Exercising Caution

"As with many things,

hesitation is better than hurry."

-- Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear

Traffic light 11-13-14

"Strange, what being forced to slow down 

could do to a person."

-- Nicholas Sparks, The Last Song

"Don't ever take a fence down 

until you know why it was put up."

-- Robert Frost

Yesterday I got the green light from my eye surgeon to start exercising again.

Well, it was more like a yellow light.

Because I have to proceed very cautiously and very carefully.

He said I could "resume normal activity," but when it comes to exercise, for me "normal" can be anything but.

So I pinned him down so I'd know exactly what I should -- and more importantly shouldn't -- do exercise-wise, so that I don't interfere with my eyes healing right, and looking right.

I've been a good patient so far, staying well within the strict post-op boundaries. My doctor said I am progressing nicely and on schedule and that I've been doing everything just right.

So far.

And I sure as hell don't wanna fuck it up now.

Every safe driver knows that if you hit the gas after the light turns yellow, you're much more likely to get wrecked. So for now, when I exercise, I shall exercise caution.

Usually my insane workout mantra goes something like "bigger, better, faster, more."

But for now, I need to readjust my approach to something more like, "slower, gentler, little by little, stop if necessary."

I can live with that.

Because too much of a good thing isn't always a good thing.

No Agenda

"The heart which has no agenda but God's 

is the heart at leisure from itself."

-- Elisabeth Elliot, 

The Path of Loneliness: 

Finding Your Way through the Wilderness to God

Cosmos (cosmos bipinnatus) bud 11-10-14

"Consider how the wild flowers grow.

They do not labor or spin."

-- Luke 12:27 (NIV)

Cosmos (cosmos bipinnatus) buds and flower 11-10-14

I'm grounded. And I like it.

Because of my eyelid surgery, for the next couple of weeks my schedule is pretty much dictated by doctor's orders to stay on the couch with ice packs over my eyes and do as little else as possible.

To minimize facial swelling and bruising, to protect the fragile incisions and stitches, and otherwise allow the slow healing process to happen, I'm not supposed to do anything even mildly strenuous for a while.

That's OK. I don't feel like it anyway.

For me, downtime is usually difficult. Especially when I'm not able to exercise.

But so far, at about five days post-op, I'm not yet chafing at my limitations. Mostly it's because I get really uncomfortable if the ice is off for even a little while. But more than that, I think it's because I don't have a choice in the matter. 

Someone else, i.e. my surgeon, is dictating the parameters and the agenda. Therefore, I can't make myself feel guilty or bad about not doing stuff that I tell myself I should be doing. 

And frankly, it's kind of a huge relief to not be burdened by my hard-driving, often punitive, self-destructive tendencies. 

Also, if I don't follow the rules, I could seriously fuck up my face. It'd be like forcing open a flower bud with my fingers rather than letting it unfurl gradually on nature's timetable. It would never look right. 

So for now, my one-item agenda is to not have an agenda -- to just lay low and let the healing happen.

I got this.

Fresh Legs

"We had 18 hours to pump life 

back into those tired legs ..."

-- Chris Carmichael, 

"Make Tomorrow a Better Day," Bicycling.com

Drumsticks 10-8-14

"Overall, Lance's response was good:

his legs felt fresher and less sore the following day."

-- Chris Carmichael, 

"Hey Lance! Nice Socks." Bicycling.com

"And by saying good legs I mean untouchable, inexhaustible ...

It must be every cyclist's dream to have those magical good legs on such a day."

-- Gianni, "Having Good Legs," Velominati.com

I've been riding my bike a lot lately, and my legs are feeling tired and sore. 

So yesterday I did my legs a favor and treated them to a rest day.

I had a massage.

I took it easy.

I stayed off my bike.

I ate right.

For supper I cooked up some tasty drumsticks.

If it's really true that you are what you eat, then today my chicken legs should feel pretty damn fresh and delicious.

