It must really be springtime in Sunnyside: high school track season has begun, and both the wind and the dogs are on the move. We had more days with strong winds than not this week, which made track practice a blustery exercise in maintaining a positive core body temperature. Even though I was chilled at windy track practices, the actual temperatures were mild: high 50s to mid-60s. A side effect of the warmer weather is that dog owners leave their pets outside. More of my runs than not were invaded by dogs this week, which made me alternately scared and angry. Seriously, the dog situation out in our corner of the countryside is annoying at best, terrifying at worst.
Sunday, March 2nd we had the local family members over for dinner, for a total of 6 adults and 7 kids. I made sausage white beans and cornbread, and there was only one small bowl of beans and 2 tiny pieces of cornbread left after dinner: everyone liked it and ate their fill! That's always a satisfying feeling for me as the cook. We used our real washable dishes at the family gathering for the first time in forever, and when I saw the mountain of bowls, plates, and cups left after the dinner, I thought maybe paper plates would be the way to go in the future. Jeff and I did the dishes together pretty quickly, so it wasn't that big of a deal, but that counter full of dirty dishes from one meal was a rather daunting sight.
Monday, March 3rd was the first day of high school track practice! Jeff began his fourth season as head coach. 130 kids signed up, and about 100 came to practice on the first day! I was overjoyed to see that TEN of the fourteen 8th graders that were on my middle school track team last year joined the high school track team this year as freshmen!!!! 71%!! That's some seriously glorious retention right there! Year by year, day by day, I am forging that pipeline! It felt so amazing to recognize all of those freshmen at high school practice and have them come up to me for a hug. Possibly the most rewarding part of coaching middle school track is when they decide to join high school track. Makes me feel like I did something right!
Seven kids ended up joining the high school team after my first year of coaching middle school track, but only one of them was not a member of our ward. This time around, only one of the ten freshmen who joined the high school team was a member of our ward. Ok, I'm so glad I decided to look up these numbers for this post because it's making me feel pretty happy. We still have one week before middle school track practice started, and Rose told me that seven kids at school have all asked her when track season starts. I even had two 8th graders come up to me and ask that same question when I was at the middle school for Rose's orchestra concert this week. The MOMENTUM begins.
I attended high school track practice all week as a volunteer assistant coach, helping Jeff work with the newcomers, teaching them drills and various event skills, and helping filter them into different event groups. I was pretty anxious on the first day of practice, because only 4 of the 7 paid high school track coaches were returning this season and none of the three open assistant coach positions had been filled. But practice went well and I remembered yet again how fun it is to coach with Jeff.
I joked that this week was like the honeymoon of track season, since Jeff and I got to spend every practice together working with the new kids. Honeymoons are that blissful fun together time at the beginning of a long journey: an apropos description of the first week of track practice. Based on past experience, I keenly felt the long track season hanging over our heads, and that this was the easiest week we were going to have of the whole season. I tried to enjoy it without dreading the attrition of energy deficit that inevitably occurs as the long demanding track season continues. By Friday, we had sorted all 30+ of the new kids into their event groups, so the honeymoon was over. It really was fun while it lasted; this was the most enthusiastic group of newbies we've had so far.
On the home front, I switched fully into "cook dinner in the morning" mode with great success. It felt pretty normal, honestly. I didn't fully transition out of that mode over the past winter, since I was driving swim kids back and forth from the barn to the pool for most of swim season, and since we still had piano lessons on Monday nights and church youth activities on Wednesday nights. Having dinner hot and ready for us when we walk in the door after track practice is an art skill that I am developing better and better each season. It involves morning meal prep no matter how unappealing raw meat is before 8am, heavy crock pot usage, the rice cooker's delay timer function, and also the oven's delay bake setting. It also involves a whole lot of planning. Take notes; I'm sharing trade secrets here!
Rose had an orchestra concert on Tuesday, March 4th. She was a total star! She played 2 songs on the piano as an accompanist: one with the 6th grade orchestra, and one with the 8th grade orchestra. She played two songs on the cello with her 8th grade orchestra. One of those songs was Cellos Ole, wherein the cellos carry the melody the entire time. Rose is one of three cellos in the tiny 14-person 8th grade orchestra, and their section is the strongest in the whole school. They did so well! We were so proud of Rose--we had a cheering section made up of Jeff, me, two grandparents, and three cousins. She said she was pretty nervous and shaky at the piano, but she did so well trying something new. I loved seeing Rose enjoy music so much.
Wednesday, March 5th was a less-windy day at track practice, and I had fun watching Jeff demonstrate some running drills for the new kids because Jeff has very good legs. During church today, I patted Jeff's leg and whispered my appreciation of his nice legs when he flexed his quad under my hand. "I'm not sure I should be telling you that during church, but it's true," I joked. "It's ok, church is a place for truth," Jeff replied, sending me into a fit of shoulder-shaking suppressed church laughter.
