In memory of the dearly departed...

When I put them on in the morning, I didn't know it would be for the last time.

No more clunking through the lobby at work, echoing off the tiles. No more dropping loudly at the grocery store when the slip off my feet. For you see, my favorite wooden-soled shoes have reached the end of their life.

I had no idea how much I would like them. When I was yuckily newly pregnant with Ben back in July of 2004, I picked them up at the Nordstrom sale. For the first few years, they were just summer shoes. But, as my desire for simple, de-stockinged feet became greater in the past few years, I wore them year-round (you can get away with that in Utah, as long as it's not snowing on that particular day.) My friend Melanie and I have often expressed our love for wooden-heeled shoes; now those conversations will be monologues.

It was a simple concrete stair that brought them to their doom. I guess the 7+ year old weathered wood couldn't take my slamming into the step. A splinter of wood flew from my shoe, exposing the nails below. I knew it was a goner before I got up the rest of the stairs.

Good-bye little shoes. I will miss you. So will my coworkers, who will never again hear me pounding up the stairs or across the lobby again.

Shed a tear, friends, shed a tear.

Ragnar Race Report

This year’s Ragnar was awesome. I mean seriously awesome. There wasn’t a single moment during the entire 34 hours in which I wasn’t glad to be doing exactly what I was doing. And that’s saying something…

It started out (for me) at 5:25 on Friday morning when I woke up out of a dead sleep and immediately texted my peeps in van 1. They had been up since 2am driving to Logan so they could be ready for our 6:15 am start time. It looked cold and windy…

The text I received back stated that they were running late, drunk, and plagued with diarrhea. It was a bunch of crap (no pun intended) because they were all right as rain; just having a bit of humor in their delirium. I got a text at 6:17 with the picture of our first runner Craig starting us off. I panicked a little, thinking that I was still cozy in bed and they were already running. I was right to panic; our team ended up being a lot faster than expected and we were always rushing to be at the right exchanges for our van-to-van hand offs. I’m not complaining; getting home 3 hours earlier than last year AND getting to finish with the whole team was worth it, but we were all a little out of breath from more than just running.

We had rented a van, so Shane and I picked up the van that morning. Shortly after we got home, our team members started showing up at our house. It was so exciting to see Sheila, Dave, Mike, and Amy with all their running shoes and gear, ready to run Ragnar.

We left at 10 am and drove to Liberty Park in Liberty Utah (I’m assuming; it might have been Eden, Utah. Those little towns get squished together afer a while.) We had all of 20 minutes to park, get over to our safety orientation, get our flags, numbers, and swag bag before the first runner in our van (Sheila) was off. It was a whirlwind, but exciting all the same. Last year we were behind the game from the beginning so we saw a slower paced Ragnar. This year, we were caught in traffic for a lot of the time, as everyone was trying to get to the same exchanges all at once. It was exciting, but also hectic and stressful. My team saw exactly how I deal with stress on more than one occasion.

We cycled through our van’s legs: Sheila’s leg through Eden, Mike tearing it up near the north end of Pineview Reservoir, Shane’s first run of 3 miles with pain in his calf, Dave’s awesome run in his red kilt and hat, Amy’s climb up Snowbasin Road (wherein she reached the exchange before the van; she had to backtrack to give me the bracelet!), my climb up the second part of Snowbasin into the ski resort. I loved my first run; it was a tough hill, but since it was relentless, I could work out a good pace and stick to it. I didn’t walk at all, which was what I clung to instead of the thought that tons of people passed me while I passed no one. It was a beautiful run; I would love to do it again.

We ate some lovely dinner at the lodge at Snowbasin. I had memories of last year where we literally took naps on the chairs inside.

Then we got in the car and headed to Morgan High where we laid down for an hour or so. I couldn’t sleep so I spent my time listening to everyone’s stomachs growl, Dave snore, and the texting alert on my phone go off. I had run into a friend from my Ogden Relay team and we were texting back and forth for a long time until I got a text from van 1: their final runner was halfway finished with her leg, and we were 11 miles and hundreds of cars away from where we needed to be. W e rushed out of the school, jumped in the car, and headed to the exchange. We had just enough time to change (in the car, btw. No one looked too closely I don’t believe!) when we got to the exchange point. Our van’s members got separated for a while; some of us were using the Honey Buckets, others getting hot chocolate and coffee, and all of us trying to get to the exchange which was nowhere near where we had to park. At last we had Sheila off again for her night run, and we were back in the van.