Columbine

"If I choose to look up and not down,

it's because I know what waits below."

-- Sally Brampton, 

Shoot the Damn Dog: A Memoir of Depression

Columbine flower 5-30-14

Columbine is one of my favorite wildflowers.

Happy, sun-drenched clumps of it run rampant along the south side of my house. They remind me of the funny stilt-walkers at a circus with their silly little belled, jester-hat blooms perched high atop long, leggy stems.

Up close, their demure, down-turned blossoms are a particularly delicate and lovely example of nature's wondrously deft hand at intricacy.

According to legend, the Columbine flower is the symbol for foolishness.

If you Google the word "Columbine" though, you won't get images of happy wildflowers. You'll get a startling barrage of words like massacre, rampage, psychopaths, shootings, murders, killers, monsters, bloodbath, horror, rage and tragedy.

Do an image search and you'll be smacked with an even more disturbing collage of photos depicting all of the above.

Sadly, ever since an April day in 1999, this happy, innocent wildflower that never hurt anyone is forevermore linked with unimaginable darkness.

It's the polarity of life, I suppose, the dramatic through-line of all existence, the tug and pull of opposite ends.

Good and evil.
Darkness and light.
High and low.
Happy and sad.
Love and hate.
Yes and no.
In and out.
Life and death.
Beginning and ending.
Now and never.
Here and gone.

I guess I'm writing this to remind myself (and you if you need reminding) that life's not all bad. Even the worst parts -- even the parts that seem unimaginably dark and hopeless when you're trapped in them -- have a flip-side.

Things get better eventually. Wounds heal, eventually. Even if eventually takes a lifetime.

At least I hope so.

I was reminded of this hope yesterday when I saw that despite the mud and blood spattered all over her good name (people used to name their newborn daughters Columbine. I don't have to do a baby names popularity search to know it's probably scraping the bottom of the barrel these days), my Columbine keeps blooming.

My Columbine keeps dancing in the sunshine.

Those silly little fool's caps keep bobbing in the Spring breeze.

Their heads may be bowed, their delicate faces may be down-turned, but they keep on reaching towards the sky.

A Day Of Rest

"Rest and be thankful."

-- William Wordsworth

Self portrait 5-24-14

"Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day,

listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky,

is by no means a waste of time."

-- John Lubbock, The Use of Life

I took a day off yesterday, which almost never happens.

If it's good enough for God, I guess it's good enough for me.

By a "day off," I mean I didn't exercise/work out, which is a pretty big deal seeing as I get all twitchy and anxious at the merest mention of being grounded. But with my tendency to overdo it, my body's been paying the price.

When my first thought in the morning changes from "Yay! I get to take a bike ride!" to "Fuck, I have to take a bike ride," red flags go up. When I don't have enough energy to even walk up the stairs without my stiff and swollen legs burning with oxygen debt -- yep, more red flags.

Usually I have to force myself to take a day off, especially when it's a perfectly gorgeous day like it was yesterday. But gorgeous day or not, I simply didn't have the energy to do anything about it.

So I gave myself a -- gasp! -- recovery day.

Instead of hammering 3 hours into the wind, I hung upside down on my inversion machine to get the lactic acid moving out of my legs. I did some mild stretching. I sat in an ice bath, which felt blissfully refreshing. I wore compression tights under my jeans all day, and then even slept in them.

This morning my legs feel much better, but I'm still really wiped out.

So I think I'll do something really wackadoodle and take two days off. I know, it sounds crazy, but maybe I'm getting a little wiser in my old age.

Intellectually, conceptually, I know how important rest and recovery are. But in reality, I've always had a hard time doing it. I've always been a "bigger, better, faster, more" kind of athlete. Sometimes to my own detriment.

But maybe I'm turning a corner, or making a realization, or simply learning a little tiny bit about how to take better care of myself.

Better late than never, right?

Who knows? This could be the start of something good.