According to my Sunday post I was supposed to talk about health/fitness yesterday. Instead of talking I ended up doing. And since my focus was renewing my DOT medical card that bleeds into the subject of work. So I guess today I will discuss both.

For the longest time work was my biggest focus in life. Make enough money to be sure that the family has a roof over their heads, good food on the table, power and water paid for, clothing and transportation taken care of, etc. Work is how you take care of your family. Work is how you show your value to the world. Work is how you define yourself…it gives a major part of your identity. That’s how I lived and I’m not sorry for it, but now I feel like I missed something big.

I’m watching my parents’ health decline. We are trying to plan a party to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary, but we wonder if my dad is going to make it even another month. He has been struggling with blood sugars and edema and heart troubles for nearly a decade. He doesn’t have the energy to work on his projects or fix the car. Replacing the battery in one of their vehicles is almost too much for him to manage these days. Any time he tries and fails I can see the light leave his eyes. He defined himself by his ability to work to maintain himself and his family and now that has been torn from him by poor health. This is no way to live.

Seven years ago my husband was taken by a heart attack. It was sudden. There was no long decline. He was just gone too young. Sometimes, thinking about it I feel like that was the kindest way. I can’t imagine if he was weakened and lingering, unable to do his projects or keep up his house. I would have figured out how to manage, but between the two of us I was never the one that made things happen. I don’t know if he would have been able to redefine himself to live life his way again. Loss of health and vitality is still a great loss.

I’ve started out on a depressing note. I have my reasons, and they can be demonstrated by a story I often share. My grandmother had her first hip replacement in 1956. I believe that was in the early days of joint replacements. The story I heard was that her doctors were surprised that she was even able to continue walking up to the surgery. There was no cartilage left in the joint, leaving it to grind bone on bone with every movement. That joint replacement had to be redone a couple of times as it wore out over the years. She kept moving. She gardened and cleaned her house. She used crutches or a walker, but she walked the dog several times a day. In 1996 she still maintained a spotless house and flowers by the porch. Only in the last year of her life did she slow down and that probably sped up the end. By comparison, my mother has struggled with walking for decades. Her lower back hurts her and the recliner calls it’s siren song. Now she can barely get out the front door before needing to rest. I see the difference and I have a choice.

Five years ago I had a foot surgery. There were a couple of joints with no cartilage left, grinding bone on bone when I walked. So they did a fusion. I was off work for seven months as I healed. I went to the gym every single week. I remembered my grandmother and I choose to follow her example. My body is the only one I will ever have. If I stop moving I will lose the ability to move. If I mistreat my body in the name of work the damage may be irreparable. I do not want to be defined by ill health. I do not want to be stolen away from my family before I get to see what they make in this world. Caring for my health must begin to define me.

My job right now is to drive a transit bus. I am behind the wheel whether at work or on my commute for nearly 12 hours a day. This is damaging my back. I can fight the damage with exercise, I know this. Often I allow my exercise to take place a s physical labor on my property. Crushing blackberry thickets takes strength, balance, and agility that few gym workouts could reproduce. But I know I need to find more. I need to figure out a food schedule that will care for my needs without putting things out of balance. And lastly, I need to change the way I produce an income. I need to find a job that can give me the income I need to maintain my life plus the extra I want to put away for an uncertain future. I have been exploring options in all of those areas, but nothing has borne fruit yet. I’m almost afraid to share my ideas for fear of jinxing myself, but if I don’t put them down here I have nothing to hold myself accountable to.

For food, I have been focusing on proteins in the mornings, leaving anything rich in carbohydrates for later in the day. This seems to keep my appetite quiet, which makes sense as I learn how sugars affect the insulin cycle which affects hunger and appetite. I am also intrigued by intermittent fasting, but have not yet figured out how to fit that into my routine.

For exercise, aside from working on my property and walking on breaks I have let this mostly fall by the wayside. I have made little progress and I can feel the effects. In the past, I really enjoyed a tai chi class. It made a major difference in my back pain, but it is not easy to get out the door before 7am to make the class. I know that’s an excuse. I hate using it. But it is also true. I have also lately come across the idea of strength training. I have wanted to do something like that for a long time, but didn’t know what to ask for. Setting up a home gym would be a tricky thing and cost nearly $2000 but it has it’s own appeal. I am still in a holding pattern on this and just need to kick myself into motion on something. I’ll ponder it.

Finally, for my job. I went to see a career counselor last week. I am set to meet with him for another six sessions as he tries to help me sort out who I am, what I want, and how to get it. I will be happy if I come out of this knowing how to make a resume and what a cover letter is supposed to be. I have a feeling that I will be pushed in unexpected ways by the experience. I might find parts of myself that I thought I had lost or abandoned along the way. I might find out that I really have been myself the whole time.

I don’t know quite how to end this. I know health is important to me. I know that work affects health. I know that I am fighting to have the best in all of this, if I can only figure out what that means. I am floundering on a lot of things, but I am trying.

If you keep moving, you won’t lose the ability to move.

I like structure. I like predictability. I like knowing what needs to be done in a given moment based on plans that have been set in the past. sometimes that makes it hard for me to adapt to changing situations, but it also means that I have to be good at creating structure for my life. Now, after a week of blathering, I want to set some form of structure for my blog so that it is easier to know what I want to talk about and harder to skip a day when I needed to write.

The shape of my weeks are very predictable. Sunday I make plans and try to get things done at home. Monday I go out for errands, shopping, appointments, etc. Tuesday through Saturday I go to work. I already decided that Saturday will be my day off from blogging. That is my early day and my longest day. It is also the day where I end so exhausted that I barely want to drive home. Last night I sat in my truck for almost two hours before I finally made myself get moving.