All of our night runs seemed to go well. I had 6.9 miles from the south end of Rockport Reservoir to the Fairgrounds in Oakley, Utah. I watched the sky turn from black to midnight blue; I listened to the chatter of birds, watched some men getting ready to go fishing at 4:30, and enjoyed the quiet, peaceful dark. I had my one “road kill” a quarter of a mile from the exchange point (I finally passed someone instead of just being passed.) I tried to be nice about it; but really, no amount of encouragement changes the fact that someone is passing by you going much faster. I had the words “after the trial of your faith come the blessings” but I feel insincere about that since my blessing was at the girl I passed expense. I had hoped to just pass one person, and one person I got.

Arikka and Callista from van 1 were at the exchange, along with Jared and Adam. It was fun to hear how their night had gone, and the runs they had experienced during the evening. Shane and I bid them a farewell and we rushed to a junior high in Heber to get a few hours sleep and prepare for our last Ragnar runs. I got exactly 45 minutes of sleep to add to the 45 minutes I had during Dave’s run in the middle of the night. This was all on the floor in the main hall of the school, I might add. I waited in line for the bathroom for a long time, only to go back to our sleeping area, find Amy awake and ready to get ready for the day. So we spent some more time in the bathroom line together. I managed to redo my hair and brush my teeth and change all my clothes. This made me feel like a completely new person.

Mike looks like this sleeping on a junior high floor.

After organizing the van a bit, checking out our Ragnar shirts for sizing, and eating a few bites of turkey and cheese bagel, we headed to the exchange point to wait for van 1. We got some awesome pictures of our van and had fun trying to stay out of the hot morning sun. Before long, van 1 was there and Melissa was finishing her last leg and we were off again (are you getting sick of me saying that? Well, that’s just Ragnar! Run, Rest, Sleep? Repeat.) All went well until Mike’s last leg when we lost him on the course. We drove forward and back and forward again only to go to the exchange point praying he would show up (or be there waiting for us.) We anxiously waited for him at the exchange for a good 20 minutes before he finally came up the hill. It was a terrible feeling knowing that we hadn’t stopped to cheer or encourage or even offer him a drink of water during his 7 mile run. We did manage to take a “where’s Mike?” picture to document our shame.

Mike handed off to Shane and we watched him battle Ragnar hill for 3+ miles. That awesome husband of mine beat the van to the exchange; how cool is he? Dave battled the second half, finishing strong in the bitter breath of the snow at the top of Guardsman Pass. We saw two ambulances hurtling down Ragnar hill while Dave was running; it was scary, and Sheila about cried when she finally saw Dave come smiling up the hill. Dave and Amy exchanged the bracelet and she took her sparkly skirt and twin braids down the hill above Deer Valley for 7 long fast miles. I was excited when I saw her sparkling down the hill toward the exchange; so excited, I danced feverishly to the Beastie Boys tunes that someone was blasting. We exchanged and I hugged her and set off for my final 6.9.

I was up and down all over the foothill neighborhoods of Park City, running on the trails near the road to Heber, and skirting the roads leading up to the finish at Park City High school. Before my run started, my iPod died, so I was listening to Amy’s spare mp3 player, which was one of the best events to happen to me. Every song was a surprise. Some songs were on my (dead) iPod; others were songs I didn’t know but enjoyed, others were songs that were so tinged with Amy-ness that they made me smile. I loved it when Ministry’s Stigmata started blaring at me; I turned it up as much as I could and remembered the times I used to hear it at dance clubs when I was young and far cooler. My last mile of my run were filled with gratitude for borrowed wool socks, sadness that it was over, and the realization that tails aren't the only things that can chafe (hello thighs!)

