physical goals: looking back/looking forward

It's New Year's Eve and I started last night on what will run through tomorrow and possibly beyond...the great string of blog posts that mark my transition from one year to another.  Looking back, looking forward, celebrating, pondering...this holiday is my favorite of all writing occasions, I think. 

With this post, I will have written 111 times on the Naked blog in 2012.  February was my banner month, with almost one post per day...December has been dismal on the blogging front, with this being just number 5 for the whole month. 

I've been rereading to see what I thought I might do this year.  The nice part about this business of letting God teach me to love my body is that it's not a *resolution* and not a *diet* and not an *exercise program* and so I don't have to come here with the usual report of dismal failure.  I am further along the path, re: loving my body than I was this time last year.  So that's a success.  

I dreamed aloud about some physical goals at the last New Year...not so much resolutions as great hopes:

• cycling to Savannah - this was to be a 120 mile round trip with one of my great friends at JPUSA.  I conditioned for it all spring and summer.  And then, come fall, when the time was right, it was sabotaged by a combination of schedule and arthritic feet.  Grrr. 
• century ride - I was SO PUMPED to do the annual century (100 mile, that is) ride in Chicago that is a tour of the city's perimeter.  When they finally announced the date...I was committed elsewhere that weekend.  Grrr.  
• 5K - I talked about doing at least the Rhubarb Run in Aledo and maybe also the Hot Chocolate Hustle, also in Aledo.   Then in a moment of genius, I scheduled myself to be many states away on vacation during the Rhubarb Run.  And I think I basically forgot the Hot Chocolate Hustle, come December.

Those were the only physical goals on the 2012 list of dreams.   Sounds like a crashing failure, eh?

But I don't count it as such.  Instead, I recall that I:

• rode several 50-mile bike rides this year, along with a huge number of 30+ mile rides
• rode up the Davenport Main Street hill without stopping (multiple instances)
• rode a cumulative 1000+ miles this year
• ran 7 miles in The Bix race here in Davenport
• ran up the Davenport Brady Street hill without stopping (multiple instances) 
• faithfully ran my 2.5 miles three to five mornings a week, anytime that my arthritic feet didn't say no
• rode my bike to and from work quite a number of times 

That's not the sound of failure.  That's the sound of an over-scheduled woman choosing to find joy in her achievements and not focus on the fact that they don't read exactly like she thought they might. 

At the last New Year, I mentioned possibilities for 2013 that I was scheming in advance about:  riding the RAGBRAI (a week-long ride/party on wheels across Iowa) and perhaps participating in a duathlon.  I'm scratching both of those.  While I was very excited about the idea of riding the RAGBRAI, between the fact that my first grandbaby was born in Kentucky 2 weeks ago and also that I'm head over heels in love with a wonderful someone who lives almost 4 hours from me in Chicago...let's just say, I'm not using up a full week of PTO to spend time NOT being in one or the other of those places.  It's just not happening.  Maybe someday my guy will ride the RAGBRAI with me...say, when we can do things like sharing a tent.  And I spent enough time trying to talk myself into doing a triathlon with a friend this year that I know my level of resistance to the "-thlon" kind of competition.  No duathlon for me.  Not this year.  I'll ask myself again in 50 more pounds, maybe, if I get there.  Or maybe not.

While I would still love to try again next year for the ride to Savannah (Steffie!  Don't give up on me yet!) and/or the century ride, and while I absolutely intend to do the Bix again (can I run it without walking this time?  I'm asking myself...) none of these things is the target of my physical goal this year. 

What is it, you ask?


In 2013, I will wage war on the ever-worsening adult onset A.D.D. that is making it harder and harder to do the things I need to do at work and even sometimes at home. 

This is not an "exercise" issue but I suspect it very much IS a "loving my body" issue.  I've been making half-hearted efforts to combat the A.D.D. for a few years now, and in the 17 months since I moved back from Chicago, it has been a much more formidable opponent than before that.  Enough of an issue that I mentioned it as a problem on the job when my boss asked me to evaluate myself as part of his evaluation of me last spring.  I'm darn good and tired of *thinking* that I am paying attention, only to get embarrassed when it quickly becomes apparent that I have not been.  In 2013 I will make a focused campaign to get it under control, and to make it STOP derailing me from taking care of business.

That's all, folks, for my "physical goals" for 2013.  I'll be blogging about the other stuff over at my other address.  Maybe I'll see you there.

Meanwhile...what are you seeing in YOUR 2013?