in tack. It was back to the jumping saddle, which I was very happy about. I could definitely feel there was less support, but I do prefer the jumping saddle to the dressage.
As usual, had problems getting Pet up to a trot. I think my balance still makes him a little cautious. It took two full laps of pressure and kicking to get him up to the trot. He also kept taking short turns, so I had to really concentrate on what signals I was sending him. I still lean into turns too much and probably am not consistent with my reigning. Laura had me work on holding my reigns as far out as possible, even past my knees at some points. This did a lot for my balance and confidence when I finally got the hang of it. Then back into working on the “shoulder in” where you turn your horse in on the quarter line and then slowly, with the horse staying parallel to the wall, make your way towards the other end of the arena slowly getting closer to the wall. Afterwards I was cantering on my own again. Definitely felt a lot more at ease tonight. My hands loosened on the reigns a little and I could rest my knuckles on Pet’s neck rather than grasp his main. Its still far from perfect, but I’m getting there.
Bonnie Robbins invited me to an event after work with the Sunset Club. The Sunset club is made up of ‘established’ women shall I say? Basically a group of society women that hold a variety of social events. Bonnie is a member, Mari Jalbing, a fellow SYC rower, is a member too.
Tonight’s talk was on Global Partnerships, a group that does village banking in South America based on the Gramin Bank in India. I hoped this would be a soul development opportunity since the late dinner meant I wouldn’t able to do any training. Boy did it turn out to be just that. Started with cocktails with the Claps, the couple that started Global Partnerships. These conversations, about what you do, what I do, etc. always seem pretentious at first, probably because I don’t have them often. I sometimes feel like people my age are trying to be intellectuals and fake these kind of conversations. But it quickly became apparent how passionate Mrs. Clapp felt about Global Partnerships and was sincerely interested in learning more about me as well. Same thing with Bart Fite and then the Nollans and Blacks. Mrs. Nolan was from Little Rock, AR and obviously came from a cultured background. What a fascinating person. The conversation was so stimulating, intellectually and spiritually. As we dined in this grand room we all talked about how much we take for granted here and what it was like to really live life. Mrs. Black’s daughter happened to be traveling in Nepal as we spoke so we had lots to talk about. She had just went to a symposium on mind, body and spirit so was really intrigued in my ‘motto’: developing my mind, body and soul to its fullest extent. The lecture on Global Partnerships was wonderful too, but is was certainly the incredibly rich (in spirit) company that made my evening.
After yoga did weights for the first time in MONTHS! I used data from the last time I kept track (for rowing), which was…yikes…September of 98. Got back home and did my usual cleaning requirement. I have a bad habit of letting everything go and then needing to clean it before being to sit down and get any home/reading type work done. Cleaned everything up and cleared up my desk, then set into to do some excel sheets for my weights training. I’m not intending to get big, but I do like the idea of tracking progress. And…started my diary! Checked out Adam Holland’s diary on Rower’s World for a little inspiration. I’m looking forward to movies with Ron and Dave tonight.
Got a message back from Craig Ballew regarding homecoming. He’s still in Korea so can’t make it but we had a short email discussion about VanWert (our high school history teacher) passing away. VanWert had really had a profound effect on us all, we just couldn’t appreciate it at the time. As I approach my 30th birthday, I find myself looking back on that time and realizing how much of me was really formulated back then. Since I wasn’t a big athlete in high school, VanWert was the first to really make me internalize that developing your mind and soul was just as important as developing athletically. He said not to worry, that I’d find my sport someday and would probably be in the best shape of my life by the time I turned 30. VanWert’s right again.
I’m still starting pretty slow with the swim. I’m doing a 4 lap swim, 4 crawl, 4 crawl with hand paddle and pull buoy, 4 with hand paddle, 4 breath stroke, 2 crawl kick and 2 breath stroke kick. This is a long way from my days back at UW when I did a 10 lap warm up, 10 lap with hand paddle, 10 lap pyramid and 4 lap kicks for crawl and breath stroke. But I’m pretty please with my level so far. I think the swimming will pick up pretty quickly so that I am back to my UW levels within a month.
After work I went to a Braintrust meeting with ONE Northwest (Online Networking for the Environment). Its basically a brainstorming session with a bunch of techies into environmental/social issues to help develop programs for ONE/NW. Its such a rewarding feeling to sit with a bunch of high-caliber thinkers and come up with some really great ideas. Definitely falls into the developing the mind category.
After the Braintrust, I dropped by the old fencing turf, The Wallingford Fencing Club (WFC), to see if the group had returned from their summer location. I used to go to the club when I attended UW. I never really competed much in college but got pretty close. Its been about 3 years since I last fenced, so I was looking forward to re-starting this portion of my training. So here’s where the Karma starts. Turns out that this was the club’s first night back at this location. They had some other temporary digs while they renegotiated the contract for the gym at Hamilton Middle School. Steve was still there an very welcoming. Turns out there was a new Coach, Gary, who hailed from Belorussia and had trained several of their Olympic athletes. Foil is his forte, but he also trains in epee. There are several people in the WFC that are ranked at the national level, so it should be a great place to train on my fencing. Also met a guy, Eliott, who is iterated in taking up pentathlon as well. Pretty cool, but it gets better. He was born in Kenya, his dad’s a conservation biologist there, and he’s really into the outdoors. My kind of guy and hopefully another great friend in the making. For now, I plan on attending WFC on Tuesdays, when they have an hour of beginning lessons (I’m plan on being pretty rusty for a while), an hour of footwork and then open fencing and lessons until 9:30. I was always pretty intimidated by the epeeists back in my college days, so a major challenge lies ahead.
