In a true reflection of life, this blog is not only about the things that I feel I am achieving (although I am super proud of those things) but also the things that I feel that I am not quite there with yet!
RUNNING – I have actually been running a fair bit and twice on my own…. I have had an altercation with a hedge and a wheely bin (it was them not me…honest Gov’nr) and a few near misses with dogs insisting on running up to me on my blind side and nearly tipping me into Roundhay Lake but generally it’s been ok. I still feel drunk when I run and my brain is desperately trying to make up the missing data from my left eye (think about when your iPad screen stutters when the WIFI isn’t very good and you’ll kinda get what I mean) but drunk running isn’t too bad!
PARKRUNNING – Is this now a verb? I’m not sure, and I’m also not sure what the deal is for full block capitals of ‘parkrun’…. Anyway, parkrun is my Saturday morning fix, I often head down on my own to my local one at Roundhay park and enjoy and hour so or catching up, running and sometimes coffee. I mentioned before that despite having run one of the very first ones outside of London, I lapsed for a few years but now I could not imagine my life without it…. Oh and the added fact that I have just been appointed one of the new non executive directors of parkrun UK is pretty cool…..I actually can’t believe that it has taken me so long to write that as I am pretty darn stoked about it! Anyway I thought that this Saturday we would enjoy a lovely family parkrun together. I imagined running with the kids, highfiving, laughing, smiling, skipping and crossing the line as a family, thankful that we could all run together…. this is what actually happened…
- I decided on Friday night that it would be a good idea for the kids to cycle down and for me and Mr Me-myself-and-eye to run down to the park for some added family/warm uptime…I did not anticipate that the kids would actually sleep in on Saturday morning (literary the FIRST time in history) which meant quickly ramming toast into their mouths whilst hollering to get their shoes on and get out of the door otherwise the whole world was going to end.
- Getting to parkrun (actually in plenty of time) and child number one claiming that she couldn’t run because she had a tiny blister on the top of her foot (from climbing a rope the day before) which hurt too much to run and she was just going to walk across the grass to meet me a various places on the course….. that was fine (I didn’t mind that apart from the fact that she actually pretty much ran like a whippet all over the park, proving that there was actually nothing wrong with her foot AT ALL). Child number two then had a meltdown because I took his gloves off to take his fleece off before putting his gloves back on (What a careless and stupid thing to do mummy) and that was COMPLETLEY the wrong thing to do and I had essentially ruined his life by doing this.
- I had not anticipated the amount of people that were going to be there and promptly started to panic as soon as we arrived thinking that I wouldn’t be able to do it with all of the people, until the wonderful Alex Wu said that she would run with me and actually despite the congested start, people knocking past me on my left, having the feeling that I was going to run into people in front of me and the shock at being shouted at to keep left for the faster runners I did ok, I think it was Alex keeping me talking that helped! I may have to think about which quieter parkrun to do to get a faster time though, or enlist a team of bouncers that can run around me, protecting me as if I celebrity!
- Whilst child number one was frolicking around the park living her best life, child number two started the run but only managed 1.5 laps before he said he couldn’t survive the rest of it because he couldn’t breath, this is despite Mr me-myself-and-eye telling him to stop running for about half a lap before because he was crying (we are responsible parents, honest!) Child number two was then beside himself because he couldn’t finish the run….. like a trooper though Mr me-myself-and-eye forfeited his run so I could finish mine (we actually fell out about it and I went off in a strop to finish the run, but I like the thought of the other version better…)
- Child number two then did not want to ride his bike home and it took a bribe of a babychino and a chocolate croissant to get him back on his bike and home again, which, to be fair to him he did do.
So not QUITE the return to parkrun that I had anticipated, I am totally going to go on my own again next time!
