At some point in your life you and your friends went outside to play for the last time, but none of you knew it.

Sadly it doesn't end there.  Life repeats itself. 

(daily ex., morning slow dog walk 1.2 miles, eve streaksaver 1.1 mi)

When you are a kid, you don't realize you are watching your mom and dad grow up.

 (daily ex., morning slow dog walk 1 mile, pm slow jog 3.1 mi)

“I need solitude. I need space. I need air. I need the empty fields round me; and my legs pounding along roads; and sleep; and animal existence.” —Virginia Woolf in a diary entry dated October 15, 1930

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 2.5 miles slow and forced.  pm jog 3 miles)

“The portrait of my parents is a complicated one, but lovingly drawn.” — Joyce Maynard

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 1.7 mi, pm jog 1.3 mi)

It isn’t the mountain ahead that wears you out; it’s the grain of sand in your shoe.

(morning dog walk 0.5 miles, shovel snow 20 min., pm streak saver jog 1 mile) 

You don't always have to tell your side of the story. Time will.

 Happy Thanksgiving Weekend!

(Morning dog walk 0.8 miles, pm streaksaver 1 mile)

There must be quite a few things a hot bath won't cure, but I don't know many of them.--Sylvia Plath

 Happy Thanksgiving Eve.

(morning dog walk 0.7 miles, pm streaksaver mile)

Maya Angelou / . "Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between."

 (morning dog walk, 0,7 miles, pm streak saver jog 1 mi)

Creative people don't have a mess, they have ideas lying around everywhere.

 That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

(daily ex., pm slow jog 3.1 miles)

“What is done cannot be undone, but one can prevent it happening again.” ― Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

 (daily ex., morning slow dog walk 1.5 miles, pm slow jog 5.7 miles)

“Guns are the crutches of the impotent.” — Arthur C. Clarke

 

“If we don't end war, war will end us.”

― H.G. Wells

(daily ex. update, 3 walks = 5.3 miles, pm streaksaver slow jog 1.5 miles, Goodnight all)

Pity the nation whose people are sheep,

and whose shepherds mislead them.

Pity the nation whose leaders are liars, whose sages are silenced,

and whose bigots haunt the airwaves.

Pity the nation that raises not its voice,

except to praise conquerors and acclaim the bully as hero

and aims to rule the world with force and by torture.

Pity the nation that knows no other language but its own

and no other culture but its own.

Pity the nation whose breath is money

and sleeps the sleep of the too well fed.

Pity the nation — oh, pity the people who allow their rights to erode

and their freedoms to be washed away.

My country, tears of thee, sweet land of liberty. ~Lawrence Ferlinghetti

(daily ex., morning very slow dog walk 1.6 miles, pm slow jog 5.5 mi)

/ Alan Watts / . "The future is a concept, it doesn't exist. There is no such thing as tomorrow. There never will be, because time is always now. That's one of the things we discover when we stop talking to ourselves and stop thinking. We find there is only present, only an eternal now."

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 1.3 mi, pm slow  streaksaver jog 1.1 mi)

“We need to spend some time in the weeds to appreciate the flowers.” — Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 1.3 miles, pm slow jog 3.2 miles)

Arabic proverb: "They asked the Pharoah, what made you a tyrant? He said: No one stopped me."

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 1.6 miles, pm slow jog 3.6 miles)

 "When I was 19 years old I couldn't go to college because I came from a poor family. We had no money, so I went to the library at least. Three days a week I read every possible book. At the age of 27 I have actually completed almost the entire library instead of university. So I got my education in the library and for free. When a person wants something, they will find a way to achieve it.

I would like to remind you one thing:

Humans should never forget that we have been assigned only a very small place on earth, that we live surrounded by nature that can easily take back everything that has ever given to man.

