Birthday Blues 2013



Let's get real personal.  My birthday is next week and I'm just not into it.  I usually don't have this issue, but this year, I'm struggling.  It's not even a milestone, it's another number mixed in with all the other numbers that have come before.  It's just another trip around the sun.  However, I'm overwhelmed with all that is happening in my life. Processing much of it requires a cool-down, but I can't get to the cool down and I end up spinning my wheels in the perpetual motion of going nowhere.  Yes, that pun is intended.

I've always thought of blogging as a narcissistic hobby, so I try to reserve this space for things not too personal.  It started as a place to share my music and schedule for those who asked and wanted to follow me around. Then, for some reason, people seemed to like what I have to say.  I don't do it much and when I do, I like the focus to be there and not here.  So, when I'm traveling a rough road, I tend to go silent.  Here's the deal: My stuff is no different than your stuff.  This year, I may have more, next year you may have more.  You don't need to read about mine to get through yours.  I don't need to write about my details in a public place to understand them.  However, what I feel I need to say is that I GET IT.  I get it all.  I am with you, wherever you are.  I get what it feels like to ask the big questions about life and love and come up with nothing.  I get what it's like to be driving past a wedding party outside a church, the glowing bride's while gown blowing in the breeze, and have to hold myself back from screaming, "DON'T DO IT!!!" out the open window.  I get heartache. I get what it's like to sit across the table from a crying friend with a blank stare because I don't have the answers, because the older I get, the less I feel like I know for sure.  I get what it's like to have a medicine bag of self-help tools (that really do work), only to leave it collecting dust on the shelf in favor of 3 hours of shitty reality TV and a glass(es) of wine.  I get what it's like to be sinking chest deep in the cliche of a mid-life crisis, being jealous of the idealism of those younger than me, turning around and looking behind me wondering "where the fuck did mine go?"  Yet, I also know what it feels like to look down that same road and say, "look what I've created, look what I've pushed through."  It may not be perfect, but it's mine.  I know what it's like to read an essay my 14-year old son wrote about me and see, in print, that he GOT it, that everything I have been trying to do for him and his brother (so far), I have done.  I know what it feels like to be "in the groove," as I call it.  It feels like when the needle hits that vinyl album in just the right spot and doesn't skip at all.  Everything flows, all the right notes come rushing in and the sound is so so sweet.  I know what it's like to still have some of that youthful idealism to hug.  I know that life ebbs and flows and it will all come around again and my tools will be put to good use, becoming stronger for the next time I need them.  Like on the bike, maybe it really is all about training and practice. Maybe I know more than I think I do.  Huh.



Vent over.  Phew.  If you're still here, let's talk indoor cycling.  I recently taught a charity class for Relay For Life.  We lit luminarias, rode "for more birthdays," and celebrated life and love.  It wasn't any larger or longer than any other Thursday morning at 9:15 am, but there was a spirit in that room that I've never experienced in all my years of teaching.  That playlist is below, along with one that took another Thursday morning to an entirely different place.  To the client who said to me this week, "I just always feel so good after your classes, you really touch people," thank YOU.  This is why I do all the things I do. xo Jen 

Relay For Life 2013

Little Old, Little New, Much Mashed



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