Express entry (5:35 a.m.): Here’s one for the Dream diary…just woke up from the craziest dream. I’ll describe my dream first, then interpret later for the full crazy affect. So I had joined the Air Force and come in to my dream as I’m walking around a campus (I think it was UW) practicing my march. I’m not sure if I can enter the student union building or not with my wooden display/practice weapon so I head back to my dorm which is actually more like one of those portable classroom/trailers. Luckily some fellow recruits are there including Audrey Hepburn and Liz O’Malley a girl I used to work at the Nordstrom espresso bar with (she was the quintessential Irish girl with short red hair and a lot of personal style). I put on my Air Force cap and looked in the mirror and it reminded us of something Audrey wore in Breakfast in Tiffany’s because it was so big. So I asked Audrey to put it on which she did and it was very funny. Cut to the next part that I remember…Audrey kept all of her wedding dresses on the wall near the door of our dorm room. I came in to her trying on one of the dresses. So I snapped a few souvenir shots and then asked Liz to come over and play a few songs on her guitar. I was wearing the big Air Force had this time. The sun came into the room through a skylight and I couldn’t believe what awesome pictures I was getting; Audrey sitting down among her wedding dresses in that way only a super model could, Liz in front of her and the both of them singing Moon River. I finish the role of film, rewind it, but of course open it before the film is done rewinding so I’m not sure if I have the pictures or not. The was a fellow guy recruit sitting next to me, but I’m not sure who he was. He was pretty amazed by the incredible photo opp. as well. So now, interpretation. I’ve been seriously considering joining the Air Force reserves for a while. Serving the military is one of those things that I regret not ever doing. I was scared stiff of doing such a thing when I was younger. Didn’t think I could measure up if I remember correctly. But I think I could do it now and actually look forward to the self discipline and physical challenge that would be involved. In addition, I recently read a book called Audrey Style by …It of course talks about how she developed her personal style, which was a huge deal to the world but was never much thought for her as a person. The book was very inspiring, and she has certainly been on of my role models for a while. I remember watching an interview with Isabelle Rossolini where she spoke about Audrey as her role mode. They were at a fundraiser together and Audrey was at the podium speaking. There she was in her evening gown, looking amazing and giving an inspirational lecture, but Isabelle noticed that she had dirt under her fingernails as she leaned on the podium and put one of her hands over the side. It turns out Audrey had just flew in from Africa where she had been planing with some local villagers. Now that’s my kind of woman! Liz was one of the coolest people I ever worked with at the espresso bar. She was young, but super intelligent and spunky. The kind of person I always wanted to be. I think the dream spoke to the fact that I’m starting to feel a little more self-actualized; getting to where I want to be. Then again, it could have just been the cashmere cap.
Now back to training...started the day with weights, my first leg workout in quite some time. Did the same as my upper body…started out with the weights that I left of with last time I was lifting. No major feats, but it felt good to get back into it. Once again, I’m not wanting to get huge but could use some additional strength and wouldn’t mind some more definition.
My work stress and new training showed up in riding tonight. Laura said I really looked rigid and I could certainly feel it. She said my ankle was stuck in a Z and wasn’t moving. I almost felt like I was trying to relax too much. Part of the problem could have been Pet again. He still seems to have the upper hand in a lot of situations. He is tending to veer towards the inside shoulder. I couldn’t figure out if I was sending the signal or if was him being his usual pill self. Laura first though it was my rigidness but we figured out that Pet was doing what he often did with children riders…turning to the inside which results in the rider spending their time trying to get him back in line rather than forcing him into the trot. I ended up just letting veer where he wanted, but forcing him into the trot. Worked pretty well and I was able to get some shoulder in done before going up to the canter. Cantering proved a challenge given my rigidness, but I eventually pulled out some good laps and was able to work on getting my hand positioning correct.
The swim went well this morning. I added a lap on to each stroke/kick so I’m slowly building back up to my former distances. I’m in no big rush, but I think I will be able to progress pretty quickly. My crawl stroke is feeling great which I think is pretty important in itself. I did a quick erg before my yoga. I can definitely feel that my back is out of shape compared to what it used to be while I was rowing. I’ll have to keep up on the ergs because I would like to get back into rowing next spring if pentathlon training allows. Yoga was nice. We did a lot of partner yoga. Partner yoga is great for getting some good stretches that you normally wouldn’t be able to do yourself, but its not as appealing mentally and spiritually to me. Perhaps if I were doing with a significant other it would provide a different energy. Nevertheless, I was shaking after yoga…the sign of a good workout.