New Thoughts

I've started making bottles at the studio.

I've never been really interested in creating that form before, I think because I couldn't figure out how to make it mine. However, at a market a few weeks ago, a fellow vendor mentioned that the rain made her wish she had a flask. I jokingly said I would make her one, and started getting excited about how that would work. Though my bottles aren't quite flask-like yet, the form is really interesting.

This is the first bottle that's been trimmed and altered. What you can't see is that I'm throwing them all bottomless, so I can paddle them into more flat or oblong shapes and add bottoms when they're done.

These are the newest forms. I'm excited! Something new!

Thoughts?

Compression

I think putting compression socks on after each run has completely changed my recovery process. I went for an easy three miler this morning, having given myself a day of recovery. I wore a pair of (I'm not ashamed) mens compression socks that I bought for cheap off of amazon for a while after that run (because I forgot to take them off before going grocery shopping), and the run I had today was easy and fast. Maybe the easiest post-long-run run that I remember. I'm glad this is an easy week, though. I pushed my running last week, and I'm proud of myself.

Source: Amazon.com

Yesterday was my last outdoor craft market (SoWa, for Bostonians) for the season. It was another rainy market, but I think that actually benefits me, at the end of the day. Having done a few rainy markets and a few sunny ones, here's what I've noticed:

• People are a bit friendlier when the weather is bad. Customers are appreciative and maybe even grateful that we, the vendors, have come out at all (this is heightened by there being noticeably few vendors yesterday).
• The perusers who do come out to the market are looking to buy. When the weather is bad, it's not a pleasant window-shopping Sunday stroll around the South End. It's business.
• Vendors are friendlier to each other. There's a bit of a sense that "we're all in this together" amongst vendors, and we share stories, appreciate each others wares, and help each other out. This might also be due to having more time to talk to each other with fewer customers around.

When I did the Bazaar Bizarre Boston last year I didn't talk to anyone except customers until the last forty-five minutes of the market, because I just didn't have time to even look around. For a good four hours of the seven that we were there, we were just ringing up one sale after another.

I'm glad to be done with markets until December. It's time to buckle down and make.

On the schedule for today:

• 9-1, Mudflat, doing work for them (kiln unloading, scraping shelves, loading up again, etc.
• 1-5, Mudflat, doing work for me (trimming, throwing, figuring out how this last glazing went, and what choices to make next time.
• 6:30-8:30, group supervision for art therapy. I'm 10 hours away from fulfilling my requirements to get my ATR (registered art therapist), which would allow me to have more letters after my name. Letters = respect, and potentially more money. 

Let's go.

Developing

Yesterday I ran SEVEN miles, for the first time since my stress fracture. It felt so damn good to rack up the miles. To hear that voice on my mile-tracking app tell me "Seven..Miles..Completed." and to feel like I could keep going. To run on the river again. I missed the feeling of being able to just start running and feel confident that I can keep going.

In other news, I've been logging at least twenty hours a week at my ceramics studio. I've taken a training position there, in that I'm a part of how the studio runs. For example - a typical Monday consists of:

• unloading the glaze kiln (it's a 54 square foot kiln)
• scraping down the kiln shelves (it's my favorite thing to do)
• loading the bisque kiln (careful not to break anything)
• wedging up at least 50 pounds of recycled clay
• four hours of my own work (trimming, throwing new pieces)
• miscellaneous tasks like wiping down empty carts and consolidating shelves and carts

The more time I spend at the studio, the more I want to make it my full time job. I want to document the time I spend at the studio, and working on my art, and see how it develops. Here's some in-process work!

Liner glazes in the mugs, and lots of tiny bowls.

Slow

Several things are developing at once. it's a little overwhelming, so I'll try to map it here.

