Cemetery Runs

So this morning was absolutely beautiful, cool, and breezy in the Chicagoland area. Not to far from me stands the Free Sons of Israel Cemetery, I walked over and went for a light jog. The graves and memorial buildings are eerily beautiful. I think I’ll be making this a regular place for running, especially when I need to just think.  Here are a few pictures I took on the way back (more to be uploaded to my panoramio as they come) :

          

Being there made me think of my dad, and just how many of actually fallen asleep in death. It makes me wonder who these people were, and what kind of lives did they live, and what about their families now, at this exact moment, does anybody even miss them now that they are gone?  I can’t wait for the beautiful prospect our Father has given. (John 5:28, 29)  I also noticed that a few of the graves reference the “book of life” since it’s a Jewish cemetery, I wonder what that means to them exactly?

Runners Update:

I’m still at 2 miles, I think, duh! I really need to invest in something that tracks my timing and distance a little better. I can tell I’m getting stronger though, I don’t feel like my heart is going to immediately jump out of my chest and punch me in the throat after a running interval anymore. My goal is to increase my running intervals to minutes vs. 30 sec spurts.

Oh and thanks to eating A LOT better I’ve lost 3 more lbs. Yea me!

Take Care Readers, why? Because YOU ARE MADE OF AWESOME! 🙂

The Fear of Running While Fat

Today made a post to my MYFITNESSPAL blog and I can not believe the response I received.  It overwhelmingly made my day. I’m reposting it here.

I’ve been struggling emotionally lately trying to express what trying to lose over 100lbs feels like and I think that sharing my journey with words may be exactly what I need, and hopefully inspire others.

So welcome! Read on for my first steps.

So I’ve read all I can about running.  I woke up this morning and it was drizzling, for a split second I thought about going back to bed but I had spent half of my night reading blogs about being a plus side runner and looking for information on how to overcome my fear. I got dressed.  Black tee, Black leggings–because god forbid I run in a pair of shorts, and then a hoodie.

I stretched, put on my Pandora workout station and started in for my first six minutes of walking and when the time came I…….kept walking. I wanted to lift my legs and become a “penguin” ( a penguin is the name for slow runners). This went on for 25 minutes, I was really enjoying the walk itself, the music was perfect, but cars kept driving by or people were on the street and I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

But then I saw a mom and daughter walking to the bus stop. The girl looked like she was maybe a high school teen, and she was pretty large, dare I even say my size?? And I could tell that the short walk she was taking was really difficult for her. For some reason that was all I needed.

That was the moment, I knew right then and there it didn’t matter what anybody thought the reason I was doing this is because I don’t want to struggle to breath when I walk to the bus stop, because darn’t  I have the strength to run, so I should run! Because I need to do SOMETHING to control my emotions and find a release.  I NEED TO RUN!So I cut through an alley, walked it halfway and then ran the rest.

I couldn’t believe it!  I had just ran, and then I ran a little more, and then my fear of all fears happened. A car literally stopped in the middle of the street and watched me. I stopped in my tracks, but engaged full power walk status. I was a little mortified but I’m happy it happened because I lived through it AND  I didn’t die. I did a rest walk and tried again, and I’ll  keep doing it tommorow!!

I cannot explain the range of emotions that I had this morning, and though I probably only ran for a total of maybe 2 minutes. I ran, and I ran outside and in front of people darnit and I feel great!