When I turned the corner and entered the track at PC High school, I saw the most wonderful sight: Team Chafing More Tail. I started crying a little and hugged the first one I could get my arms around (Arikka). The emotion and adrenaline kicked me into gear and I blazed through the finish line ahead of my team. I’m embarrassed now, but I just had too much going on inside and my body just wanted to be done. We all hugged and took pictures and enjoyed being done together at the finish. My cute mom and her friend had spent the day waiting for us to finish, so I hugged and talked with her for a few minutes. It was the best ending to my favorite 34 hours of the year.

Thanks to Adam, Amy, Arikka, Callista, Craig, Dave, Jared, Melissa, Mike, Shane, and Sheila for being the best team ever.

Thanks for reading my 1,278 facebook messages every day.  I was honored to run with you. I hope you all had an amazing time. And thanks to you, dear blog readers, for sticking around for this monster post.

Team Chafing More Tail fo-ev-ah.

A little info on my 3 runs:

Finished at: 4:27 pm Friday.  Time: 57 minutes

Finished at: 5:04 am.  Time: 1 hour 17 minutes.

Finished at: 4:23 pm.  Time: 1 hour 23 minutes.

Random thoughts: June/Ragnar Edition

• Yesterday was Ragnar Eve Eve.  You already know about my love for Christmas Eve Eve.  Well, it was yesterday.  Not quite as fun as the one in December, but the stress level was about the same.
• Will be glad when Ragnar is over and simultaneously heartbroken.  Being the team captain might have something to do with it.
• Loves her Ragnar team.  They all pulled together last week when we had a Crisis.  We found 2 runners who would commit 8 days before the race.  So glad.  And again, simultaneously sad that we had to replace anyone at all.  We won't have all our sparkle colors represented.
• Will be wearing a purple Team Sparkle skirt and socks for one of my legs.  It is so cute.  I wore it one day to do yoga in and then had to answer the door and found one of my kids parents standing on my porch.  Pretty sure he thought I was a stripper.
• Is so excited to have Amy on her team.  I wished all last year for her to be with me, and this year she is.  She is going to rock being runner 11!
• Tried to get a van topper.  Thought we could just put it in our Xterra last night - wrong.  Nor would it fit on top of our Xterra. Grr.  I found a cargo net - hoping that will work and will be what I am expecting.
• Is trying to be grateful rather than pouty.  The weather might be bad.  We might get stuck in the mud trying to drive over Guardsman Pass.  (Ragnar encouraged teams to bring a tow rope. Seriously! How is that going to work.)  Is still a tiny bit worried about the 18.5 miles I'll be tackling.  So yeah, going with the grateful route: grateful to be running, grateful to be able to rent a van, grateful to have friends and family to run with.  Grateful.
• Hopes it doesn't go too fast.  I want it to be here but I don't want it to be over.  I was sad on my last leg last year that it was so short.  I won't have to do that this year, as my last leg is 6.9 miles. Pretty sure I can eek out any and all Ragnar satisfaction out of that run and then some.
• Is already looking forward to next year.  Am I crazy or stupid?

NPR topic: Dark themes in YA Fiction

NPR = Swoon.  I am in love.

But I not only like to listen to it, I've recently started getting updates through Facebook, which adds an even more swoon-worthy element to the mix.  In the past two weeks, I've gotten articles regarding reading that have made my whole day.  And now I want to share one of them with you, this article written in response to a NY Times article criticizing YA fiction's dark themes.  (Go and check it out; I'll wait.)

Honestly: this article had me at the VC Andrews reference, my personal go-to author in 7th grade.  When I told my mom I wanted to read Flowers in the Attic, she bought me a copy (it was the .  I devoured it, then moved on to Petals on the Wind, If There Be Thorns, Seeds of Yesterday, and the prequel, Garden of Shadows.  Was I disturbed by the gratuitous incest, adultery, and cruelty within? Absolutely.  I even banned myself from serial readings of the books after I read If There Be Thorns because it felt sinister and (for lack of a better word) devilish.  But I finished the series, and a few others written by VC (the name Troy Tatton will never not make my heart skip a beat!), stopping only when her name became a brand rather than an actual author.  To me, those dark and twisty books jived with my own dark and twisty tendencies, and so we were a perfect fit.  That isn't to say that I didn't enjoy reading something less dark (I did go through a phase of Jack Weyland, and can still tear up at the thought of Charlie sleeping by the bedside of her infant son), but I wouldn't turn away a book just because it contained themes and subjects that were on the darker side of life, such as The Silence of the Lamb, violence like Lonesome Dove, or overtly sexual books like the Earth's Children's series by Jean Auel.  They all broadened by literary landscape and affected the reader I am today.