CLIMBING – I have been climbing TWICE! This is a BIG thing for me. I used to climb when I was younger and my body wasn’t quite so broken, dabbled with it again between being preggers, and then hurt my back for about 2 years and then my knee (Jeepers, i sound like a permentley injured person!) and then had just started back climbing before #eyegate…. when I say I ‘climb’, I really mean that I just about made it to the top of what I was going up. I’ve never been very good, just quite determined…. my daughter can whizz up a climbing wall on the hardest grades with no fear at all whereas I break out into a cold sweat as soon as I get 5 foot off the ground. However, last week, Mr Me-myself-and-eye and I took our daughter climbing at the Leeds Climbing Wall. She climbs for an hour and a half on a Wednesday and it just felt like a long time to be waiting for her, so I harnessed up, Mr Me-myself-and-eye sorted out the belay and I climbed! Oddly, the cold sweat fear that I normally have wasn’t there…. I just climbed, not bothered at all about falling (which I did) and nailed a couple of tricky climbs. The strangest feeling was trying to work out how far up each hold was for my hands and feet and it was the same perception that I had when I walked on the flagstone pavement for the first time where I was picking up my feet too high…. the only difference was that I was doing it with my hands AND feet. I have to admit that I cried when I got down to the bottom of the first climb, relieved that was pushing myself to do it again. I then went climbing AGAIN with my lovely buddy Hels Bels and then spent the next two days in agony as my shoulders and arms were on fire and would not move above waist height.
BOXING – I bloody love boxing and started to go to the FABULOUS Tigers Gym in Meanwood with my friend ‘Big Right’ Hobbs….. It is a proper boxing gym, gritty, down to earth with a reminder on the bins not to put bloody tissues in them…. (you can imagine my face when I went there for the first time…) It is run by hard as nails Michelle Sutcliffe who has so many world titles and wins under her belt, that there is not enough room to list them, and her hubby, who are also two of the best people I have ever met. Kind, open, honest and do not hold back if you are not doing something correctly.
Having only been boxing for a few months before hand, I was really nervous about going back, mainly because I was worried about smashing my friend in the face by accident if I couldn’t work out where the pads were that she was holding. Michelle and her hubby (I don’t know his name even though he has told me before and now I feel rude asking him!) were awesome, asked about what had happened (which is actually quite nice as generally it has only been children and taxi drivers who have ever asked me about why I wear a patch….. nobody else asks… it’s like the elephant in the room, it actually makes me chuckle…) and then got me straight back into it with no concession at all (which was the same for ‘Big Right’ Hobbs whose punches nearly knocked my shoulders out of joint…) It was exactly the tonic that I needed and I don’t think that I have punched that hard before…. I think I may have a tiny bit of pent up aggression and tension….
Despite all the things that I CAN do and are continuing to do….. I do think that I have to address the balance and mention a few things that I haven’t been able to do this week…
- Order a pair of trousers off the internet the correct size…. they were two sizes too small after having misread the sizes online (the writing is so small!) and I could not even get them over my ankles.
- Put the correct amount of sugar in banana bread that I made (and sadly I didn’t even question that I was putting in too much) The kids bloody lapped it up though and then were literally bouncing off the walls afterwards.
- Find a tiny grey part of one of the kids toys that they dropped on our grey kitchen floor and rolled under the table….. I think I’m just going to give up on that though…. we’ll find it when we move I’m sure.
- Know when the ‘eye’ is open or closed as I can’t feel my eyelids on my eye…. very strange sensation and a bit annoying as I am often saying to Mr Me-myself-and-eye “Is it open or closed?” in an over panicked manner.
- Successfully navigate my way around the supermarket without taking out a few grannies whilst doing it…. child number two came with me today, it was really busy with people in a rush, which didn’t do my nerves any good and I pretty much ended up letting the 6 year do the shopping, so for the next week we will be eating Pom Bears, Soreen, oranges and yoghurt…
- Work out what is going on in my kids heads….. I think child number one is dealing with everything ok, and I do talk to her a lot about it and ask her questions etc… but child number two is being quite tricky and his behaviour is at times unmanageable with really big meltdowns. I can’t work out if it’s to do with me (like the whole world revolves around me) or if he is in a growth spurt, or if there is something else going on. It’s not the best feeling to have, thinking that there is something going one that I can’t help him with…. I think maybe we need some time just me and him together doing something fun…. any suggestions would be gratefully received!
So, there we go, it’s all swings and roundabouts, but I do think that at the moment, the swings are outweighing the roundabouts…… which can only be a positive thing….. Oh and a wonderful lady on Facebook called ‘In the Blink of an Eye’, made me some super cool eyepatches and so now I have one for every day of the week!
CC x
Me, myself and eye 