Things That Remain : 2007 : November

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Things That Remain

November 2007

Over the River and Through the Woods

Posted by Stephen Peterson Nov 26, 2007

We went to Grandmother's house (or as my kids call her - "Nana") for Thanksgiving. We actually crossed a number of rivers and passed through a lot of woods to get there. As always, it was worth the 6+ hour drive. My Mom and Dad live on a slice of heaven in the mountains of East Tennessee, and I never tire of standing, sitting or walking in their backyard and looking out over the layers of varied hills extending in every direction.

Temperatures started dropping on Thursday morning while my wife and I went on a 5-mile run, and it began to rain during our cool-down. The run was a sort of pre-paid penance for the day of gluttony on which we were about to embark. Later, we feasted on a traditional turkey dinner. After I gorged myself during the main course, I over-filled my stomach with pie and my son's birthday cake (by happy coincidence, his birthday lands on Thanksgiving every six years or so, and he is indeed one of the greatest reasons that I am thankful). That afternoon I planted my ample stomach on the porch swing and looked out over the cloud-shrouded hills, wondering if they were named, and wishing I had time to explore.

On Friday morning I ran again, but the temps had fallen to around 30 degrees, so my wife opted out. It snowed during my run and I'm sure the locals cast a suspicious look at the out-of-towner running through their park in shorts. Over the course of my run I did a lot of meditating about my life, passions and priorities. It's a constant balancing act, and there are other people to consider in connection with every decision I make. I had decided some 10 days prior to train for a full marathon, something I've long wanted to do, but I was already starting to feel the tension of scheduling long runs amidst dance recitals, Christmas parties and school programs.

On one side of the scale I place my reasons for wanting to complete a marathon, and note that they are primarily selfish - it's something I want to say I've done. I can sanitize my reasoning - I want to do it for health, etc., but I can get plenty healthy and fit by training for something other than a marathon. On the other side of the scale are the needs of my wife and kids, primarily the need for me to be around during the weekends, because during the week I am generally not. The work week simply doesn't afford the opportunity for a long run. The scales swung into balance as I ran. I'll content myself with running the ING half marathon in March.

As I sat in my parents' porch swing and looked out over the valley, I asked myself why I felt such peace there. It was the beauty of the place in part, but also the awareness that in the moment I didn't have to do anything other than enjoy it. And so, to the extent I can, I will try to pass my choices through the filter of whether the options are peace creating or peace reducing. To the extent that I can, I will chose the former.

(I'm the dude with the coffee cup obscuring the view)

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Running Companion

Posted by Stephen Peterson Nov 18, 2007

This weekend my wife and I went on a marriage retreat sponsored by our church. It was the culmination of an eight-week course called "Legacy of Love." We met on Tuesday nights and talked about issues like the fundamental differences between men and women, the different ways in which we hear and express love, and the challenges of meshing differing personality types. There were some 17 couples in the class, married for anywhere from less than a year to nearly thirty, some on second marriages, some with grown kids, some with lots of young kids, some with none. It was surprising how similar our challenges are notwithstanding our differing backgrounds. It's been amusing to note people's reaction when I tell them we're attending a marriage seminar or retreat. Many assume that we must be experiencing some sort of crisis in order to take such measures. In truth, we were there in hopes of making a good marriage better.

The retreat was held at a Methodist conference and retreat center called "Simpsonwood" outside of Atlanta. It's a beautiful 400-acre site that runs along the banks of the Chattahoochee River.

On Friday afternoon the schedule allowed for a few hours of free time, and my wife and I used some of that time to take a run together along the Simpsonwood trails. It's been a late leaf season this year, and this past weekend was the height of color. It was as if God reserved his palate for a weekend when we'd be spending a lot of time outside.

I run quite a bit faster than my wife, which is among the several reasons that we rarely run together. But I wisely concluded that given the focus of the weekend, I could afford to let my wife take the lead and set the pace so that we could stay together. The main trail was marked with white blazes, but at several intersections with other trails the blazes were strangely absent. We would pause, discuss the best route, and push forward. Sometimes we were right, but a few times we ran for several minutes before concluding we were headed in the wrong direction, so we'd backtrack, chose the next most obvious route and press ahead. After a few such wrong turns, we'd lost all sense of how long we would be running, or how long it would take for us to make it make to the room. More than once, we found ourselves covering ground we thought we'd already put behind us, twice passing a chapel that served as one of the few manmade landmarks along the way.

