When my sister was in college, she and her two best friends were rooming together. They also had a fourth roommate. Her name was Shauna. Actually, her name was Shauna Niequist. They read one of her books, Bittersweet, aloud on a road trip and they would frequently quote her to each other and sometimes the final word in a discussion would be, "Well, Shauna says ..."
Me, I never understood the hype. I have always enjoyed fiction more than non-fiction, and a book of essays didn't seem particularly appealing. Did I mention Bittersweet is about miscarriage, which seemed an odd topic for three young girls to seize upon? I just didn't get it, and allowed my sister to chatter on about Shauna without feeling the need to really understand. She was happy, I was ignorant, that was fine.
Until.
Last night, spending the night with my parents, I forgot to take my Kindle up to bed. I must read something for at least 60 seconds before going to sleep, so I cast about and came up with Bread and Wine, by Shauna Niequist. It was late, and I expected to read for a minute and then go to sleep.
At 12:45, I texted my sister: "I am reading Bread and Wine. I don't want to stop. Ever."
Shortly after there were dangerous waking-sounds from the buggles, and I was forced to turn off the light, which was probably for the best.
Shauna Niequist (I don't "know" her as well as my sister, so I should probably not presume to refer to her by her first name.) writes about food the way I hope to one day. As something to be relished, celebrated, even indulged in. Food is worth the effort. The need for food is an honest one, and not something shaming. She talks about the conversations one has over a table of food and how we use food to express congratulations or sympathy for each other.
Reading this book, I realized that I have been thinking of food the wrong way. I have been thinking that I love food too much, that I have made it an idol (that's probably true), that the answer is to love food less.
I don't want to love food less. Food is awesome. Eating it is even better. I love cooking food, eating food, serving food to others. But what I have been doing hasn't been loving food. It has been craving it. Stuffing more and more of it down, down, down. Because if one brownie is good, four are the best. If the potato salad is good, it should be good enough to eat two cups of it at a sitting. If your husband has spoken sharply to you, serving him chocolate cake will make him love you again. If he doesn't eat it, then you should eat all of it, the whole thing, and you won't be sad for as long as you are scooping, chewing, swallowing. You should never consider what else you've eaten that day - this moment is the most important, and this moment you really need a 5th ice cream sandwich to go on living.
None of this is true.
I am going to say that again, because in this moment I believe it and I am afraid that it will slip away by tomorrow.
None of this is true.
None of this is true.
NONE OF THIS IS TRUE.
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Monday, August 12, 2013
Excuses
Exercise: Erm none. Except for carrying two very heavy children in and out of cars and up and down stairs
Excuse: The Husband had to go to work early, so I would have to get up at 6:30 to run (so not happening). I had firmish plans to run before supper, but then there was rain ... and picking The Husband up from work ... and making supper ... and carpet pulling ... and ...
Breakfast: grande coffee frappechino (btw, spell check? That is so totally a word. I'm not sure how it's spelled ... but it's totally a word), 1 1/2 everything bagels, plain
Excuse: The Husband had to go to work early. It "made the most sense" to get breakfast in between dropping him off and when Aldi (best grocery store ever) opened. And let's face it. I could have done much, much worse than a frappechino and bagels.
Lunch: Hm. Good question. I think ... a largish piece of almond cake and 1/2 a piece of canteloupe? Maybe?
Excuse: I had an appointment right at lunch, which meant that everything got scrambled. Fortunately Big Bit had been eating animal crackers all morning, so he was good to go. Unfortunately, Little Bit ate about as much as I did (proportionally) so he'll probably want to nurse all night to make up for it. Also, almond cake really isn't that sweet. Practically doesn't even count.
Supper: 4 egg cups and a mug of Ghirardelli hot chocolate.
Excuse: Actually - none. This meal was defensible, I feel. Yes, 4 eggs is a bit much, but I hadn't eaten lunch to speak of, and you bake them in muffin pans lined with ham, so there's no extra butter involved. They were delicious. Highly recommend. The Ghirardelli hot chocolate was likewise delicious and was savored by The Husband, Big Bit and myself. Big Bit's joy in finding (warm) hot chocolate in his bottle instead of milk was particularly heart-warming.