As a parent, I have allowed my 9-year-old to read books with swear words in them (I know! But it's called Harry Potter, and Percy Jackson.)  He's read a book about a youth only a few years older than him who died in the Civil War, a historical fiction-type book based on an actual young soldier in the northern army. When Thomas was 6, I read Charlotte's Web to him, knowing that the spider would die and he would be sad, but also knowing it would prepare him in a small way for losses of grandparents and uncles later in life.  I think that reading allows children to be introduced to ideas that allow them to grow in ways that they wouldn't in their real lives. True, they might not have thought of these themes themselves. But I like what the author says:

'Surrounding them with books full of joy and beauty is fine, but confining their reading to those things because we are afraid that they cannot tolerate being exposed to the things they are already so often exposed to does them a terrible disservice. It's difficult to say to a teenager, "We don't even let you read about anyone who cuts herself; it's that much of a taboo. But by all means, if you're cutting yourself, feel free to tell a trusted adult."' 

And yes, I realize he is not a teenager, and I keep his reading level to an appropriate age level for him, but I also see what will be coming down the pike in the next few years when he will be choosing his own reading material, and more importantly, when his english teachers are requiring him to read literature with mature themes (A Separate Peace, Julius Caesar, even Beowulf).  And while total immersion in books that are evil or gruesome or graphic is something I will steer my child away from when that day comes, I believe there is a maturity that is learned from books that is less invasive than a similar depiction in a movie or video game.  If he is to experience it, I'd rather it be through his own imagination than through the (literal) lens of someone else's.

So I applaud this article.  I wish I could quote almost every paragraph in the article, but these are a few of my favorites.

And with younger kids, like 13-year-olds? If they're interested in dark themes, they're going to find them, whether it's in YA novels or something else. Curiosity about death or illness or suffering doesn't have to be grafted onto 13-year-olds by fiction writers. The ones who seek out dark themes are the ponderous ones, the ones who like the idea of things feeling Very Very Serious, who like the idea that they are doing something daring when they open a book. Yes, some of them are depressed. But some of them would be depressed anyway. You could give them books about uplift and clean living, and it wouldn't cure them of depression, because depression is chemical. If depression were treatable with copies of Cherry Ames, Jungle Nurse, they wouldn't make medication for it.

It's a lovely thought that surrounding kids with fun books about beauty will bend their perspectives toward beauty like a plant growing toward a sunny window. And certainly, it would be bad if everything always were murder and death and misery.

But adolescence is a dark time for a lot of people. Not a fake-dark time, because they got a pimple, but a real dark time, because they have a friend who drinks too much or is abused at home or has a mental illness and wants to kill himself. It's sad, but keeping books away from them doesn't make it any less true. Yes, it's always possible that someone will get the idea to cut herself from a book about cutting herself, but if she's in a position where cutting herself seems like a good idea, she wasn't just fine before she opened the book. The odds are she is already familiar with brutality and loss at some level; kids who aren't don't pick up a book about cutting and decide to slice into their arms.

And this one:

Much of this concern comes from a very well-intentioned place, I think. Parents hate the collision of their children with unpleasantness. Everyone wishes life as a teenager were irreconcilable with having an interest in angry, psychologically complicated, perhaps violent characters. Nobody wants to think their kid can really relate to a teenage protagonist who considers suicide or gets beaten up at school or feels crushed by pressure to be perfect. It feels good to make those "adult" themes, but that doesn't make it so.

What do you think about the article, or about darkness in the youth fiction arena? Is it escapism or a way to cope with reality?  Or, more simply: does NPR make you swoon, too?