Skip to main content

Smiley faces, gold stars and achievement

Day six of my daily Wii-Fit routine.  (Well. actually day five since I had to miss Saturday for Delaney's singing competition at Western Michigan University where I had to schlep from the parking ramp to the music building and back a few times which felt like exercise enough so that by the time I got home, I was too tired to Wii).

I enjoy some of the activities or exercises more than others - including the marching band, Kung Fu and boxing. If you're not familiar with Wii Fit, I'm sure it sounds fairly lame and not much of an 'exercise'. But for someone who is way out of shape, it's a start and kind of fun! For the marching band, I imagine the high school band director, Andrew Holtz, snickering as I often march out of rhythm. And I remember Matthew laughing at me (not with) when he saw me doing the Kung Fu and John did the same when he saw me boxing. I now do Wii in the privacy of the basement when no one is around so I don't have any more memories of inciting laughter!

I must confess to being secretly thrilled, however, when I receive the highest score (where I receive a gold crown) and the compliments of my Wii trainer! It is a lot like the smiley faces and gold stars we receive in elementary school for a job well done!


I am looking forward to reaching that three-week mark when research has proven that a new activity becomes a routine. There was a time when I exercised daily or nearly every day - I remember the feeling and that's what I want to get back to - that feeling of needing and loving the work out. Only 15 more days!

Comments

It's not a popularity contest, but ...

The meaning of success and how

I sat down to write today about being cast/boot free. It is a joy to be back to my 'normal' state of mobility - which is to say that I stumble and totter like a drunken sailor but at least now I'm not wearing a big black boot. Ahoy matey! But instead, I came across the above quote and being easily distracted, I began to think about it instead. (Heck, I'm tired of the damn cast and don't want to waste anymore time thinking or writing about it anyway.) It's a quote my Aunt Bonnie first introduced me too when I graduated from high school and it's come on my radar many times since then, but today for some reason it has given me pause. I laugh often, to be sure. I'm like the uncle in Mary Poppins - I love to laugh. I surround myself with people that make me smile and laugh and am grateful for a husband that still knows how to make me laugh. I'm not to sure about winning the respect of intelligent people, though. I tend to think out of the box and...

The "I'll Nevers" of growing older

  Years ago as a freelance writer, I submitted an essay entitled "The I'll Nevers of Parenting". It was a list, mostly, of things I had said prior to having children and the crow I was then eating because of the stupidity of the claims. You know little pearls of 'wisdom' that only someone who hasn't experienced the joys of  parenting could utter, like: I will never yell at my child in public or I will never let my child eat dinner in front of the television or my children will never stay up past 9 pm. I yelled at my children (usually when we were both tired and totally irrational!) in public. One time, as we were in the drop off lane at school with a long line of cars behind us, the boys hoped out of the car but Delaney was insisting on something that for the life of me I cannot recall and I was insisting that she get out of the van. We crept along, van door still open, until I got to the end of the line and yelled at the top of my voice, "Delaney get the...

Sick in St. Louis and Earthquakes in Michigan. What?

A 4.2 magnitude earthquake rattled our home a few weeks ago. Now if we lived in California (or even Oklahoma!) that would be almost commonplace but we live in Michigan where an earthquake is earth shattering, not because of the resulting damage (aside from a few funny Facebook pictures of toppled lawn furniture, I didn't witness any damage) but because earthquakes in Michigan almost never happen. Or at least ones that are felt by the average person. Or even me!  That earthquake was just the beginning of strange events, for this not-so-average person.  The day after Michigan shook, John and I went to St. Louis to see Delaney's end of freshman year performance.  One of the last times John had been to St. Louis together, was in August when he'd had his heart attack. We had dropped our daughter and a van full of belongings in sweltering heat and humidity. It was the first day of a planned two-day orientation and and the following day was the official good bye. John hadn...