More About Shoes

Nearly two years ago I wrote about buying a new pair of running shoes. Those crappy things lasted about a month before both sides of both shoes blew out. I took them back and was given only a small portion of my money back towards a new pair. According to Sport Chek, no receipt = no leverage. I gave New Balance another try in case I just got a lemon and I'm glad I did. That replacement pair has finally been replaced because it looked like the original pair. It took a year and a half of 3-4 days a week through mud, dust, snow, over rocks, logs, and pavement. The sides had huge tears and they smelled awful, but until the soles started detaching they were still comfortable for a one hour jaunt in the dark morning.

I bought a new pair exactly the same back in Spring because I figured the old ones were going to disintegrate any day and I wanted to be ready. Those new ones sat in the closet ready for 6 months. I took the new ones out yesterday, so they have a bit of mud on them, but they still look brand new. I'm enthusiastic about seeing how many miles they will cover. 

Who's up? Dog.

I have an all-weather dog. She's all-terrain too. On the one hand, this is awesome because I don't ever have dress her up. Raining? Fur coat. Snowing? Fur coat. Sunny? Sorry pooch, fur coat. On the other hand, it means I have to be an all-weather person. Dark and blowing sleet? I'll get another coat.

I like hiking and trail running, but my enjoyment doesn't ever seem to even approach her level of enthusiasm. While I huff and puff and struggle to maintain forward momentum up the trail, my dog runs way ahead, then back to me again, and off into the underbrush and back up yet again. For every mile I cover, she does at least 4. When we get to the top, or if I stop for a rest, she looks at me like we're going to play-wrestle right away. Somehow my leaning on my knees trying to prevent reverse peristalsis looks like a dog wrestling pose.

For the past few years, I haven't used the snooze button on my alarm. This does not mean getting up is any easier, I just prefer to sleep properly until it is time to stop, instead of inflicting a half hour of disruption on myself to start the day. Of course, while I fumble to find the floor and clothes, that crazy dog is pacing and yawning pointedly and panting at me.

I think she is more excited to get out when it is dark and cold and stormy than on a warm spring morning complete with early sunrise. I'd be lazier and softer if it wasn't for that dog huffing unapologetically at me each and every morning. Even on the days where I'm annoyed to be up so early, I can't stay grumpy for long; watching her bound into the tall grass or tear down the trail at full speed is a picture of pure joy. I suppose I'd start with a little more joy too if I knew I was going to get to go back to sleep for a few more hours when we got back to the house.

This old house

Life builds in expectations. It's hard to see structural expectations when things fall in line the way they are supposed to. Absence reveals structure. You don't see the posts and joists in your house because they are covered up with drywall and paint and carpet. What if the contractors never showed up to install any of that stuff and you moved in anyway?

Our entire life has been built in anticipation of children. We married young, went to university, bought a three bedroom house in a decent neighbourhood close to good schools. We have reliable four doored vehicles, good steady careers, and a dog.

The foundation is good. The roof doesn't leak and the walls are solid, but it's still hard to tell what each room is going supposed to be. You can see from one side all the way across to the other and it echos strangely. Apparently drywall isn't my thing and I can't get a contractor to call me back.

It occurred to me the other day, changing the floor plan at this stage could be pretty easy. Knock down a few walls, add a window here and there, maybe just pick the whole damn thing up and move it on down the road. A few changes to the structure might make the absence into a cool minimalist thing instead of just some unfinished suburban cutout. I'm left with a decision: is redesigning the same as giving up?

How hard could it be?

Last year my friend started brewing his own beer. I was doubtful that anyone could produce a drinkable beer in their basement. My dad experimented with a U-brew place years ago and even with professional help, it didn't go well. I'm pretty sure it went bad within two months of being bottled, and being a proper cheap Mennonite, he refused to pour it out. I endured one bottle, and that was plenty. So when this friend dropped off a sample, I was curious but not optimistic. As it turns out, if you do it right, you can make really good beer in your basement.

