Category: activity

Pain of My Own Choosing

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Today my hands hurt, pretty much all the time, but especially when I use them for anything more than typing. I can’t be certain of the reason, but am fairly sure it’s because of the bike ride I took yesterday.

It was a relaxed ride because I went by myself. I almost prefer going alone so I don’t have to be embarrassed by all the times I stop to take pictures or just look around the forest (or walk up a hill that simply requires too much of me).

The bike paths are well engineered but they are not meant to be smooth like pavement. There are rocks and roots, hairpin curves, sand traps, small ups and downs put there on purpose to make the ride interesting. It’s supposed to be different from road biking, and it is. On some of the hills I’m tempted to brake because I know there’s a curve at the bottom. But there’s also the reality that the “downs” help you when it’s time to go up again. There’s a rhythm established that it’s best not to break (or to brake). Steering is also complicated because it’s not as simple as just missing objects in your path. You also have to miss them without getting unbalanced. Often I can’t do both and have to decide to hit the rock and go over it. All this leads, without intention, to a death grip on the handle bars the whole time I’m riding. I choose to do this.

Pain tells me I’m alive (as long as it’s not too bad). Bike rides take me to places that I love to see and give me a sense of freedom. Bike rides give me lots of cool pictures in my phone. Bike rides give me an excuse to give my hands a rest on the following day. I hurt, but it’s pain of my own choosing and comes with its own weird satisfaction.

Here are some of my cool pics from yesterday – which, by the way, was an excellent day.

The path goes around this lovely marsh
This creek winds through the property
This bridge crosses the creek and goes back into the woods. Trails are on both sides of the creek.
A relatively smooth part of the trail. I’m too busy on the curves to take pictures of them.
Riding bike through the woods is a singular experience.
Trails like this are all over our north Wisconsin area making it a destination for fat tire biking. BTW, good thing there is a hospital nearby…

White and Cold

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

This morning the snowplows were running before daylight, when it’s still kind of hard to see where you’re plowing. I shoveled myself out and had coffee with Mom. My brother got off his snowblower long enough to join us and then went back to work.

But the sun did come out. Walking outside seemed a possibility and I did have some things to deliver at our church, which is only about a mile away. I put on every possible winter layer, including a mask which, for once, was a help, not an aggravation. There was a breeze which was chilly when I was walking into it. Our temp was about 5 degrees F.

I stomped into the church with frost on my eyebrows and semi-numb feet. I didn’t realize that I had arrived at the same time as the work party for the coming Christmas Eve event. By the time I delivered my envelopes to the office I had also been given a job. I had nothing better to do so I put up lights, erected a wooden menagerie of animals, and carried decorations here and there. Every time I took off my mittens, even for a few seconds, I was amazed at how fast the cold became painful.

Can you imagine celebrating Christmas Eve outside when it’s below zero weather? Blame COVID for that.

By the time I set out for home, my feet were more like blocks of ice but I hadn’t gotten my steps in for the day. Hitching a ride was out of the question. I knew I could make it, and I did, but it was the fastest section of my walk for the day. My app said I was walking 5.5 miles per hour at one point, but that would be more like running so I think it must be wrong. All I could think about was getting warm again… fireplace, hot drink, my “blankie”.

It is beautiful after a snow, and I did snap a few pictures because I couldn’t not do that. (There are times when nothing says it better than a double negative.)

I might rest tomorrow instead of taking a walk. It’s supposed to be even colder. Just sayin’… May you all find a blessing in your Christmas celebration.

My view right out my front door. Clean, white, and cold, very cold.

On Riverside Drive

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Yesterday’s steps were finished in the late afternoon. Today’s steps will be done this evening. I have already taken a long walk outside, in the cold, with fresh snow underfoot, so 8,000 steps are already accomplished.

Walking outside is much superior to walking on the treadmill (if I’ve said it once, I’ve said it more than once…). I am always stopping to look at something beautiful and hearing the “workout paused” remark, then “workout resumed” as I walk again. I’d prefer having a whole body along for the walk but a voice is better than nothing. I could mute it but sometimes it’s just nice to hear that my app is tracking me.

The walk today was a circle mostly done along the highway and small residential roads. Riverside Drive winds along the Namekagon River and has some remnants of tall pine plantation on either side with rustic looking homes tucked in here and there. I look at the ground a lot when I’m walking because the footprints are interesting. I measure my prints against the one other walker who has come since the last snow. It was probably a woman – the boot print is narrower than mine – and she had a dog with her. There are lots of rabbit tracks and deer prints as well. Winter walking is interesting when I look into the woods as well. The trees “bones” are laid bare and have lovely composition. Crows, hawks, and woodpeckers give alarm calls and fly away as I get closer than they would like.