Wrong turns and backtracking normally frustrate me, but this time I didn't care. We had time, it was a beautiful day, and I wasn't alone. I knew that somehow or another we'd make it back. We spent a lot of the time talking about our marriage and the other marriages represented on the retreat, about our kids, our goals and more mundane things like our plan for our oldest son's birthday party the next day. It was a pleasant run. It was a great run, in fact. I have no idea how far we went, and even lost track of how long we ran, but we ran the whole way together, and I was disappointed when we suddenly emerged from the woods and found ourselves back at the dormitory.

Our run was like living out an overly obvious allegory. We had to pace ourselves because we really didn't know how long we'd have to run. We took time to enjoy the natural beauty around us. We didn't get too worried, we cooperated in our decision-making, we never blamed if the chosen path proved to be incorrect. I enjoyed even the wrong turns because I was with her. In fact, as long as I was with her, they weren't wrong turns at all, because she's the one I was ultimately after.

My life is full of "wrong turns", but with a different perspective I suspect that I could receive them more like the ones that I experienced on Friday. The key is to remember what I'm running after.

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Can I Do It?

Posted by Stephen Peterson Nov 12, 2007

Saturday was my younger son's 5^th birthday. My wife has a tremendous ability to turn even the most mundane of occasions into an event, and so when a birthday rolls around, it's Katie bar the door, we're going to have a party. In addition to the obligatory cake, streamers and invitations, there are elaborate crafts and themes and games that I'm sure both our children and their guests will remember forever. It takes a lot of planning and a lot of work to pull off, so we all woke up Saturday morning giddy with anticipation.

Giddiness quickly turned into concern when my wife informed me that our son didn't seem to be feeling well. I went to see him, and he was lying on the floor, lethargic and a little pale. He wasn't acting much like the birthday boy. Still, the invitations were out, guests were coming, and the birthday train was in motion so we kept trying to convince ourselves that he was okay. "He's probably just tired." "He was up late because he was excited about the party." We were doing a pretty good job of self-delusion until he walked into the kitchen, his eyes bugged out wide, and he emptied his stomach onto the floor. At least he hit the hardwood and not the carpet. My wife went immediately for the phone, and I went for the paper towels. There would be no party on Saturday.

There was a lot of crying, but once that ended we had a muted celebration near the couch that we've designated for sick children (we have far too much use for that couch). He unwrapped a couple of presents with a stainless steel bowl close by just in case. We set him up with a super-hero DVD and found ourselves with a suddenly free morning and afternoon, so I decided to go for a run.

I rarely have as much time as I want to run, so I decided to go further than usual. The longest race I've ever run is a 10K, so I haven't had much need to try longer distances. Back on my birthday in September, I decided to push it a little further just to prove to myself that I was in better shape at 38 than I was at 22 and I ran 7.2 miles. The unconventional distance is due to my most convenient training loop being 2.4 miles (for the math-impaired 2.4 x 3 = 7.2).

So, on Saturday, I decided to see if I could push it further. People who know what they're doing seem to suggest adding distance incrementally, but I decided to see if I could tack on another full loop and go 9.6 miles. I felt surprisingly strong, and even after the 9.6 miles I felt like I could go further. I have been planning to run the Atlanta ING half marathon in March, but during my last loop I started to wonder - can I do the full? Do I have the time? Am I too old to run my first marathon? I'm not yet decided, but I'm starting to lean toward it. A marathon has always seemed liked something that other people do. But I used to feel the same way about 10k's and sprint triathlons. Maybe it's the right time.

Our son got better. In fact, he seemed fine by the time the afternoon rolled around. We rescheduled for Sunday afternoon, and most folks were still able to show. The theme was a super hero training program, and all the kids wore their favorite super hero costume. I explained to the kids that not everyone was fortunate enough to be born with a beneficial genetic mutation, be bitten by a radioactive spider, or exposed to excessive gamma rays. Some of us have to train if we want to become super heroes. I explained that a super hero needs four primary attributes in order to succeed: (1) Speed, (2) Strength, (3) Agility, and (4) A genius-level aptitude in the natural sciences. Because we only had 90 minutes, we focused on the first three.