After a few batches, it was obvious that either this hobby was going to progress very slowly or he was going to quickly develop a drinking problem, so he pitched the idea of a collective to a few friends. He would continue to brew and experiment, while we would contribute money for ingredients and receive a portion of the finished product. I've never had so much beer in my house, nor has it ever been consumed so quickly. If I was drinking it all myself, I would be a disaster. Thankfully, the beer is good enough to bring along when we visit friends and serve when people come to our place.

The most exciting part for me is that I've started growing hops in my backyard to use in the beer. I had never knowingly seen hops growing before, but I had a garden already and figured "How hard could it be?" Like all projects that start with such a phrase, the answer is "Quite." Commercial hop yards use posts pounded into the ground with cables strung along the tops of them. Strings are then dangled from these cables and the hop bines (square shafted vines) climb the strings. You can buy rhizomes from existing hop farms, which are basically just pieces of root that you plant. It's not complicated, except the posts are generally around 18' high. The plants will go to 30' if they have something to climb, so I built this:

My wife is thrilled.

I ordered four varieties online and planted them this spring. All 8 plants came up and a few even made it to the top of my 20' structure with harvestable fruit to boot. The neighbours have been good about it, and their guesses about what I was building were pretty wild: an Easter bunny trap, a roller coaster, a gallows... For such a benign purpose, the construction was the scariest thing I've ever built. Standing at the upper reaches of my very extended extension ladder trying to hold boards and drill and my balance while reaching a little further than I ought to have done while the yet unsecured frame wobbled in the wind was very uncomfortable. Mama went inside so she wouldn't have to watch, but realized if she looked out the upstairs windows, she was looking straight at me. I'm told future yard projects are going to take some negotiating before materials are procured.

Moving Pictures

One of the most exciting things that could happen when I was a child was my father bringing home a borrowed videocassette player. We had a little 13" black and white television with rabbit ears that could pick up three channels most of the time, if you were careful. Two of them usually showed the same thing, so there wasn't really much TV to watch, but a movie was something else. The average movie would run about double my usual daily allotment of TV with no commercials and no twiddling with the antennae.

Dad would bring the big yellow padded suitcase into the living room and go to work connecting this exotic piece of equipment to our TV. There can only have been a couple of wires to the TV and one to the outlet, so it can't have been complicated, but to me it was pure wizardry. The top of the machine would pop up to accept a cassette, and we were ready for an adventure.

As kids, we had no say in when this machine would visit our home and we had no choice in the movies we saw. We could watch what Dad brought or go to bed. I had friends with colour television sets, VCRs, cable vision and less supervision, but there was little sense that I was being deprived of anything. My parents generally made time in front of the TV into a sort of currency, so we could negotiate a trade in foregone viewing time for things they would have bought us anyway. I earned my first canoe paddle and sleeping bag this way, one month each.

As a child, my view of history was entirely static, so the idea that watching recorded films at home was something new, or that one day perhaps it would become completely ubiquitous didn't enter my head. Videos were rare, the machines to play them were expensive, and all I knew was that getting to watch Herbie the Lovebug's black and white antics was the very definition of a treat. If the stars aligned just so, there might even be popcorn and half a can of soda to go with it.

Fast forward 25 years and I can stream Netflix on my phone any time I want. My TV is 6 times bigger than the old black and white model, remote controlled, highly defined, and rabbit ear free. I still have a VCR somewhere, but it is unnecessary. There is a little black box that gives me access to just about any movie I could think of to buy, borrow, or rent. I do hope I can always hear my five year old self having his little mind blown that we get to watch a movie tonight, no matter how easy it is.

Smile When You Lie

Eyes shining, smile moulded into permanence, he tells of the birth of yet another son. The grandfathers, the other fathers, the other men, they nod and smile and pat him on the back like he was a liberating soldier to a long-sieged city. He speaks of the bravery of his wife, the awe in his other children, his own calm handling of this newest arrival. Everything a man could want has fallen into his hands easily, though he speaks of it now as if he snatched it from the flaming jaws of a dragon.

I smile dishonestly yet again, but congratulations stick in my throat as I look for any reason to leave. These reminders of what I do not have and cannot be come more frequently these days. Dwelling on the fact is a road to bitterness, so I do my best to force the disappointment down and drown it out with a busy life.