An unusual pine. Had to take a picture.
Another “had to take a picture”.

I end up walking along a major highway and cut into the Walmart parking lot. I go in and pick up a prescription for the husband, then finish the walk by circling the store and opening the gate into our residential development.

It’s been a quiet, overcast winter day and the walk was very calming. I had a lot of time to think and pray.

Afraid

Shirleyjdietz1 Comment

I was actually afraid I was going to lose momentum if I slacked off a day. I want being active to be so natural, desirable, and easy that I don’t have to struggle. But it’s hard. To be specific, it’s getting easier physically but harder mentally.

But this is today on the treadmill. I’m back.
And this is Zeb giving me a “high five” for my efforts. Maybe it’s a “high one“ if all you have is a hoof. I don’t know.

There were a couple good suggestions for naming my zebra and I was trying them both on for the right feel. Tonight, I’m finding myself mentally calling him Zeb, which is short for Zebedee. I’m not even thinking hard about it so I guess it’s a natural. He’s responding to it nicely.

Things were weird today. It’s not often that I find over $750 worth of coins that I didn’t expect to find. Okay, it’s never happened before and probably won’t again. I didn’t find it for myself and I know where it belongs, but it’s still crazy and a day to remember.

It was also a day when I got to talk to and look at both my daughters on a ZOOM call. They have interesting lives and are always doing something in their respective areas that keeps me in awe of them. It’s another time when I feel somewhat afraid – thinking about them active in their careers, still having much of life ahead of them and remembering when my life was at that stage. I could be envious of them and afraid of what comes next for me. But being envious and fearful takes far too much energy. I’d rather be proud of my daughters and content with walking into the future with a sense of adventure and God’s favor. I also have things to accomplish.

Unsure whether this philosophizing was worth posting but it was on my mind. I kind of learn who I am by writing my mind and processing as I write. And this is my space to do it, and your space to read and recognize that you’re not alone if you do it too. Just sayin’…

A Less Than Stellar Day

Shirleyjdietz1 Comment
Ooh, that look again! He is not sure he wants to be my cheerleader.

It was not a bad day by any means, except one. It’s 9 pm and I do not feel like getting on the treadmill for an hour. I have only 2,234 steps and I kind of don’t care. I’m going to take this as my day off. I’m into a small rebellion and watched three episodes of Madame Secretary instead of walking, but it was fun. I’ll get back on track tomorrow.

The Least Favored Soup

Shirleyjdietz4 Comments

The Least Favored Soup

They kept coming, wave after wave of people carrying backpacks, looking a bit dazed, numb. They were hungry and they needed food, warm liquid, salt, calories. They had just skied 29K in below freezing temperatures. This was the Kortelopet and Prince Haakon races of the American Birkebeiner. https://www.birkie.com/ski/events/kortelopet/

Our small town hosts this winter event every year in February, unless there is no snow or the temperatures are deadly, rare situations. The number of people in town goes from the usual 2500 to 40,000 for the two days of races. It’s a pretty big deal for people who like snow. It takes nearly the whole town volunteering to pull it off. This is my second year of helping in the food tent, where all the skiers congregate after crossing the finish line.

The International Bridge which all skiers cross to reach the finish. It is erected over the main highway and covered with snow.

My brother is one of the race chiefs, heading up the serving of food and all the volunteers who help him. The menu is simple – soup, bread, bananas, cookies and drinks. The challenge is doing it in a tent, set up on a vacant lot where everything you need has to be brought in by someone. All the soup arrives frozen in gallon bags and has to be thawed before being warmed to serving temperature. It takes a crew of several men to keep filling the warming tanks, opening the bags and emptying them into the cooking pots, then transferring the hot soup to the serving tables inside the tent. All this is done outside.

“I ski the Birkie every year just for the chicken soup,” one man tells me. I don’t believe him, but the soup is really good. Volunteers inside the tent ladle it into serving cups as fast as they can for hours. Chicken noodle soup is the favorite but there is a choice. The tomato vegetable soup was my station and it is also a good one, perhaps a bit more nutritious too. However the chick/noodle is favored two to one.

I’m guessing that the pots are filled with about seven or eight gallons of soup at a time. I emptied seven of them – I can’t even imagine how many servings that was. It helped that I was tall. Scooping into the pot is easy when it’s full but as the level goes down, it gets more difficult to reach the bottom, and messy, especially when doing it fast.

