On the Road Again...Again

How many false starts can you abide, honestly?

True confessions time. Since the Great Hip Break of 2014 following my first ever run-all-the-way race (in which I placed 2nd for my age group, by the way), I have been terrified to start walking with any real purpose again. In the back of my mind is the thought that there is no way for me to tell if that thing is really all healed up and ready to do its job again without, you know, frickin' splintering right down the middle again. 

Once or twice after hitting the date at which my orthopedist advised I'd be able to start a very light exercise program again I've laced up and headed out, but my heart just hasn't been in it. At all. And then that winter weather, and a million other reasons that became excuses that became choices that became lifestyle, and here I continued to sit. 

This morning, friends of mine all over the country are running in races, and it is the day of Montgomery's first-ever full marathon. I never aspired to participate in one, even when I was in the best shape, but seeing so many folks I know work so hard to take part made me miss the feeling of beating my most vexacious competitor:  my own fine self. 

This morning I laced up and went out, and while I set no land speed records, I actually did a couple of very light "shuffle jogs" on the way, neither of which created this in the road, but as far as I can tell, my hip is still in whatever number of pieces it's supposed to be in to work the way it's supposed to. 

I don't know if I'll stick with it any better than I have the last several times I went out and came home and swore that I was back in the swing of things, but today felt good, and had its own rewards. 

Found these fellas in the street on my walk this morning. 

Putting the hem in my blessings.

In October of 2011, I wrote about my Mama's unfinished afghan. 

You can read about that by clicking the link under the photograph. 

Unfinished Symphonies

In September of 2014, I wrote about it again.

Follow the link below to read why.

It's a Boy and I'm Not Surprised

What I didn't tell you is that some months back, Ellie Vogt, the mother of my friend Melissa Allen, became aware of this story and volunteered to finish this project for me. I shipped it to her home in Florida, and with great sensitivity to what it represented to me, she undertook to finish it right where it was, adding nothing; no extra length, just enough to work the needles out and make it secure. She shipped it back to me quickly, and I've held it aside until today. 

Our grandson James Henry Lucas was born on January 15, 2015, and he came home today. And then I wrapped him up in the afghan his Great Granny started for him way back in 2011. 

"Hem your blessings with thankfulness so they don't unravel."  Anonymous

*****

Thank you, Ellie. 

Thank you, Mama. 

Thank you, Jackie.

Thank you, God. 

Carl Sandburg might have said it best.

JAMES TAYLOR UPCHURCH, JR. 

"Jimmy"

May 1, 1927 -  December 31, 2014

A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on...Never will a time come when the most marvelous recent invention is as marvelous as a newborn baby. The finest of our precision watches, the most super colossal of our supercargo plants, don't compare with a newborn baby and the number and ingenuity of coils and springs, in the flow and change of chemical solutions, and timing devices and interrelated parts that are irreplaceable. A baby is very modern. Yet it is also the oldest of the ancients. A baby doesn't know he is a hoary and venerable antique--but he is. Before man learned how to make an alphabet, how to make a wheel, how to make a fire, he knew how to make a baby--with the Great help of woman, and his God and Maker.          ~~ Carl Sandburg

JAMES HENRY LUCAS

"Jimmy"

January 15, 2015