I generally barricade the door with forced indifference. Friends and coworkers announce pregnancy, birth, and proudly tell stories about the latest phase their offspring are going through. Social convention dictates I smile and congratulate and nod sympathetically like all the other men. I do it mechanically and try to move either myself or the conversation on. Occasionally, regrettably, I become the focus of these discussions, with questions about when or if I will have children of my own. About why I don't already have a few. As if it were a simple choice, yes or no. I equivocate, maybe, we'll see, perhaps after (insert event here)...

Three and a half years of trying, surgery, praying, timing, and supplements. If it were a choice, we'd need a school bus by now. We've tried to force the issue and adopt. We are still thankful to have not experienced miscarriage, but when our adoption agency closed down suddenly last year, part way through our file, it felt about like that. We're nearly back on track now. Still haven't sent in the stack of paperwork for the new agency sitting ready on the desk. Once bitten, twice shy, and all that. Soon.

Running with the herd

The Vancouver Sun Run was last weekend, one week after the bombings in Boston that have filled the news. I ran as team captain for my work team. As it turns out, I'm the fastest employee over 10 km, but not the fastest team member. Not even close. I'm okay with that. There were over 48,000 people participating, providing me a few observations.

Everyone has to pee before running. I got off the train, walked towards the start area, and stood in a line a city block long to get to the pink plastic porta-loos. Standing there trying to not do the urgency dance, I ended up missing the gear check, meaning I had to wear my backpack with two water bottles and extra clothes for the whole race. Not a big deal, though it was actually my wife's backpack, meaning the "waist" strap sits just below my nipples. I don't think it slowed me down, but it did bounce around uncomfortably. Next year I'll plan for more efficient peeing.

Some people really hate waiting in line. When you register for an event of this size, they ask how long you expect to take on the course. You are then issued a coloured bib with a number. The colour of the bib matches arches of balloons over the road at the start area, and you are to go to your appropriate area to wait. This way, people walking with strollers shouldn't get trampled by track stars gunning for a new personal best. I was surprised then, being in the second fastest group, to pass so many baby carriages, seniors with walking sticks, and obese walkers. One white-haired gentleman had on his glaring white Tilly hat, pleated shorts complete with black pleather fanny pack, white socks pulled over his calves, black sandals, and a hiking pole strapped to each wrist. I passed him around the 3 km mark, meaning he had been way at the front of our group. These people had registered correctly, wearing their coloured bibs identifying them as slower, but lined up with the fastest group they could.

The big local headline last week was that 2 middle-aged folks cheated. They cut off the course to avoid the bridge sections of the course, cutting down the distance they had to run and eliminating the only hills of the race. I don't understand the motivation to cheat on a fun run. Even if that were your thing, there are cameras everywhere, so chances of you being photographed ducking a rope are extremely high. A little more sophistication is needed to manage it these days, and even more next year thanks to those boobs.

Two years ago, Vancouver hosted a riot loosely based on the outcome of a hockey game between the locals and the Boston team. For a while, it was extremely unpopular to own, let alone display, anything that might identify with the city of Boston. Vancouverites, it would seem, are not gracious losers. There were rumours and implications that the rioters weren't from here, that they came from out of town, and even out of country. However true that may be, the courts continue successfully prosecuting locals for the chaos. Last Sunday, Vancouverites showed that while they may lose rather badly, they can be vocally sympathetic. There were blue and yellow ribbons, banner, flags, and signs posted along the route, carried by runners, and waved by spectators. Red Sox and Bruins jerseys were everywhere. I'm not sure anyone in Boston especially cares that someone ran "for Boston," but the sentiment was good and it added a bit more camaraderie to an already friendly event (cheating notwithstanding).

All in all, it was a fun event. In the end, I was happy to ride the train away from the big city back to the far edge of suburbia, where the farms and mountains meet and we can all stretch our arms without hitting someone. My poor dog was frantically happy to see me, having thought I completely abandoned her that morning by leaving in my running clothes without her. I'll be back next year. I've got at least one more run lined up for spring and I'm contemplating longer distances later in the year.