The (least favored) vegetable soup

It was cold in the tent before we started serving the first finishers. The wind would lift the tarps and blow cups and table coverings off our tables. The ground also is frozen and cold, which is why we stand on rubber mats. After we got really busy I forgot all about my feet feeling like frozen blocks of ice. Watching the people come in, young ones, elder ones, men, women from all over the world, all I could think was “why would they want to be this cold and still call it fun?”

We fed over 3,000 today, and this was the smaller of the races. Tomorrow’s crowd will be twice as many. I hope to be there again, serving up the least favored soup, just sayin’…

Day of the Jaeckel

Shirleyjdietz2 Comments

It’s been years since I walked for a cause – the three day, 60 miles breast cancer walk. Today I joined my brother and his wife and a couple hundred other people from our small community to walk a 5k for ALS.

John Jaekel is a Haywardite, former coach and educator at the high school, and friend and neighbor to most everyone he meets. He is also one of the longest survivors of ALS and a spokesperson for the cause all around the state of Wisconsin. The walk was started by his family and other supporters around four years ago and has become a regular event in Hayward.

We met at the Lutheran Church in town where John is a member, and went inside to look at the silent auction items. There is no fee to join the walk, so the auction is the fund raising portion of the morning. There is an online auction as well as the one we saw, and many Hayward businesses and individuals were represented there. I bid on a small piece of furniture. Lumber from the lumber company, 2 months membership at the local gym, hair cuts and beauty supplies, art and specialty food items, and tickets to Packer games(!!!) as well as other creative and tempting offerings were up for bid.

The walk was leisurely, led by John Jaekel himself in his motorized chair. There were parents with small children in wagons and strollers, elderly people being pushed in wheelchairs, and all ages in between. The weather was cooperative, actually could not have been more perfect. I’m not kidding, there were cheerleaders and encouraging signs along the route.

One family walking close to me came from a city 80 miles away to join the walk. They had lost a brother to ALS the year before and knew John through the support network they had been in together. I didn’t get to talk to John but it was clear that he was a beloved member of the community and had been successful in stirring people to action. One of the signs along the route pointed out that the purpose of the walk was to make sure that someday there wouldn’t have to be any walks. Research toward a cure is the goal.

At the end of the walk, volunteers at the church had breakfast ready for all the walkers. Someone had upped the ante on my table bid, so I pushed it up a little higher. I didn’t get it but it went for a better price and that was good.

This was a day to walk and talk with others, over a common interest – that of helping people like John Jaekel and others who are battling als. I admire his enthusiasm and dedication, and wish him well. I thank him for bringing our community together around a good cause.

Lake Fest

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Lake Fest

8-4-2019

Do you have a community? I mean a community where people know one another, speak regularly, wave to each other and know who is in your family? I haven’t often observed that type of neighborhood, even in a place I lived for over 20 years.

But then, along came Lake Fest. I had been hearing about it from day one of our time in North Carolina. “Are you staying for Lake Fest?” “They will be pretty busy getting ready for Lake Fest.” “Leave the slip n slide in the truck – it’s for Lake Fest.” I had originally planned to leave before this event, akin to a national holiday, occurred but my curiosity got the better of me. We stayed.

Lake Fest, as I understand it, is the natural outgrowth of a healthy community. It’s neighbors, friends and family who love where they live, love to celebrate summer, and really like being with each other. And who doesn’t love an outdoor, summer party?

Three neighbors with adjoining properties around a small, private lake took it upon themselves to start this event. It is now well on its way to becoming an annual tradition. A block party, with a lake instead of a block. A Saturday afternoon in August with games, water sports, food (food, lots of food), a pool, live music and so many beautiful spots to sit and watch it all that it was hard to decide where to go.

I didn’t kayak the lake – though I wanted to.

I didn’t do the slip ‘n slide – I really wanted to do that, really!

But I had lots of good conversations, enjoyed some good food, listened to great music and decided (unofficially) to photograph the event in order to share it.

Parking could have been a problem, but many people walked.

This neighbor hosted the children’s games and the slip ‘n slide.

Boat rides, tubing, and a jet ski on the lake.

Furry family members were welcome.

“Santa” (not his real name) putting flames to the hot dogs and hamburgers.

Live music!

Dad’s and kids

Keeping cool in the pool

Sharing a drink?

Lots of good “eats”

No one is too young for this party…

No one is too old for this party…

Wondering where his “mama” went…

Relaxing, just relaxing

At the bottom of the slip’n slide.

Have you had an event in your neighborhood to encourage real community? What good things might come from knowing those physically close to you better?