The number: 260
Excuse: The Husband had to go to work early, so I would have to get up at 6:30 to run (so not happening). I had firmish plans to run before supper, but then there was rain ... and picking The Husband up from work ... and making supper ... and carpet pulling ... and ...
Breakfast: grande coffee frappechino (btw, spell check? That is so totally a word. I'm not sure how it's spelled ... but it's totally a word), 1 1/2 everything bagels, plain
Excuse: The Husband had to go to work early. It "made the most sense" to get breakfast in between dropping him off and when Aldi (best grocery store ever) opened. And let's face it. I could have done much, much worse than a frappechino and bagels.
Lunch: Hm. Good question. I think ... a largish piece of almond cake and 1/2 a piece of canteloupe? Maybe?
Excuse: I had an appointment right at lunch, which meant that everything got scrambled. Fortunately Big Bit had been eating animal crackers all morning, so he was good to go. Unfortunately, Little Bit ate about as much as I did (proportionally) so he'll probably want to nurse all night to make up for it. Also, almond cake really isn't that sweet. Practically doesn't even count.
Supper: 4 egg cups and a mug of Ghirardelli hot chocolate.
Excuse: Actually - none. This meal was defensible, I feel. Yes, 4 eggs is a bit much, but I hadn't eaten lunch to speak of, and you bake them in muffin pans lined with ham, so there's no extra butter involved. They were delicious. Highly recommend. The Ghirardelli hot chocolate was likewise delicious and was savored by The Husband, Big Bit and myself. Big Bit's joy in finding (warm) hot chocolate in his bottle instead of milk was particularly heart-warming.
The number: 260
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Monday's Lesson
The lesson of this week is that it is definitely easier to go ahead and run in the early morning than to try to fit it in somewhere else where it doesn't really go. Monday morning The Husband had to leave early for work, which means that I would have to have gotten up super early to go running while he was still home with the kiddos and, faced with a gray morning and buzzing alarm clock, I told him "I'll go running tonight instead."
When I woke up more fully, I knew that running after supper wasn't going to work. We both had big to-do lists for the evening, and shoehorning in a 30-minute run (before dark) and a shower just wasn't going to happen.
So I did it in our backyard.
It was not very pretty. I'm sure that Big Bit thought I had lost my mind as I paced around our yard and bobbed up and down the cement walkway with the world's slowest jog. I felt fortunate that we rarely see our neighbors. It was a little embarrassing, particularly to keep doing it for so long. But I did it anyway and it wasn't just a token gesture - I was sweating and my calves were burning by the end, so all's well, etc.
Wednesday morning, needless to say, I pulled myself out of bed on time (or roughly thereabouts) and took myself jogging.
The number: 254
When I woke up more fully, I knew that running after supper wasn't going to work. We both had big to-do lists for the evening, and shoehorning in a 30-minute run (before dark) and a shower just wasn't going to happen.
So I did it in our backyard.
It was not very pretty. I'm sure that Big Bit thought I had lost my mind as I paced around our yard and bobbed up and down the cement walkway with the world's slowest jog. I felt fortunate that we rarely see our neighbors. It was a little embarrassing, particularly to keep doing it for so long. But I did it anyway and it wasn't just a token gesture - I was sweating and my calves were burning by the end, so all's well, etc.
Wednesday morning, needless to say, I pulled myself out of bed on time (or roughly thereabouts) and took myself jogging.
The number: 254
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Monday
So, I survived ...
No, the radio silence was not me recovering from major injury or heat exhaustion. Just an overabundance of everyday life going on, particularly as regards, as The Husband would say, "our buggle infestation."* The couch to 5k app is very helpful, and the whole thing seems well designed. I sweated, I burned, I gasped, I puffed, but I didn't actually die, or think I was going to die, and for me that was an unexpected bonus. I was totally expecting the last third to be a miserable, slogging mess, but it wasn't. It wasn't fun, but it was doable.