I know the things I want to talk about on my blog. I want to talk about my plans and the things I’m doing. I want to talk about health and exercise. I want to talk about my job and what I’m doing to try to change it. I want to talk about my family and my critters. I want to talk about my creative endeavors, and I want to talk about what inspiration I have found to keep me focused and moving forward in life.

Oddly enough, I just counted those and find that there are six things on the list. That matches the six days that I have chosen to blog. Just by blathering on this morning I have found a possible structure.

Sunday: Plans and Doings

Monday: Health and Exercise

Tuesday: Work and Transition

Wednesday: Family and Animals

Thursday: Creativity (I guess that means I should get back into it.)

Friday: Inspiration or Smashing Bugs

Saturday: take a break

Since it is Sunday and I have just written about plans, I feel like I am already successful. Hooray! This is almost too easy. I guess I can now spend the day deciding how to talk health for tomorrow.

In all honesty I didn’t want to wake up. Instead I distracted myself by reading. Then the dogs needed attention. Then I was reminded that I had to leave early to give someone a ride in to work. Then I discovered a couple of presents left for me by the dogs and was suddenly running late… If I really believed nobody was ever going to read this I’d describe what I think the dog had discovered to be indigestible, but that’s too much honesty even for me.

I promised six days a week. I don’t really know what I’m doing yet but I will never find out if I don’t make an effort. I’m pretty sure I have a bug smasher quote to lean on…. Actually, I have two.

Habits are an entrance ramp to productivity.

Start moving forward and new paths will become visible.

I want to create habits so that I can see new opportunities. That’s why I’m not skipping today. I don’t have much to say other than that I won’t let my excuses get in my way. I don’t have a real routine set up yet but if I keep going it will come. After a couple of weeks I might choose themes for days so I know what to focus on. I’m not there yet but it’s coming. As long as I don’t skip.

I had an interesting conversation with a coworker yesterday. We were at Gateway Transit Center, a super busy crossroads of humanity, light rail, and buses. On the other end of the platform there were some transit police with a working dog. My coworker saw the high energy of the dog and immediately commented that it was ill behaved for a dog in public. I then tried to explain that a police dog is not a service dog and should not be held to the same standard. It was interesting because I find that he, like so many other people, is ignorant of the many roles that can be filled by dogs and the range of behavior that is acceptable depending on their role.

Most people are used to dogs as pets. Good dogs should walk nicely on a leash in public, come when called, drop things when told, not bite anyone, and not soil the carpets. There are some people’s pets that fail on one or all of the above, but these are universally recognized traits of good dogs. Pets are usually treated as member of the family, if not a favorite child. It makes sense because they tend to operate on the level of a 3-5 year old for life. They just need structure and rules and play and love to be happy like the eternal optimists they are.

Then there are working dogs. Everyone can recognize a Seeing Eye Dog when they see one. More and more people are using dogs to provide services for them. The legitimate ones are highly trained to perform behaviors that are not naturally occurring, whether it is leading a handler through hazards or calming a panic attack. Police dogs can either sniff out illegal items or give an officer a longer reach when dealing with more dangerous people. Livestock Guardian dogs bond with their livestock more than their people. Hunting dogs tap into their natural instincts to provide a method of eliminating vermin without putting poison into the food chain. Each category of working dog has a different ideal temperament and many of them would not make ideal pets. Herding breeds, for example, are well known for nipping at heels, even of their family. That violates a huge rule for proper pet behavior. Don’t bite! Some dogs are just not happy unless they are given a job and if they don’t have one they might make one up.

My dogs are mostly pets. Probably 95% of the time they just laze around the house or wrestle or run crazy out in the yard. There are four of them, and they each have distinct personalities. Three of them are almost 12 years old while the other is 4. Two of them would like to work. The other two would learn if I had the time to teach them.

Freddy is kind of the old man of the pack. He came to us as an Australian Shepherd mix, but he looks like a Golden Retriever dipped in chocolate. We call him the stoner dog because he’s so chill. He lounges around almost everywhere he goes. Children can climb all over him with no fear. I thought about training him as a therapy dog when he was young because of his great personality. Now he patrols the property. If he turns into a fur missile the boys usually follow with the .22 because he might be after a coyote. He would probably be a great Guardian dog if not for his age.

Bruno is our German Shepherd mix. He’s a bit of a special case since he obsesses over his toys. I’ve used him to herd goats a couple of times, though he had no idea that’s what he was doing. I just threw the ball to the area I wanted the goats to leave and they avoided his intensity. What really gets him excited is rats. He would make a great ratter if he could calm down enough to focus.

Angel was my brother’s dog. She came to us when he got divorced and moved into an apartment. She’s a herding dog through and through. She runs the others in circles, nipping and barking. I haven’t allowed her in with the goats though, because she doesn’t listen to directions and has the attention span of a gnat. We call her the frou-frou anime girl because she flounces everywhere.

And then there is Clay. He’s the youngster of the pack. He has decided that his place is at my side forever. He actively tries to block the others from sharing my attention and guards me from all threats, even if it might be just a bird flying overhead. He also believes he is a ratter. I have many stories about all my dogs, but Clay tends to top them all. To my knowledge he has only ever killed one small rat, but is determined to kill more. My entire yard is filled with trenches from his rodent hunts. I need to figure out how to smooth it out again. But it’s hard to be mad at him or any of the dogs. Their lives are so short and full of enthusiasm. They bring joy even if that enthusiasm cannot be fully directed towards useful endeavors.

I’m sure I’ll write a lot about my dogs in the days to come. They are a big part of my life and I have many opinions about them. But this is a good enough start. I might ramble on to much, but that’s okay if nobody’s reading. I’ll get it out of my system and by the time anybody pays attention I’ll be better at keeping it simple. Maybe. After all, I’ll still be me.