Blue skies, finally

Today was the first continuously sunny day in more than a week. After being scoured by so much rain, sleet, and more rain, the sky was a brilliant, crisp blue. I decided to be a bad graduate student and skip school (and traffic). (In my defense, I've put in a lot of work this week, gone in early and stayed late, and submitted abstracts and manuscript drafts, so I decided playing hooky was okay.) On my day off, I...

...went to an Xtend Barre class at the decadently late hour of 9 a.m.

...decided to enjoy the sun by going to the park and jogging. I'm not sure where I mustered up the energy, but I managed to run four miles with negative splits, with my slowest mile being 9:28 and my fastest being 9:05. Those are good times for me, especially considering that I never felt like I was going all out.

Evidence of a gorgeous day.

...went on a coffee/hummus date with my husband at a new cafe in town:

The coffee was Panama something-or-other,

and it was amazing.

...borrowed some books from the library, including the new biography of David Foster Wallace.

...did some laundry.

...did not clean my house.

Re: that last one. It's funny how memories that once seemed insignificant - like, why have I remembered it all these years? What was the purpose in hanging onto it? - sometimes take on greater meaning. One such memory is of going to my first best friend's house to play. The place was always a complete disaster area: toys everywhere, sticky countertops, pet fur covering the couches, dust all over the floor. Even as a six-year-old, I noticed the disarray. But it was always so much fun. We let our imaginations run wild building stuff, coloring, moving toys from one room to another, going from inside to outside to inside to outside. Unlike my other friends' moms, she wasn't one to chase after us with broom, dustpan, vacuum cleaner, and annoyed tone. Instead, she was usually reading or writing or cooking or doing something for herself. She seemed to have her own life. I remember feeling really free and relaxed there, knowing that as long as we didn't fight or say/do anything inappropriate, no-one was going to yell at us.

Even with just one kid, it's hard to keep our place clean, and I try far less to do so than I used to. There are legos under pretty much every piece of furniture and Kindergarten artwork on almost every wall. Our ottoman is falling apart, and our couch has a three-inch gash in the cushion. My son's room looks - to me - like a mess, though he assures me that it is actually a house with its own kitchen, bedroom, and art center.

It's not a total pit. It's not dirty. It's just messy and lived-in. Well loved, well used. Nothing like a Pottery Barn ad. I could clean for 18 hours a day and my son could still undo it in a matter of minutes. 

Sometimes I wish it were cleaner (I'm type A: messes of any kind make me at least a little anxious) but then I remember my friends' house and I feel better. That feeling I had when I was there is the feeling I want him to have at home. Freedom to just be a kid and not worry about how an emptied toy box might affect the adult's psyche.

Embracing the Mom Jeans

Tonight, after years of deluding myself into thinking that I can make low-rise jeans work, I finally gave up and bought what I suppose some people would call "Mom Jeans."

Yes. I did. Because I just can't deal with the muffin top anymore. More than that, I can't deal with the possibility of anyone else asking me whether I am pregnant. (As it turns out, that question really bothered me. I didn't think so at the time, but not a day has gone by since that I haven't looked at myself more critically in the mirror.)

I can't remember when it was that low-rise jeans became the go-to jean fit (seven years ago? More?) but let's face the fact that a good portion of the population, in shape or otherwise, can't really make these work. At least, not if they're buying cheap, mass-produced department-store brands like I do.

Here's the thing. I'm in the best shape ever, for me. I feel strong. I can see muscles in my arms now, and muscles in my legs that I didn't know existed before I started marathon training and ballet/Pilates. In Xtend Barre class, I can plie, releve, and squeeze a ball between my upper thighs multiple times without thinking twice about it (three months ago, that move almost made me collapse in a sweaty, shaking heap). Plank, times two? No problem. 20 mile run? Not easy, sort of painful, but I can do it.

Yet I have hips. I have stomach flab. I have extra skin that will never go away unless I get plastic surgery, which I would never do because even if I HAD the money, which I do not, I'd much rather pay for a fancy tropical vacation than go under a knife. No question.

But do I really want my I'll-never-leave-you muffin top doing all the representing? No thank you.

I hesitated to try on the dreaded "mom jeans," and even when I had them on I was sort of cringing at first... But then I looked in the dressing room mirror and was like, HEY! Look at that! I can work this cut. No fleshy waterfall, no pseudo-baby bump. No sucking in my gut. Butt looks fine. Do I sort of look like I belong in a JC Penny ad? Kind of. But I'd rather my muffin top can hang out behind the zipper instead of over my waistband.

Also, Public Service Announcement: be warned that walking into the women's wear section of Target this fall/winter is like walking back into 1989-1992. I SWEAR I wore some of the exact same bulky/long sweaters in 7th grade.

Exhibit A

Sweater skirt

I also saw sweater pants, but I can't find them on the Target website. Sad.