Thursday, March 6th was a house cleaning day. I work out with friends in the barn on Thursday mornings at 9am, so I turn on the Roomba vacuum while I'm out there. I also cleaned bathrooms and generally spruced up the house--always satisfying. I have really been enjoying digging into some hard piano music lately. I tend to like and choose piano music that is way above my mostly self-taught level, but that only makes it more satisfying when I see progress! On Thursday, I tested myself by playing straight through an incredibly complex 6 page song after practicing one hard section all week, and I managed to shave almost 2 minutes off of my time! Before, it took 20-24 minutes to play through this hard song, but on Thursday it only took 18 minutes! I think eventually it's only supposed to take like 4 or 5 minutes to play the whole song, so obviously I'm nowhere near finished learning it, but it was still exciting and satisfying to see noticeable progress.
Friday, March 7th was another dog day. We had a quiet unobtrusive stray dog hanging on the fringes of our yard all week, but when I went running on Friday, a large German Shepherd joined me. We have encountered this particular beast before. It thankfully is not mean, but it fits the textbook definition of stupid dog. It was oblivious to where I was and kept zigzagging in front of me, cutting me off over and over while I ran, causing me to dodge and breaking my rhythm every 2 or 3 strides. It would run right behind me some of the time so my heels would clip its chin, tripping me and breaking my stride. I decided to run past a house with two mean dogs that bark and chase me in the street with their hackles raised, so I could hopefully use the German Shepherd as a shield, or maybe even leave it with these other dogs. The stupid coward HID BEHIND ME when the two dogs charged out of their yard. Thanks for nothing! The chasing barking dogs at least stayed a few feet farther away from me than usual when they saw my big wimpy companion, but seriously. Grrr.
Don't even get me started on how the German Shepherd would weave out into the middle of the road, causing oncoming cars to slow down and look at me like "why are you letting your dog run in the middle of the road?" Making me look like a bad dog owner when I was the victim! Argh! I was so fed up with the dumb dog by the time I got home! When the other stray dog in our yard saw me return from my run with the German shepherd at my heels, it gave me such a reproachful look of betrayal. Then it trotted off across the street and I haven't seen it since. Unfortunately, the German Shepherd has been hanging out in our yard ever since. It sticks its nasty wet nose up my butt whenever I walk outside, it licks my legs, it tries to get into our garage, and is generally a disgusting nuisance that I have no power to control. It has no collar. Jeff thinks it lives down the canal a ways from us, and I think it's been going home to eat because it is just as spunky as ever and I even saw it trotting along the canal road back towards our house this morning. Yesterday I tried sneaking out the front door of our house for a run, but the dumb dog heard me all the way from the back yard and goosed me from behind with its nasty nose. I yelled and kicked its face, then went back inside, got my car keys, and drove into town so I could run without the annoying beast tripping me up.
Saturday, March 8th was the 4th Annual Red and Black Trials: Jeff's fancy name for the high school track team time trials that they did for practice. Jeff started doing this so he could practice setting up the automatic timing system each season, and make sure all of the equipment works. The intra squad time trial had 6 track events and 6 field events. Our trio was back in business: Jeff as head timer, Dan Winger as starter, and me as clerk. It was only a 2 hour event (plus setup and cleanup time equaled out to close to four hours total at the track), and it was only our team, so it was low key and fun, though still plenty tiring. Jay was dealing with an ankle issue all week and wasn't ready to race, but Rose jumped into the longest event of the day, the 2000 meter race (5 laps of the track--we did unofficial jamboree distances, not official track race distances). Rose was happy with her performance. She ran a 7:05 mile and did the five laps in 8:03. A good starting point for her 8th grade track season.
After watching all of those kids run, I was in the mood to run a mile for time myself! But we were starving and ready to go home at 1:30pm after cleaning up the time trial, so I drove the kids home. I ate a snack and then drove back into town for a run on the bike path (to avoid the German Shepherd dog). I was torn between doing a one mile time trial and a longer run, so I ended up doing both: I ran 7 miles on the bike path, but sped up during mile 6 to see how fast I could do it at that point in the run. I only managed a 6:53, but I was happy with that because I knew it was all I had in me after the long morning working at the track.
Jeff took a school van full of kids (including Rose) to the running shoe store in the Tri Cities, and came home with seven pairs of running shoes. He always buys several pairs of shoes to have on hand for kids to purchase from him for equal to or less than what he paid for them, because not all kids who need shoes are able to get to the shoe store and/or afford good shoes. The owner of the running shoe store is super nice and always gives our team a discount when Jeff brings kids in. Jeff also found shoes for both Rose and Jay during this outing. When Jeff told me "I spent about $500 today," I chuckled to myself that everyone has their "expensive thing" that they will always be happy to spend money on. My weakness is merino wool apparel. Jeff's is running shoes--but not just for himself, for anyone and everyone! Haha. I love my husband.
1 comment:
Church laughter!😄😄😄
Sweet flaming shoes!
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