First of all, back to running, finally. Fits and starts. I started with week 3 of the running 101 podcast, because it added up to 15 minutes of running, which is closer to what my PA recommended. I did my first run on a treadmill, and was bored out of my mind, but curious to watch my form in the mirror. My feet hit on the outside edges. I'm surprised I don't have runner's knee (knock on wood) from my odd form. Since that first run, I walked to work for two consecutive days in my rain boots and did something weird to the tendon on my left foot that connects to my big toe. It would hurt when I pressed on it, and would ache a bit while walking. It hurts more the day after a run, but after a week of walking and very little pain, I ran today. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I moved on to week 4 of running 101. 20 minutes of running total, with minute walking breaks every four minutes. I got so bored I started skipping walking breaks, doing two intervals of 4 minutes, one of 9, and one of 4. Two intervals of 4, and one of 14. When I noticed my foot wasn't feeling better, I took a few days off. Then, over the weekend, I headed to New York City to spend a few days with my mom (she met me there), and walked all over the Village, Soho, Chelsea, Nolita, and then up around the museums. Ate really great food, saw amazing art and a Sunday matinee showing of Death of a Salesman (with Andrew Garfield and Phillip Seymour Hoffman). A pretty stellar weekend, and after a delayed bus ride with no napping, I made it home to S around seven last night.

This morning was my final day of week 4, in which I ran one interval of four minutes, and two of nine minutes. Thursday, (my birthday) I'll start week 5, three intervals of eight minutes. I'm excited. I had hoped to be able to run three miles again by my birthday, but I'm getting there.

Next: clay.
Excitingly, I have six markets this summer and autumn at which to sell my ceramics. So I've been furiously working away at the studio, making mugs and tiny bowls (big sellers) and a few big bowls (for myself and my creative/artistic pursuits). I just got accepted to the SoWa Markets for five Sundays between June and October, which means I need to buy:
* 10'x10' white tent (EZ-UP, preferably)
* (4) 40lb tent weights (and fill them with sand)
* Folding table (because one six foot table under a ten foot tent will look so sad)
* 2 new tablecloths (White? Off-white? Need to make the goods pop)

Finally: work.
S and I are driving cross-country in July, which, there and back with a wedding in the middle, will take the month. When I come back, I will not be staying in the same position here. Whether that means I don't have a job or I do is unclear. That one's still in development. We'll see.

For now, I'm having a birthday on Thursday, and going out to T.W. Food for dinner. My favorite restaurant, and my (I think) 3rd birthday in a row dining there. I hope we get the same table.

X-rays and MRIs

This morning was my follow-up x-ray to see how my stress fracture has healed. I showed up, and my PA showed me images from the MRI. Terrifying. As he pointed out, the bones of my leg and forefoot were black in the MRI image, but the area around my heel was all white due to fluid and inflammation. In an alternate view, the bones were white except for a jagged black line that seemed to separate my heel from the rest of my foot. That, he told me, was the stress fracture. It looked so severe and huge, and reminded me how strange that I wasn't in pain at all when the MRI was done.


So, a quick x-ray was on the docket for today. I was seated on a table and two x-rays were taken, one from the side, and one from the sole of my foot.


Within minutes I was back with my PA, and he was pointing out the white smudgy line indicating that my heel was healing.


"BUT," he said, "It takes 3 months to totally heal. You're looking good, so you can start to walk to work again, but a week or two more on the elliptical is in order, and then you can start running."


So it should look like this: 2 more weeks on the elliptical. Then slowly running a mile, then taking the next day off to see how it feels. Stay at 1 mile runs for a week or two, then increase to 1.5 mile runs.
I'm thinking that I'll start the Running101 podcast from week 4 after a week more on the elliptical, and I'll do it on a treadmill. (refresher: week 4 is four intervals of four minutes running at an easy pace, with recovery walks in between. I'll do the podcast for a few weeks on the treadmill, then switch to outside.


And new shoes. Any suggestions? I pronate slightly, and need extra support for my heels. Thoughts? I'm open to anything.

