How's your crow?

Skirt Sports Redemption Shorts First Run--Sweet! 

There's this great scene in the movie Hook where Robin Williams' character, Peter Pan, has grown up and forgotten how to crow. The Lost Boys spend an inordinate amount of time in the film trying to get him to remember how to crow, and when he finally does, he can not only crow but he can fight and fly. 

To extend the metaphor (but not to ally myself with a Disney villain or anything), there's a scene in Disney's new film Descendants where Ursula the sea witch's daughter, Uma, sings a song about her crow--"My crow's as real as it gets!"That line gets me every time. 

Both of these scenes popped into my head today as I was out running in the heat. Peter Pan grows up and forgets how to crow. Then he finds it again. I periodically lose my crow; I beat myself about not getting a run in, and I lose a bit of my swagger. I pay too much attention to my watch, and I beat myself up about running too slowly. I think back on races I ran and the shape I was in. I forget that my crow is the same. 

Lately, when I find myself alone on a run on a back road, and the road is curving up to challenge me, and the wind is nowhere to be found, and the asphalt is giving off heat, and I need a little bit of a push, I crow. Like out loud. Loudly. Sometimes multiple times. I imagine it's not all that unlike Serena Williams' yell at a serve or Robin Williams' crow when he finds it. Shouldn't we all have such a thing? 

Crow on, friends. 

It's been a quiet month in Lake Maxinkuckee... so I #NEVERDID some stuff

Who has two thumbs and hates the snow? This gal. 

It's been a quiet month here. After fifteen months of training using consecutive training programs (half marathon followed by full marathon followed by Dopey Challenge), I took an easy month. I ran a couple of times in the cold, but not in the snow. And it took me a couple of weeks to unpack my bags from Dopey. But it was a quiet month. No pressure. I also was looking for some inspiration. I crossed off something from my bucket list at the beginning of January. I really didn't have any "what's next?" inspiration. Not all who wander are lost, though! 

And then I received the exciting news that I have been named an ambassador for Skirt Sports. I'm a huge fan (although some of my new Skirt Sisters are showing me through their posts that I have to up my Skirt game!) 

Who doesn't love this? 

 One of the best parts of the Skirt Sports mission is that they are a group of strong frickin' women who support one another. It's about the skirts, but it's not about the skirts. So while I was looking for a challenge, I found one at Skirt Sports; I was inspired by a challenge they put out to the ambassadors. 

The #NEVERDO challenge asks that we choose something that we never do and do it. Simple enough? I interpreted it a little differently from perhaps the original intent of the challenge. I kept thinking of how I often remind my students that "sometimes they must do the thing that they don't want to do so that they can do the thing that they want to do." So I picked out a thing I don't ever want to do, and I did it. I ran outside in a snowstorm. Well, on snowy roads after a snowstorm. I have seldom run outside in the last two years if there was snow on the roads because I didn't want to risk injury in my pursuit of Dopey. So off I went! And I didn't hate it. 

And then I did another #NEVERDO. See the picture below: 

Bike on Trainer--My butt never likes this. My brain also never likes this. 

In the last two years, I haven't had my bike on the trainer. And in the summer months, I've mostly been running. I think I may have ridden my bike three or four times total all summer. I was running. So I headed to the basement, and I threw my bike on the trainer, and I watched an episode of The West Wing. And then I did planks! And crunches! And then a pig flew past the window...
not really. But it is a rare, rare thing for me to do anything but run. So maybe I'm turning a corner on this thing...

Because today, I rode again.

What's your #NEVERDO? Gonna do it?