It costs absolutely nothing in her way to one day blow us all off the face of the earth or flood the waters of the ocean with her single breath, just to remind man once again that he is not as all-powerful as he still foolishly thinks. "

Ray Bradbury

American writer

(daily ex., 2 slow dog walks = 3.3 miles, pm slow jog 4 miles)

There is nothing more pathetic than caution when headlong might save a life, even, possibly, your own. - Mary Oliver

 (daily ex. update, morning very slow dog walk 3 miles, pm slow jog 3.5 miles)

Happy Diwali

Diwali is the Hindu festival of lights with its variations also celebrated in other Indian religions. It symbolises the spiritual "victory of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance". Wikipedia 

I love this!

“The road and the tale have both been long, would you not say so? The trip has been long and the cost has been high... but no great thing was ever attained easily. A long tale, like a tall Tower, must be built a stone at a time.” ― Stephen King, The Dark Tower

(daily ex. 3 walks = 4 miles, pm slow jog 2.5 miles)

“I am still every age that I have been. Because I was once a child, I am always a child. Because I was once a searching adolescent, given to moods and ecstasies, these are still part of me, and always will be... This does not mean that I ought to be trapped or enclosed in any of these ages... Far too many people misunderstand what 'putting away childish things' means, and think that forgetting what it is like to think and feel and touch and smell and taste and see and hear like a three-year-old or a thirteen-year-old or a twenty-three-year-old means being grownup. When I'm with these people I, like the kids, feel that if this is what it means to be a grown-up, then I don't ever want to be one. Instead of which, if I can retain a child's awareness and joy, and 'be' fifty-one, then I will really learn what it means to be grownup.” Madeleine L'Engle

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 2.7 miles, pm slow jog 3.3 miles)

"And I'll keep this world from dragging me down. Gonna stand my ground."

 (daily ex. update, slow morning dog walk 3.1 miles, pm slow jog 3 miles)

From Nayyirah Waheed's book, Salt

you broke the ocean in 

half to be here.

only to meet nothing that wants you.

             immigrant

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 1.3 miles, beat the snow/rain home.  pm jog 4.4 miles)

“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” – Albert Einstein

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 2.1 miles, pm streaksaver jog 1.1 mi)

Always good to re-read

 Listen to the mustn’ts, child.

Listen to the don’ts.

Listen to the shouldn’ts, the impossibles, the won’ts.

Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me...

Anything can happen, child.

Anything can be.

-Shel Silverstein

“The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.” ― Walter Bagehot

(daily ex.,slow morning dog walk 2.7 miles, 2 pm slow jogs = 4.3 miles, must start increasing my walks and runs or I won't reach 2023 miles this year)

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe / . "We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe."

 (daily ex., morning slow dog walk 2.5 miles, mostly talking to a neighbor, pm slow jog 4 miles)

“Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.--Joseph Heller, Catch 22

 (daily ex., morning dog walk plus fleet feet group walk 3.6 miles, pm slow jog 3.6 miles)

An aged man is but a paltry thing, A tattered coat upon a stick, unless Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing For every tatter in its mortal dress,

 W.B.Yeats, Sailing to Byzantium

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar quoted this poem in his newsletter today but he stressed the "unless." He feels that:

Those “tatters” aren’t our weakness, they’re our strength. They challenge us, sure, but they also force us to place our lives in clear perspective. We are sledding down a hillside that we will never climb up again. So, we must learn to love the sliding, the view, the crisp air, and those cheering us on.

We must learn to love the sliding.

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 1.6 miles, pm slow jog 4.5 miles)

Can MIT students become certified pirates? All MIT undergraduates must complete eight points of physical education classes to graduate—but students that complete courses in archery, pistol shooting, sailing, and fencing are granted pirate status with a tangible certificate.

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk slow 1.7 miles, pm slow jog 3.3 miles) 

“The Earth does not belong to us: we belong to the Earth.” – Chief Seattle

 Happy World Vegan Day.

(daily ex., morning dog walk 1 mile, pm slow jog 4.5 miles)

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley : It's a perfect night for mystery and horror. The air itself is filled with monsters.