I currently live in South Dakota where I am trying to balance a family of five, two large lab/shepherd mixes, an editing career and an active lifestyle which includes as much travel as possible and as much physical fitness as I can squeeze in. My husband and spent countless weekends pre-kiddos hiking and exploring the parks of Northern California (under grad) and Central Kentucky (grad school). Now that the kids are old enough to be mobile, I am determined to get as much hiking done as possible both in short trips with the whole fam and longer outing solo with the babysitting mightiest of the grandparents at work. My hope is to record many fine adventures out on the trail hiking.
Running became my favorite activity after becoming a mom. It satisfies many of my needs simultaneously, I get a fit, I get out of the house and into the fresh sunshiny air, and I get an hour inside my own head without any external demands. I only came to running/walking/hiking as an adult and struggled at first with getting miles under my belt. They do add up if you take the time to put one foot forward at a time. Much of it is a mental game. The body is physically built to move and with a gradual building of time and distance, can accomplish any distance you challenge it to. My mental game is simple, I set a mileage goal and then tell myself that I won’t stop until I get to the end. I might slow way down, but I don’t stop. And it works. I remind myself that my body was designed to move, and once I can walk a distance it is only kicking it into the next gear to jog and then run.
Going into our first long hike in years, my husband prepared by working like a madman to ensure he could take the time off, and I completed my first full marathon. You can imagine the fitness disparity. Not having been an integral part of trip planning before, I approached the trails lengths in relationship to the miles I knew I was capable of from running. If I could run 12 miles in a few hours in the morning to start the day then I reasoned we could do that in the course of an entire day weighted down by packs. Also, it felt like a real challenge and we could see so much more from say 30 miles rather than 20. Things I underestimated: terrain, switchbacks and mountains don’t eat the miles up like a city paved park; my husbands need to pack for every known contingency, leading to him carrying way more weight than he should have; blisters on his feet; the need to stop and soak it all in. We made 10-12 miles a day, but it took from early morning to dark each day, and the pace was not enjoyable for half of our team. This thought led to the my title. I am both driven by the mile monster in me who thrives on the challenge of seeing how many miles I can eat up, and understand the need to tame the monster, relax and enjoy the journey. Here’s to balance.
tamingthemilemonster 