I’m reading “Rising Strong” by Brene Brown for a book group, well truth be told they are way ahead of me in reading but I do enjoy the discussion.  Anyhow, it talks about the belief that everybody is doing the best they can.  I’m struggling with that.  I do believe people aren’t intentionally doing awful things and that people are inherently good.  I also know that I’m not doing my best.  Not even close.  I think best is what you save for when you go above and beyond.  If I were to try to live being my best every minute of every day, I’d collapse.
  I know this has driven my parents crazy for years, and now that I’m a parent with a kid who is laid back and does things half-assed it drives me insane also.  There was a time in high school that my mom sat me down and said “you are smart, don’t you want to rise above getting Bs and aim for the honor roll?  You could have your name in the paper and it would be great!”  My focus was sports, so I did what I needed to do to get Bs and get by, nothing more.  I agreed to show her that yes, I could do it, and in between soccer and softball seasons I made the honor roll.  Then I went back to getting Bs.  I am fairly certain it drove my parents insane.  The thing is, there was never a question in my mind that I could do it, I just didn’t want to.
   When Carlos goes out on the soccer pitch, I always tell him to have fun and play hard.  I try not to say “play your best” because if he played his best every minute of the game, he would be running around like a lunatic after the ball.  Playing hard, he knows that there are times when he may be jogging back into position or even standing and waiting but doing your best, to me, means giving 110% all the time.
   What does it mean to you?  Do you think everybody is doing the best they can all the time?  I think feel they are doing what’s right in the moment and their best when the occasion calls for it.  Maybe I need different wording but struggling to find it.

   For as long as I can remember, I have been big.  Always the tall girl and, in my mind, always overweight.  I recently went through a box of memorabilia and was looking back on pictures from middle school and high school and thinking back to how I felt heavy then.  Believe me, I wasn’t skinny, but I also wasn’t as big as I thought I was.  Funny how your mind plays that trick an it becomes a self fulfilling thing.
   So after being tired of being fat, Dee and I found the Dukan Diet (basically lean protein and veggies) and lost a bunch of weight really fairly easily and quickly.  Did you know you can lose weight without working out!?  You totally can.  I know I’ve written about this before and if you really want to read more you can go back to when I was gung ho on that “lifestyle change” and go from there.  It did work, but after we started to add in carbs and fruit the weight started creeping back on.
   I can’t tell you how extremely frustrating it is to be down 65 pounds and then watch as it starts to come back.  I jumped in to Weight Watchers and the “No S” diet (I really wanted that one to work!) and back to no carbs and so on and so on.  Nothing seemed to work anymore.  Even back on Dukan for awhile and that didn’t work anymore either.  So, while it was great to lose all that, it messed up my body and it is basically trying to get back to the weight it was before.  That sucks!  It’s disappointing, it seems like there is no way to win.  It is constantly on my mind and if I hadn’t seen someone for awhile, they always seem to look at me funny, as if to say “whoa, what happened!?” and that feels crappy.  I don’t know if that’s what they are really thinking but that’s where my mind goes.  I even had one person come up and ask if I was going to go back on that diet that worked so well – really!?!
   I was about to jump on the no gluten/dairy/soy/sugar bandwagon again, I actually did it for 3 awful days, and then talked with a friend who has counseled a lot of women who have gone through the same thing.  All with the same, frustrating results.  We have talked about this before, many times, and I do respect her advice – just in the past I had something that was working so well so I didn’t stop and listen when she told me it wouldn’t last.  How could it not!?  We are all looking for that miracle weight loss and I had found it, but I realize now that it’s not just about will power and eating healthy.  There is truly one proven, scientific way to lose weight and it’s slow.
   So, today I start fresh.  Headed on a long, slow journey that I will stick with and will pay off.  I will change my thinking from “all carbs are bad” to a basic “you get this many calories each day” approach.    I started with www.calculator.net where you put in height, weight, age, gender and activity level and it calculates how many calories you get each day if you want to lose a pound/week (and other options).  I also found a great app (Nutracheck) that will keep track of my foods, basically an online food journal and keep me accountable to myself.  From just starting it this morning, I realize that a lot of my calories came from my morning latte.  Even without the sugar it was 90 calories!
   Here’s to the tortoise – slow and steady!

Like I said before, we have been listening to a lot of music lately – in the car the other day, one of the boys was asking about what the lyrics of the Indigo Girls song “Galileo” meant.  We talked about reincarnation and how some people believe that what you come back as in your next life depends on how you lived this one.
I had NO clue this chat would go this way – he burst into tears, begged me to never play that song again, ever ever ever.  I pried a little, curious as how he felt so strongly about reincarnation.  He said “if we come back as someone else, I can’t handle that.  I would miss my family terribly.”
Ah, my sweet, sweet boy.  Yes, death and what happens after is hard. But what if, after you die, you go to heaven and meet up with all of your loved ones?
The last week has been a reminder for me of loved ones lost.
The first was Spencer Reilly, a young man I used to nanny for,  that lost his battle with addiction.  So sad, one of my very favorite kids of all time and so talented.  He recorded this a month ago.
The next was Grandma Pat, who brought so much love into this world.  I got to know her when her grandson was in my 2nd grade class at Island School and she continued to come and read to kids at the Island School long after he had graduated.  She always had a huge smile and a bear hug when you saw her.  She made a beautiful blanket for Erin and God boxes for all our boys (that they still use to put the worries that are too big for them to handle on their own).
Both will truly be missed by all who got the gift of knowing them.

