"Laziness" *OR* "Old Wineskins"

Beleive it or not, this blog started out as a place for me to chronical my running. Actually, it started as a place for me to post reviews of energy products marketed to runners. Circa 2012, about the time my first marriage was crumbling, I needed something to direct my energies toward so I wouldn't go insane. It was at this time that I started training for my first marathon.

Marathon training is hard, ya'll. And the sad part is, I didn't even know how to train. I figured that, if I just made myself run longer and longer distances, I'd eventually get into "marathon shape", which I didn't even pin a solid definition to other than, 'The ablility to finish a marathon without dying'. 

In case we've never met, I (like most men, I think) have a bad habit of thinking I'm an expert on anything I have at least a passable knowledge about. If I can swing a wrapping paper tube around in what I think looks like a component impression of a sword, I'm instantly an Olympic-caliber fencer. And running was something, at that time, I thought I had down to a science. So clearly I needed no special research on how to run a marathon. 

What commenced was the most misersable 5 hours, 13 minutes, and 39 seconds of my life.

I was in much more misery than my expression implies. Also, I had a lot more hair. 

Fast forward more than a year. Undaunted, I signed up for my second marathon. Clearly, when I had trained for the first marathon, I had simply not used my "non-training" routine intensely enough! So I continued with the same actions, in the same way I had used them before (admittedly with more frequency) and expected a different outcome. I didn't once bother to consider that the correct approach to marathoning wasn't in the ammount I trained, but in the methods I was using. 

My second marathon, I ran in 5 hours and 12 minutes. My "more intensive training" had shaved a whopping 1 minute and 39 seconds from my time. 

That simply would not do! After all, I had developed a goal to one day qualify for the Boston Marathon. Clearly, something about my training would have to change. But, like the proverbial fly that beats its head against a window until it smashes its brains to jell-o, I continued my old training plan of "run more". 

The following year, I managed to shave 20 minutes off my marathon time, when I finished the same marathon in 4'52". 

While I was very proud of that time, I still had a big problem. In order to qualify for the Boston Marathon in my age group (the 34-39 age group), I would have to finish a Boston qualifying marathon in 3 hours and 5 minutes. Which meant that I still, somehow, needed to shave more than an hour and forty-five minutes from my marathon time. 

Which seems impossible. At least, it seemed impossible with the way I was training. 

Humans are creatures of habit. I get that. We're animals that hate change, and resist it with everything in us. Psychologists have written long articles about why this is, but I think the short answer is because changing a behavior is difficult and takes effort, and none of us want to beleive that we are flawed enough that our methods actually need changing. We want to beleive that we're experts and have the best way to do things already mastered. 

Simply put, we are a lazy species. Me, chiefly among them. 

This revelation about myself was a long time coming when it came to running, but I'm glad to say that it's application to other areas of my life was much more forthcoming. When my first marriage fell apart, I pretty quickly saw that I wasn't, contrary to my own beleif, an expert when it came to relationships. Though she and I had been in a relationship for five years, I actually had NO IDEA what entailed in being a husband. I may have understood the role of "boyfriend", but the role of "husband" completely escaped me. 

Withing the last few years, I stepped in a new role, one that another version of Graham would have assumed he was already a master of withouth even the slighest experience: the role of Dad. Thankfully, Old Graham was long gone, and new, willing-to-admit-that-he-doesn't-have-it-all-together Graham was willing to learn. I had to rethink the ways I used my energy, my time, and my finances. Suddenly, my life was no longer about me and the things I wanted. And I'll admit, it was very difficult to break out of those selfish mindsets.

But, even though it was difficult, it was GOOD.  

And that's perhaps the trap that we, as people, find ourself in when it comes to change. We assume that because it's difficult, or requires a lot of time or energy, that it can't be GOOD. But that often is the exact opposite, in the examples we read in Scripture: God doesn't do extreme GOOD in the lives of people who aren't willing to do something DIFFICULT. 

I'm running my 5th marathon this fall (I won't even go into the time of my 4th marathon, because there were other extenuating circumstances which made that time esepecially terrible). But this time, I'm following a training plan. I've been a subscriber of Runner's World magazine for many years, and I figured it was time I started taking the advice of experts as seriously as I took the advice of the little voices in my head that told me I already knew everything. 

The training plan is hard. I ran over 16 miles on Sunday. My feet hurt so badly that even standing to sing hymns in church was a task. But just because the run was HARD doesn't mean it wasn't GOOD. Because it was very good. 