One week countdown

That run was a mistake. Not that I had any physical repercussions, but that I was not not not supposed to go for it. Later in the morning I got a phone call from my PA, saying "call me back immediately, and don't run." The results were in by 9am, and they were important enough to call first thing. Stress fracture in my left heel. Though there's no pain (and there's been none since, it's only started to heal.

One week until my follow-up x-ray to determine that my heel has healed (the healing is visible in an x-ray, but the fracture is only visible in an MRI). One week until I'm told "good to go" and get back to running, or am delayed even further. It's been more than two months, and I'm pretty sure I've lost all my fitness. The day after my MRI, when I took a two mile run, I felt it in my legs for a few days. And then to be told "don't run, whatever you do." No hiking! No dancing! No jumping! Along with running, those are three of my favorite things! To compensate, I go back to the gym. Yesterday I did some squats and lunges while holding weights, and whoo, my thighs. They hurt.

I miss my running body! As a female with a history of body issues, I really developed a new relationship with my body having run. I appreciated my body more, because this is the body that lets me run. I need it, I take care of it, I love it, and it loves me back by running, and telling me what it can and cannot take. I felt much more connected to my body. Not having run in two-plus months, I'm critical again. I'm thinking about the scale. I'm thinking about food as calories that need to be counted, as opposed to fuel that helps me run and tastes good.

I miss being able to get out there, listen to music and be mindful of the moment. I'm still on the look-out for good running songs, and find my taste in music has changed a lot since starting to run. I want things that have a good beat. That are peppy. I've started to shy away from the sad man with his guitar. Unless it's runable. My standards are flexible. Fleet Foxes are okay for running. My goodness, "Helplessness Blues"? Ran to it. "The Bad in Each Other" off of the new Feist album (not a man, obviously)? Ran to it. But oh, the newest Iron & Wine? No thank you. Not yet.

I'll get back out soon. Sooner than later, I hope hope hope.

Getting back in it.

I laced up my shoes this morning, and not to get on the elliptical!
After my MRI last night (at 9pm, holy hell. More on that in a minute.) I got home and feeling really beat down by an all-over exhausting day, I decided I was going to try running in the morning. Maybe it wasn't a good idea, but I'm proud of myself, and sticking to my decision.

Yesterday was mentally and physically exhausting. Lots of changes happening at work, aside from the general difficulty of my job, and I really wanted a bit of a mental break. I've been going to the gym every morning (Monday through Friday at 5am, Sunday at 8am) for three weeks (before that it was 5 days a week, not 6), on the elliptical or stationary bike, and I had reached my breaking point. I'm tired, sluggish, bored, and needed a change. I was going to take this morning off, but after yesterday... Well.

It took two weeks from seeing a doctor to get an MRI, and at this point I am 100% pain-free. In fact, I was pain free about three days after seeing the doctor, but had been advised against running. I got to the office at 8:30 last night (in Kenmore Square, in Boston. First time driving myself on Storrow! Got all turned around and honked at!) for a 9:00pm MRI. My first MRI, and I had been warned about how loud it would be. Understatement. The technitian gave me a choice of music, and I went for Abbey Road (that's The Beatles, you youngun.) and could barely hear the lyrics when the machine was doing its thing.

It was remarkably hard to keep still. Being told "Don't do [x]" makes it neigh-impossible for me to think of anything else. Yom Kippur has always been difficult for this reason. So, "Try not to move your foot" made me hyper-aware of my foot, and how badly I wanted to twitch it. (BUT I DIDN'T. Amazing.) It was over by the very beginning of "I Want You (She's so Heavy)," which was faster than I anticipated. Results should come in today, but that didn't stop me from lacing up this morning.

First run back after five (FIVE) weeks off of running was so hard. Hard because my legs felt heavy. Hard because I felt slow. Hard because I could feel that I'm not where I was a month ago. Hard because this Sunday was going to be my first half-marathon.

I ran two miles. They felt great. I have to be okay with taking things slowly.