Damn the leg hurts… I was kinda expecting a certain level of pain but not the amount of pain that I’ve been through this past week. Partly because of the pain and partly to get mom off my back that I’m starting PT tomorrow.

“We cross our bridges when we come to them and burn them behind us, with nothing to show for our progress except a memory of the smell of smoke, and a presumption that once our eyes watered.” Tom Stoppard There are so many different things going on right now that I’m scared and don’t know how to deal with. This is going to be both my 2011 in review and my looking forward to 2012 and also a stream of consciousness to make sure I do remember. 2011 Part 1: Georgia Ever since I left California to move to Georgia in 2010 I was very ambivalent about the reasons why I moved. Yes, I needed the change, I needed the challenge, I needed to prove to myself that I could do it. What didn’t dawn on me until I went back to work in January was that it didn’t feel [Read Full Post]

This past weekend has been one of very mixed emotions. I’m psyched for and proud of all my Georgia friends and teammates who completed (or are completing as I write this) Ironman Arizona… It is an awesome accomplishment. I’m also unbelievable bitter that i’m not there completing the event with them… and all because of a broken leg that hasn’t healed the way I expected it to. I asked Drew (my first TNT coach and a good friend since) whether I should push and try to get back in shape for another try with the team here in California. He mentioned my leg not being fully healed as a reason why I shouldn’t try to push this year to do Vineman in 2012 and wait to do a race in 2013. Drew sent me this link: http://www.active.com/triathlon/Articles/Should-You-Do-an-Ironman-Triathlon.htm as an honest gut check regarding whether I should or not. Here is [Read Full Post]

I saw this through a friend on G+ and it just blew my mind and made me think a lot both in terms of truth and lies as well as how can technology help us to lie (or tell the truth) better and how much we delude ourselves by holding on to what we consider to be the truth no matter what the real truth is. That’s why the lyrics of Who Knew by Pink are resonating so much with me right now.

I hate not finishing something I started. I hate it even more when I can’t finish it because my body betrayed me. I hate it the most when I was just recovering and getting ready for the last push when my body decides I’m not gonna do it. I stopped hating the idea that I had to quit what had been the focal point of my life since January when we first committed to the program and that I’ll miss my friends doing it. I got this on an email from a friend and training captain with the team in Georgia. I’m copying it because it’s the motivation I’m looking for and something to remember moving forward. Sooner or later, you start taking yourself seriously. You know when you need a break. You know when you need a rest. You know what to get worked up about and what to [Read Full Post]

I thought I was going to be more reluctant about leaving Georgia and I’m not. Part of me is sad and part of me is really glad to be on the way back to California The part that is sad is going to miss the team and the relationships I built there. It was the one positive of the year in exile: Now I know I can do it and where I need to push harder to get my Ironman goal. It will not be the only Ironman by any stretch of the imagination. I want to do more than one but I have to learn whether I can do it or not, whether the Ironman is the limit I’ve been searching for. The part that doesn’t regret leaving is tired of educational politics. It is sick of how people use employees to the last and then discard them like [Read Full Post]

The more I learn about the reasons why I was fired (no matter how you phrase it and how you point out that I resigned, I did so under duress so it amounts to the same thing in my book) the angrier I get and the more I stand by decision to move back to California, regroup and decide what’s next. Having allowed the termination letter to go forward would have meant that I agreed with the reasons why I was terminated, I most certainly do not. I have no doubt who complained to my chain of command and eventually got me fired. I’m sad that she thought it necessary to lie and distort facts to get her way but it doesn’t surprise me anymore. She’s just as likely to feed me to the lions than to help me and ‘defend’ me (and in the few times when she defended [Read Full Post]