Post 1

For close to a decade, I maintained a blog about running (and fitness and wellness generally). But for the past several years it seemed I was writing more about injuries than activities. And this past year I chronicled my foot surgeries, which was a sort of breaking point (no pun intended ... well, maybe) in my running career, a time when I'd be forced to press pause for at least six months, more if I wanted to be extra cautious. And while I plan to be back on the pavement very soon, I'm not yet sure how much, how far, how fast I’ll be able to run. These are answers I'll only arrive at over time.

Why, then, at this moment, would I abandon that blog? I think I recognized the tenuousness of running in particular, and of bodies and sports more generally. My challenges over the years with trying to remain staunchly dedicated to a single activity caused me to feel disappointed and discouraged each time I was sidelined from that activity. And although that adversity led me to other things to focus my attention on, like swimming, biking, yoga, I didn't want to wrap my identity up in those things, too, the way I had with running. Because once you lose the one major thing you think defines you, you truly are lost. Your social life, if it is tied to that thing, as mine was, changes; your sense of accomplishment and pride falters; your body perception, if it is also wrapped up in that thing, as mine was, is warped; your purpose in life becomes questionable.

So I struggled in the last few years of writing that blog—struggled to find new meaning for myself, to make myself relevant in a world where relevance for mid-thirty-year-olds was defined by things I did not have: marriage (or any relationship that could have possibly led me there), children, career fulfillment, meaningful social contribution. I worked on self-development and improvement, branching out into swimming and biking athletically and trying piano lessons and grad school for personal gratification (everything stuck except the piano lessons).

In trying to decide what to focus my next blog on, I wanted to choose something that wouldn't be too restrictive (lesson learned) but that still said something about me, who I essentially am. Well, I am an editor by trade, and while there is no guarantee that will always be the case, the personality trait that led me to editing—perfectionism—will always be an inherent part of me, for better or worse. As a recovering perfectionist, I’ve had to accept that perfect doesn’t exist, and life cannot be edited. So this will be the space where I allow myself to write about the areas and experiences in my life that perhaps aren't what I expected or wanted them to be—the ugly, the awkward, the uncomfortable, but the very real. Occasionally I’ll even write about the positive! Here I will write my life without edits.