Off to Paradise

The rains here have stopped, delaying us only a day. We're off to my favorite place on earth for a few days of camping in heaven. Mountain pine forests, wilderness trails, endless stars at night, and one of the world's clearest lakes to swim in. I've packed my trail running shoes and my wetsuit. The visibility is 100 feet, when you're swimming there it's like swimming in glass.

I wish you all a wonderful week in these last days of summer. Doesn't it seem like you enjoy them more at this time of the year? They're coming to a close, it's bittersweet. You can hear the cricket's mournful song, and feel a tang in the air in the mornings that wasn't there a week or so ago. My heart always pulls me out into nature in September. I know the rains are coming and the seasons will go 'round again.

It's a Dangerous and Beautiful World Out There

First the good news: the fall weather here has been extraordinarily beautiful, and despite the fact that my first couple of runs (after not running for a month) totally sucked, now it feels great and I knocked off a 7.5 miler this weekend pretty easily. So I'm signing up for a spring half-marathon with good confidence (barring any more injuries) that I'll have a healthy running season.

The bad news: I've had two brushes with serious danger in the last couple of days. The first, I was biking home from a volleyball game with hubby at night. He was a good hundred feet in front of me when I was passed by a car, as it turns out driven by a drunk who then proceeded to swing entirely across the bike lane, up onto the sidewalk, narrowly avoid a power pole on the sidewalk, back down onto the road and drive off. Only some very quick braking by me kept me from total annhilation. As a mom of young kids, this is the kind of thing that scares me when I get on a bicycle (especially at night).

Then yesterday while out running I was chased by a pit bull. I had to turn around and confront it (knowing that continuing to run would probably make it chase me down) and while it snapped its immense jaws in front of my face, I sternly held up a finger and said "NO! Bad Dog!", hoping fervently I was sounding like its owner, and dialing 9-1-1 with my free hand. Now I'm not one to point fingers at any one breed, after all the only dog I've ever been bit by while running was a standard poodle, but there's something about the very large and powerful jaws and teeth of a pit bull that are, well pretty darned intimidating! Fortunately, all's well that ends well. The owner turned up, the police turned up, the dog had escaped out of the owner's house by opening the front door (they lived on a busy street, so there's no way the owner wanted the dog running out into the street like that anyways). I was not eaten alive by the big doggy. But again, it makes me realize that running and biking are among the two more dangerous things you can do in this world. Skydiving, cave spelunking, underwater welding, these things have got nothing on just using our American sidewalks and bike lanes!

So I hope you all are getting to enjoy the beautiful autumn, and be safe out there!

Annual Adventures at Waldo

This will most likely be one of the few blog posts I manage to scribble before we leave for Italy next Saturday (OMG!) The number of details rattling in my brain is mind-boggling, but we managed to still throw our camping gear in the van and make it up to our favorite lake for Mackenzie's 12th (simply not possible...he's twelve???) birthday. The thing he most wanted to do was to camp at a lake and go kayaking. So we met my mom and a bunch of friends up at Waldo Lake and broke out some s'mores to celebrate. At 4:14 in the afternoon, he became a 12 year old on the shore of the lake.

As soon as we got settled in at camp and tromped down to the water's edge, I could feel the water pulling at me like some kind of crazy addiction. I couldn't just NOT get in. Good thing I brought my wetsuit, Waldo Lake is cold and clear as glass. Last year when we camped here I went for a short swim, but without a wetsuit I couldn't go very far out past the shallows where it's (relatively) warmer. This year Mackenzie kayaked with me while I swam out and around an island over much deeper water. What a trip, it was like hovering over a canyon as the water got deeper, yet was still almost as clear as the air, and the bottom fell farther and farther beneath us. The only thing I've ever felt like that before was wall diving on coral reefs in some extremely good visibility, where you just sort of float out over the abyss.

One advantage to the wetsuit that I've recently discovered is that if I just keep it on, I can stay in such freezing water and play with the kids (who are seemingly immune to the cold). So I kept my wetsuit on for about three hours and alternately swam with the kids and did laps around the island with either Mackenzie or my mom in the kayak with me. As is the case every time I end up at Waldo Lake, I feel supremely blessed to be in one of the world's most beautiful places. Here's a pic of my mom in her kayak. You can see the wonderful clarity of the water, and her adventurous spirit. She's such a great pal!


While at Waldo, a friend of mine took me mountain biking. I hadn't been in a very long time and honestly, I'm a total scaredy cat when it comes to stuff like that. So I was Very Very Brave and went out on this rooty rocky trail with her that goes around the lake (I'm sure to a dedicated single-tracker this trail would be child's play, but it intimidated me). I think it's a good idea to jump out of our personal comfort zones every so often, at least that's what I tried to tell myself as I bumped and ground over the obstacles. But I have to admit that after about an hour I really relaxed into it and was enjoying myself, not to mention shouting "wheeeee!" when I managed to make it over a particularly challenging (to me) rocky bit.

I'm also pushing my comfort zone in a completely different way these days. Mackenzie is growing up, becoming independent, doing things like paddling away from me into the lake by himself. It gives me new appreciation for my mom and her fussing over me whenever she sees me swimming in open water. It's hard to let your kids go, even when it's something you know they love to do. And truthfully, there were times when I never thought I'd see the day where my son was so independent in this way. I mean, this is the kid who was so freaked out he wouldn't get on the Storybook Boats at Disneyland. They were "too tippy" and he totally wigged out and we left that ride when he was little. And now he jumps in a kayak and paddles out into this deep deep lake? Parenthood freaks me the heck out sometimes. But at the same time I'm totally thrilled for him, this amazing creature that I get to call my son.

In any case, it was a lovely weekend, followed by a more traditional birthday party once we returned to town. My sis and brother-in-law came down for a few days and we all had a great time. I was glad that we squeezed in those couple of lovely days at the lake though, a fall tradition that I wouldn't have wanted to miss.