“Yesterday it was my birthday
I hung one more year on the line
I should be depressed, my life’s a mess
But I’m havin a good time”

A couple of months ago, Carlos was nearing the end of soccer season and trying to figure out what to do to stay fit and active in the off season.  He said he wanted to train for another 5k with me, which is funny because he could go out and sprint a 5k any time he wanted to, no training needed.  When we trained for our last 5k I was considerably lighter and it felt good to get out and jog.  When the 5k came around I was ready for it and felt really excited.
I signed us up for the Hot Chocolate 5k, figuring chocolate would be a great incentive to run even if I wasn’t super jazzed about running in the first place.  I had a 5 weeks to train, so the couch to 5k program was going to be kicked into high gear and modified down a week.  That was the plan, but my out of shape body had other plans.  I could see that this time was going to be different.  My couple outings on the road left my body so sore, shin splints and aching.  We got a treadmill from a friend and that really helped.  I actually enjoyed it and was feeling good about getting on every other day or so and sweating.  Then along came plantar fasciitis – that bites!  Dee had dealt with it before, but I didn’t realize just how painful it can be.  Think of basically feeling like the bottom of your foot is being ripped apart every step you take.  Super fun.  So, I got a pressurized sock, insoles for my shoes, new tennis shoes and do stretching exercises to help – also had to take a week off of jogging.
Not sure what tomorrow’s 5k will bring, but I am excited to be with Carlos, Mary and Alice and even if I’m the slowest on the course and can’t walk the next day…I will have done it.

So Dee and I actually went out last week – I know!  We really never go out, it’s rare.  The logistics of us both leaving the house are insane since we have 7 kids, but for the Indigo Girls concert we made it happen and it was SO worth it!  A night filled with friends and great music, couldn’t be better.
These ladies have been a part of my life for a long time now, seems they have a song for everything and the meaning is deep and I can sing shamelessly along with them and feel as if we are truly singing together.  Sappy, I know, but I realized at this concert that I wasn’t the only one who felt this connection with them.  There were smiles and tears and so much love!
They didn’t play my new favorite song (Elizabeth – take a listen!) but they rocked it!
What I left with, besides a full heart really to take on life, was a rekindled love of music.  We always listen in the car, a lot of pop that the kids like with a few classics thrown in, but there was music lacking in our home.  That is not the case anymore.  Allison Krauss while making dinner, Adele in the morning at breakfast, James Taylor while I feed the baby, and of course the Indigo Girls!

I found this You Tube video of the concert we were at – love that the audience was really the stars of the show.  I think so many left with their hearts full!

Indigo Girls Concert  https://youtu.be/TlNfY34Qdog

The lyrics to Closer to Fine stand out for that night as well….although I didn’t end up at a bar, per se, and I think I left with the clarity I was seeking.

“I stopped by the bar at 3 a.m.
To seek solace in a bottle or possibly a friend
I woke up with a headache like my head against a board
Twice as cloudy as I’d been the night before
I went in seeking clarity. “

It’s been over a month now since this amazing trip, I can hardly believe it.  Doesn’t even seem real.
Here are some pictures of our amazing adventure!
My brother is an amazing teacher and guide and took Dee, Mary and I on a trip down the San Juan River by raft.  There we learned about Anasazi history, saw ruins of small villages and held ancient pottery.  We sat by campfire and reminisced and listened to great music.  We saw nature (even caught a little lizard!) and the scenery was absolutely breathtaking and changed at every bend in the river.  I missed the kids terribly, but the adult time with Dee, Mary and my brother was just what I needed.  We hardly ever get a chance to talk without someone interrupting so 6 days was indulgent.  Hoping to make a slideshow of all the pictures, but this is a little glimpse.

There are times when you see you child step into an activity and their whole being lights up.  That would be soccer for Carlos.  As a former player, I have to say this makes me incredibly happy.  I love soccer.  The excitement, the camaraderie, the action.  Good people play soccer.  It’s a great game.  I hate to miss a game, it’s fun to watch and now that they are at the “not a blob running around a ball” stage, it makes it even better.  They are actually playing intense, good games.
Last weekend, Azzuri was ranked #6 in the league and playing against the #3 team.  It was an intense game, very evenly matched teams.  Things started to go downhill when a mom stepped onto the field and kicked a ball (in her defense, she thought it had gone out but then had a TON of attitude about it).    We were leading 2-0 and the other team started to panic.  The play started to get much more physical, the refs weren’t calling much of anything.  At one point, our goalie went up to grab a ball and got elbowed in the chest.  He had to leave the game.  No call.  Play got even more rough, and as one of their players were near the sideline, he told another teammate to take out the new goalie.  There was a cleats up slide into goal and still no call.
  Where I’m going with this is that Carlos was defending the biggest, roughest kid as well as the one who said to take out the goalie.  Mama Bear came out in me and I watched a bit more closely.   Watching my son was out there getting elbowed and pushed down and manhandled a bit, I was curious how he was going to react.  I am proud to say, he raised up his game and met the challenge.  He is a physical player already, but his intensity tripled and he did it in a fair way.  There were no dirty hits or attempts to hurt anyone, he just played good, clean, tough soccer.
   Not sure how the other player’s parents felt about how that game went, I think they were upset about the loss.  There was so much more going on, encouraging kids to play nasty,  the part of youth sports that I hate.   Way to go Azzuri, you played with honor and heart and pulled out the win.