The more I think about this analogy, the more I realize how it applies to so many different areas of my life. Which is good, because it means I am always learning and never accepting that I've "arrived" in any facet of my life. But it also stinks, because the lazy part of me that resists change desperatly wants to climb into the metaphorical bed inside my mind and pull the covers over its head. 

I'm about to enter my 10th year teaching, and some of my methods and activities have become stagnant with time. It's time to rethink many of them. 

My Bible study and prayer life are slipping. It's probably time I looked for a new approach to studying the Word, and changed the way I pray or the things I pray about. 

It's easy to dilude yourself into believing that just because you've done something for a long time you should be considered an 'expert' (or, in my case, the beleif that mere passable knowledge in a topic makes you an expert). It's a different thing entirely, and a much better thing, to accept that maybe the old methods you've cemented in your head need reconsidered. I firmly believe that laziness is part of the human condition, and that sloth is one of the seven deadly sins for a reason. 

There's no rest for the weary, it seems. But that's not a bad thing. I've got a classroom that hasn't been touched since May, a former guest bedroom that's halfway through a transition into a nursery, and six weeks left in a marathon training plan that will hopefully get me one step closer to qualifying for Boston. It's only appropriate that my thoughts about these things change with them. After all, wasn't it Jesus who said we can't put new wine into old wineskins?  

"Running on Empty" OR "My Easy Week"

It's the last week before spring break. Also known as the Last Great Battle of the school year.

Sure, there will be troubles to come. After all, KPREP is a mere 24 days away (we're keeping count), and there will be days upon days of dreary review material, during which the kids will hate me and I'll hate Common Core and we'll all pretty much loathe life. But this week is the Last Great Battle, because it is the last week before an extended break. And what a break it is; the first break since returning from Christmas vacation, snow days notwithstanding. Long-anticipated through cold, dark, dreary days.

And this week finds most of us, teachers, running on empty.

This is the week when we try to quickly assess over content we know our students will forget over the long week's vacation. The last chance to get another project finished, to try some new activity to keep our students occupied and happy and engaged for just five more days.

So we scour the internet for ideas. We beg, borrow, and steal from colleagues. We comb the resource closest. Anything and everything is thrown at the wall, to see what sticks.

And as the days progress, students get wilder and wilder and wilder.

As of now, there are three days left in the week. Three days I am not looking forward to. But three days I've got to endure.

Which sort of what makes this feel like the longest week of the year.

I'm right on the cusp of race season; my favorite races of the year are all mere weeks away. But nothing this week but anticipation.

Normally I can occupy myself with the NCAA men's basketball championship. But, this year, the University of Kentucky lost in the second round to Indiana, a team with more sleeper potential than anyone living in the Bluegrass state gave them credit for. With them gone, I've lost all interest in college basketball. Which leaves baseball as the only viable sport to become invested in. But even on its best days, baseball can't hold my attention the way football and basketball can. Since the baseball regular season has yet to start, I've got nothing to distract me from the thickness of this miserable week.

But then I remember what this week is really supposed to represent. Yes, it's a week when I'm still responsible to teach my students the content they need... but, more importantly, it's Holy Week.

Holy Week is the week before Jesus' crucifixion, when He returned to Jerusalem even though he knew what awaited him there. On Sunday, He rode triumphantly into the city, as onlookers proclaimed, "Make way for the Christ! Make way for the Christ! Blessed is he, who comes in the name of the Lord!"

Jesus knew word would spread. He knew the teacher of the law and Roman guards alike would surround him before the end of the week. He knew of his arrest, his farce of a trial, his conviction. He knew he'd endure hours and hours of torture before being subjected to the most painful death imaginable. But still, he rode into Jerusalem for the Passover festivities with his head held high. He knew who'd send him, and what he'd come to do. And he thought we were worth it.

How whiney must my complaints sound to him?

I gave up social media for Lent, and it's been difficult. This last week of media abstinence has me nearly foaming at the mouth to open Facebook, just for the heck of it. It's almost as though giving it up for Lent has actually increased my dependence on in instead of breaking me of the habit cold-turkey.

On this day, nearly two thousand years ago, my Lord was giving one of his last addresses to his closest followers. I can't wait four more days to take a personality quiz?