I set up a relay race, some mock heavy lifting and an obstacle course. The climax was my story about "Dr. Villain" who was denied a party on his 5^th birthday long ago and has now devoted his life to stealing birthday cakes from little boys. There was some skepticism, and a few guests pointed out that they had been to several 5-year-old birthday parties without the appearance of Dr. Villain. I explained that Dr. Villain was no Santa Claus, so he couldn't be expected to appear at every 5-year-old's party. Then I excused myself to have a meeting with the commissioner.

Much to the delight, if not surprise, of my son and his guests, Dr. Villain did appear. He was dressed in black, complete with the bad guy mask. The newly trained super heroes pummeled Dr. Villain with plasma-powered pulsar bombs until he finally relented and fled the scene. He might have fled a little faster, except he was still a little sore from his 9.6 mile run.

Kids are funny. After I had changed back into my civilian apparel, several of them approached me and said, "That was you... I know that was you....That was you, wasn't it?"

The party was a day late, but a tremendous success, as measured by the smile on my son's face. And that's the measure that counts.

As for Dr. Villain, he wasn't born with any super powers, or even an above-average level of athleticism, so if he wants to pull off this marathon, he's got some training to do. I just hope that he uses his power for good.

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Trapped

Posted by Stephen Peterson Nov 6, 2007

I was a backpacker more than twenty years before I ever entertained the possibility of competing in a triathlon. I was about 13 the first time I strapped two days' worth of food and gear to my back and entered a forest devoid of automobiles, telephones or any responsibility beyond walking to the next spot and preparing my next meal. When I was 16, I spent two weeks backpacking through the gorgeous and immense Philmont Scout Ranch in northern New Mexico where for the first time in my life I saw snow-capped mountains in the summer and ascended to elevations of over 11,000 feet. It was quite an experience for a kid who grew up in the East. Through high school and college my interest became a passion and grew into a need. Every so often, I feel the compelling call to pack my gear, gather some friends, and head into the woods. It's become part of my DNA.

Somewhere along the line it's gotten a lot harder to do. Not physically, but logistically. I often work well into my Friday evenings, attend my kids' sports events on Saturday, have church responsibilities on Sunday, and then enter back into the fray on Monday morning. Most years I still manage a couple of trips into the woods, but it just keeps getting harder. And this year, for the first year I can remember, it doesn't look like I am going to make it at all. I had the trip to the Len Foote Inn that I described in an earlier post, but I'm talking about real backpacking, the kind of trip where there are no beds, no one to prepare my food and no permanent walls separating me from the elements.

(Memories from trips past - the Shining Rock area of North Carolina. Again, I'm the good looking one.)

One of the many things that initially attracted me to my wife was that she'd spent the summer before I met her backpacking in Montana. I hadn't encountered a lot of gorgeous backpackers before I met her, and within 4 months after our first date I popped the question. My gift to her on her 24th birthday was a cold weather sleeping bag, and we spent our first Labor Day weekend as a married couple trekking through the North Georgia Mountains. Then kids came, and now her equipment hangs sadly unused in the basement. We often speak of that evasive "someday" when we'll hike the AT together.

Several of my like-minded friends have organized and invited me on trips this fall, but my schedule does not permit. Today I sit in my glass cage looking out over the heavily wooded city of Atlanta, yearning to get to the mountains beyond.

There's almost nothing about the experience that I don't like -finding a map and planning a route, the obligatory trip to REI to sample new gear and buy high-tech food, driving with friends to the trailhead, the sound of my MSR Pocket Rocket firing up to boil water after the first days' hike. Many of my most profound and enduring memories come from the trail - reclining against a tree during a hundred beautiful sunsets, watching in horror and amusement as a taller-than-expected bear stood up and grabbed our bear bag and helped himself to our food, coming uncomfortably close to death during a surprise spring snowstorm without winter gear.

The experience can be primal and perspective-shaping, pushing me down into the "physiological" level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Instead of worrying about whether my 401K investment selections will perform, I'm wondering whether I'll find water before the next camp. For some, that would be stressful. For me, it's a rebirth.

But for this year I'll just have to remember adventures past and start planning for the next trip before another year passes without my waking to the smell of damp leaves and wood smoke, miles away from the nearest artificial thing.