I am?

I had an interesting thing said to me today.

There was a nice little gathering tonight after our first day of inservice at a cute little place in town called the CCC.  The CCC is the Chequamegon Canoe Club- a little bar and restaurant that has good food and occasional local entertainment.  They are pretty cool- an independent bunch who runs the place!

Anyway, we were there as a whole staff and a few of us were standing around chatting and one young elementary teacher was lamenting the fact that her knees hurt right now and she wasn't sure how she was going to handle the race that she was planning to enter soon.  She was discussing pros and cons to a long and a short version of the triathalon she is involved in....  and so she was saying how it is really hard when you expect your body to react in a certain way and how disappointing it is when your body doesn't do what you want----  "you two are both athletes, you know what I mean."

Pause

/Who me?/

" HA that's for sure...." and the conversation continued.

 I tucked that little nugget away for further thought.

Seriously, no one has called me an athlete before- I have gotten a taste of it through weight lifting, I feel like I might do well at that, but for someone to so matter of factly call ME an athlete without qualification is amazing...... and most interesting, she doesn't know me any differently.  She has only known me since I lost weight.

So I guess it is official, right?

It is an interesting thing, this transformation stuff.  There (obviously) are still so many times that I still think the way I always did for so many years.  My brain just doesn't know sometimes that I can walk that far, or climb something or even sometimes make a huge step up or down from one plane to the next- just simple, ordinary things.  I have solved the being able to judge my clothing size problem, but the physical thing is somewhat tougher.  I do get stiff knees and occasionally cuss as I walk down a set of stairs.  But as a rule, I can do what I want, but old old habits and ingrained thoughts are hard to push away.

I am now beyond the weight LOSS transition, and I am into another sort of journey.  I didn't know what goals I was going to have for the year back in January, because I needed this time to change in my mind. I am just beginning to understand that, and a simple matter-of-fact statement - this assumption- helped me realize it.  I have begun wanting to ride a bike, do some more rigorous hiking, continue with my body 'sculpting" such as it is- lol- and branch out a little.  Basically add a little variety.  AND I am SO doing the Dirty Girl Run next year and maybe will get in a color run somewhere too!  Fun!  I feel my focus returning as I tuck away my outdated thoughts and replace them with new knowledge.

And I will do these not so much feeling like I can conquer the world but that I have conquered myself.


And that means I guess I AM!  And athlete?!!   Who knew??

ME!!!

Huh. Well isn't that is a joy!