A woman anointed Jesus's feet with perfume and her tears, overcome by the weight of her sin and guilt in the presence of her Savior. And I'm complaining that I have to teach three more days before I get a week off?

My Friday is going to consist of whatever activity I can throw together to keep my kids occupied until the final bell rings. Jesus' Friday consisted of him crying at a lonely rock, pleading with his Father one last time for some way, any other way, to save all of humanity than what he was about to go through.

On Saturday, my family and I are flying to Disney World, the self-proclaimed 'Happiest place on earth'. Jesus would get no sleep on Friday night, because of his trial that takes place in the dead of night. He endures stones, whips, thorns, and finally the cross.

When I lay it out like that, I know I've got nothing to complain about.

But, darn it. I'm a weak human. I know what Jesus went through for me, and the mark it should make on my life and my thankfulness for my job, and the ever-warming weather, and a week's break. But those happy thoughts feel awfully useless when I'm staring down a room full of thirty-three 7th graders who're losing their minds.

 The three days left this week are going to be the longest of the whole year. And the struggle is going to be remembering that I shouldn't complain about ANYTHING that happens during them, because no matter how many last-minute grades I have to put in, disciplinary actions I have to take, or meetings I have to attend... the end of my Passover week is going to be a heck of a lot easier than Jesus' was.

A while ago I wrote a short story in Cut and Dry, my creative blog, from the point of view of the Apostle Peter, set on Good Friday. If you have a moment, check out "Upon This Rock".

"Wearing Down", OR "Adjusting"

This is my first blog post in quite a while. Nearly five months, in fact. And I didn't actually realize just how long it had been until I typed the words.

Of course, I'll blame my lack of writing on the fact that I haven't had a laptop in a number of months.  I recently changed jobs, leaving behind a teaching job I loved at a school I loved. My previous laptop belonged to the school I'd been employed with for the last three years, and I had to return it to them.

So if the job was so great, you may be asking, why did you leave it? 

Simply? I felt called to do so.

The old job was a thirty-minute commute, one way, every day. The distance was putting a strain on Hillary, since she was solely responsible for picking up and dropping off the kids and the dog every morning to the places they had to be. That, and I wasn't making it home to my family until 5:30 or 6:00 every night, and I felt like I was missing out on valuable time. So I applied for a teaching job in the county in which we live, the school system in which my two stepchildren are enrolled. The same school system which didn't hire me last year, though I applied for multiple positions.

I was offered a job at a middle school less than two miles from my house. So I took it.

The year has been amazing. I love my students, I love my co-workers, and I love finally living and teaching in the same count, for the first time in nine years. I love investing in a community in which I am an active member.

But this is, after all, a blog about running. So it's time I got to writing about running.

At the beginning of August, I found myself nursing a hamstring injury which sidelined me for two weeks. I had been ignoring it since the first week in April, trying to convince myself that running through the pain was the best medicine. Turns out, it wasn't. When I finally saw a doctor at the beginning of August, he told me to take it easy for two weeks, and he prescribed some stretched to engage in when I returned to running.

 So,  I begrudgingly took it easy for two weeks. Two weeks that, it seems, have set me back YEARS in my running ability.

Even now, being back to running for nearly two months, I feel slower and more out of shape than I ever have. I run out of energy quicker. I feel the usual running aches and pains sooner. I feel worse when I finish. And my stupid hamstring STILL hurts.

Am I just... getting old?

Yes, I've officially been a dad for more than a year now, but it feels more cemented in reality this year than it did last. Maybe it comes from being recognized in the community as "Faith and Zoe's dad". Maybe it's because I can actually pick up Faith from her after school program at a decent hour, and actually spend real time with her. But "Dad" feels like a deeper part of my soul now than it ever has. And I could not be happier.

But does this mean I have to get "old", too? Is my body suddenly wearing down quicker, just because I feel older than I ever have? I'm not yet thirty three. Guys twenty and thirty years older than me are beating the pants off of my best marathon time. So what's the matter with me?

My brain is trying to attribute it to the fact that I have only been able to do short runs lately (running in the morning is very doable, but my school starts so early that I can never go long). I guess I'll find out next weekend. I'm running the Iron Horse Half Marathon in Midway, Kentucky, just a few miles from our home. Maybe I'll break my old half marathon time. Maybe I'll simply finish feeling good. Or maybe I'll be hobbling around like a lamed animal after eight miles.

The problem is... I'm not sure what I'll do with myself if it's the latter.