I came home to awake and dressed children and husband, took a lovely shower, and continued on with a very full day. Monday for us is grocery day, which, with the chirrens, is a fairly drawn-out process. Which meant that eating ... well ... was irregular. After coming back from running, I drank water but didn't eat anything (I know, bad Libby!) and off we went to take The Husband to work. I assumed that the buggles and I could go to the bakery section of the grocery store and get some muffins or something, so I wasn't bothered. However, breakfast had been put away. At 9 in the morning. Lunch, complete with baked potatoes and pasta salad, was spread out. Deciding against pasta salad at 9am, we pushed on. To Starbucks, where I had a grande coffee frappuccino and most of a piece of pumpkin bread. (Big Bit ate several bites.) Lunch, post-grocery trip was (I cringe to say it) mac and cheese from a box. Big Bit was ecstatic, and poured half of his into the hidden recesses of our coffee table/game night table. Dinner was bean soup and buttered wheat bread, which I felt virtuous about whenever I wasn't thinking about the mac and cheese for lunch. After dinner I made a very delicious concoction, a cross between brownies and pecan pie. Highly recommend, but not in the portions I at it in. I ate a full cereal bowl's worth and felt sickish afterwards. And then embarrassed - who eats until they actually get sick? And then sick again.
So.
Definitely a mixed bag there. And somewhat characteristic of the rest of this week. The running (if you can make a judgment from only two days) seems to be a good choice, but I'm definitely going to have to get the eating under control. Or rather, the choice making. This week in particular, it seems like I am helpless against any sweet option. If it is there, I will eat it. Even if this means plopping down on the floor at 9:30 am with Big Bit and the pecan pie brownie pan and two forks.
It would seem that I clearly need to place some limits on sugar, but what kind? How much? Start harsh or ease into it?
The number: 260 :-(
*Somewhere back in the annals of time, we started attaching "-bug" to our children's names, and now that there are two of them, they are, collectively, "the buggles." Buggle infestation in our house usually manifests in all the books in the the lower half of the bookshelves being dumped on the floor, or toys being cunningly positioned so as to cripple the parent who runs into/steps on/trips over the toy.
No, the radio silence was not me recovering from major injury or heat exhaustion. Just an overabundance of everyday life going on, particularly as regards, as The Husband would say, "our buggle infestation."* The couch to 5k app is very helpful, and the whole thing seems well designed. I sweated, I burned, I gasped, I puffed, but I didn't actually die, or think I was going to die, and for me that was an unexpected bonus. I was totally expecting the last third to be a miserable, slogging mess, but it wasn't. It wasn't fun, but it was doable.
I came home to awake and dressed children and husband, took a lovely shower, and continued on with a very full day. Monday for us is grocery day, which, with the chirrens, is a fairly drawn-out process. Which meant that eating ... well ... was irregular. After coming back from running, I drank water but didn't eat anything (I know, bad Libby!) and off we went to take The Husband to work. I assumed that the buggles and I could go to the bakery section of the grocery store and get some muffins or something, so I wasn't bothered. However, breakfast had been put away. At 9 in the morning. Lunch, complete with baked potatoes and pasta salad, was spread out. Deciding against pasta salad at 9am, we pushed on. To Starbucks, where I had a grande coffee frappuccino and most of a piece of pumpkin bread. (Big Bit ate several bites.) Lunch, post-grocery trip was (I cringe to say it) mac and cheese from a box. Big Bit was ecstatic, and poured half of his into the hidden recesses of our coffee table/game night table. Dinner was bean soup and buttered wheat bread, which I felt virtuous about whenever I wasn't thinking about the mac and cheese for lunch. After dinner I made a very delicious concoction, a cross between brownies and pecan pie. Highly recommend, but not in the portions I at it in. I ate a full cereal bowl's worth and felt sickish afterwards. And then embarrassed - who eats until they actually get sick? And then sick again.
So.
Definitely a mixed bag there. And somewhat characteristic of the rest of this week. The running (if you can make a judgment from only two days) seems to be a good choice, but I'm definitely going to have to get the eating under control. Or rather, the choice making. This week in particular, it seems like I am helpless against any sweet option. If it is there, I will eat it. Even if this means plopping down on the floor at 9:30 am with Big Bit and the pecan pie brownie pan and two forks.
It would seem that I clearly need to place some limits on sugar, but what kind? How much? Start harsh or ease into it?
The number: 260 :-(
*Somewhere back in the annals of time, we started attaching "-bug" to our children's names, and now that there are two of them, they are, collectively, "the buggles." Buggle infestation in our house usually manifests in all the books in the the lower half of the bookshelves being dumped on the floor, or toys being cunningly positioned so as to cripple the parent who runs into/steps on/trips over the toy.
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