“There ain't no answer. There ain't gonna be any answer. There never has been an answer. There's your answer.” ― Gertrude Stein

 and

“Whenever you get there, there is no there there.”
― Gertrude Stein

(daily ex., morning dog walk 2.3 miles, ytd walk 69.5 miles, pm tm run 3.6 miles, ytd run 121.6 miles, first month of the year over)

“As you start to walk on the way, the way appears.” ― Rumi

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 0.5 miles, it was minus 2 deg. F, minus 11 deg. windchill. My dog loved it though.  pm tm run 5.5 miles)

"I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times."...attributed to Bruce Lee

 (daily ex. update, no dog walk today, freezing temps and windchill,  pm tm 3.1 miles run)

“Perhaps some detours aren’t detours at all. Perhaps they are actually the path.” ― Katherine Wolf

 (daily ex. update, morning walk 3.5 miles, pm tm run 4.5 miles)

Brew me a cup for a winter's night. For the wind howls loud and the furies fight. Minna Thomas Antrim

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3.1 miles, pm tm run 4.3 miles)

What do you hang on the walls of your mind? – Eve Arnold

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 2.6 miles, brisk winds;  pm tm run 3.8 miles)

“Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.” ― Gary Snyder

 But it was cold and snowy this morning.  I will visit nature tomorrow.

(ex. update, morning dog walk 0.5 miles, pm tm run 4.2 miles)

If you stumble, make it part of the dance.

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3.1 miles, pm tm run 3.7 miles)

“May we raise children who love the unloved things”

 by Nicolette Sowder

May we raise children who love the unloved things--the dandelion, the worms and spiderlings. Children who sense the rose needs the thorn

& run into rainswept days the same way they turn towards sun...

And when they’re grown & someone has to speak for those who have no voice

may they draw upon that wilder bond, those days of tending tender things

and be the ones.

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 1.6 miles, pm tm run 3.6 miles)

“A bend in the road is not the end of the road… unless you fail to make the turn.” – Helen Keller

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3.3 miles, pm tm run 3.6 miles)

A frog decided one day that he was going to climb a tree and reach the very top. All the other frogs shouted at him saying: "It's impossible, it's impossible..." But the frog climbed the tree and reached the top. How? Because he was deaf and thought that everybody was encouraging him to reach his goal. Be deaf to negative thoughts, if your aim is to reach your goals.

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 2.1 miles, pm tm run 4.6 miles)

“I came to believe that heroism is neither being perfect, nor doing something spectacular. In fact, it’s just the opposite: it’s regular, flawed human beings, choosing to put others before themselves, even at great cost, even if no one will ever know, even as they realize the walls might be closing in around them…People are wrong to say that we have no heroes left. Just as they have always been, they are all around us, choosing to do the right thing, no matter what.” —Heather Cox Richardson, historian, professor, and author,

 (daily ex. update, morning icy, snowy dog walk 1.5 miles,  pm tm 2.7 run miles. Snow flurries all afternoon)

“I was educated once – it took me years to get over it.” — Mark Twain

 (daily ex update, morning shoveling snow 45 minutes, walk 0.4 miles.  pm streaksaver tm run 1.1 miles)

"It takes a snowflake two hours to fall from cloud to earth. Can’t you just see its slow, peaceful decent?” —Amy Krouse Rosenthal

  "A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.” — Carl Reiner

      It snowed all day so I stayed indoors and read.  There's is always tomorrow to shovel a path to the outside world.

(ex. update, no walks.  pm tm run 3.6 miles)

Come, let us have some tea and continue to talk about happy things. Chaim Potok

 (daily ex.update, morning dog walk 4.2 miles, pm tm run 4.5 miles, big snowstorm coming so probably no dog walk tomorrow, she'll be a sad puppy)

“If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.” ― Martin Luther King Jr.

 (daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3.3 miles, pm tm run 2.5 miles, tired today!)

"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.” —Muhammad Ali

 (daily ex. morning dog walk 4 miles, ytd walk 37.5 miles,  pm tm long run 6.7 miles, ytd run 62.7 miles)

Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Dory.

 (daily ex., morning walk 3.5 miles, pm tm run 2.2 miles)

“Do not grow old, no matter how long you live. Never cease to stand like curious children before the Great Mystery into which we were born.” ― Albert Einstein

 (daily ex., morning dog walk 3.1 miles, ytd walk 30 miles.  pm tm run 3.5 miles, ytd run 53.8 miles)

Akentannos (a toast)

 May you live to be 100 years.

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 2.6 miles, pm tm run 4.7 miles)

“In the end, we'll all become stories.” ― Margaret Atwood, Moral Disorder and Other Stories

 

(daily ex. update, pm tm run 3.7 miles.  no dog walk today as there is 1 inch of new snow hiding all the old ice beneath)

“Remember, a kick in the ass is a step forward.”

 No more excuses.

Do or do not.

There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs.

Do it over and over again until it becomes a part of who you are.

My goal for 2023 is to accomplish

the goals of 2022 which I should

have done in 2021 because I

made a promise in 2020 and

planned in 2019.

My new years 's resolutions are starting to crystallize in my mind! How are yours coming?

(daily ex., morning dog walk 3.2 miles, pm tm run 4.8 miles)

Rudyard Kipling

 "Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind."

"He wrapped himself in quotations - as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors."

"We're all islands shouting lies to each other across seas of misunderstanding."

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3 miles, pm tm run 3.5 miles)

A wise man once said ” Be careful who you let on your ship, because some people will sink the whole ship just because they can't be the captain".

 

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk 3 miles, pm tm run 4.4 miles)

You will get there but only if you keep moving.

“If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.” G.K. Chesterton

 (daily ex., 2 walks = 3.5 miles, pm tm run 4.5 miles, still very icy out)

“Each of you is perfect the way you are ... and you can use a little improvement.” ― Shunryu Suzuki

 (daily ex, icy morning dog walk 2.6 miles, pm tm run 4.5 miles)

"It is a myth of publishers that people want to read easy things." ~Umberto Eco, born this day, 1932.

 (daily ex,  icy morning dog walk 3.2 miles, pm tm run 4.4 miles)

Find joy and meaning in the mundane.

 Setting a goal will not change you. Achieving (or even failing to achieve) a goal will not really change you. It’s the thousands of moments in between those two points in time when the real magic happens. Make the decision to spend them with intention. Commit to being consistent in your pursuit, even (and especially) when you don’t feel like it. Find joy and meaning in the mundane. It’s as simple and as hard as that. -----coach Mario Fraioli

Thinking about some New Year Resolutions.

(daily ex. update, morning dog walk/slog 2.1 miles, pm tm run 2.2 miles)

                               

Dogs smell the passage of time.

 

The CryptoNaturalist

@CryptoNature

Bats can hear shapes. Plants can eat light. Bees can dance maps. We can hold all these ideas at once and feel both heavy and weightless with the absurd beauty of it all.

(daily ex. update, snowy icy walk with dog 1.1 miles, pm tm run 3.3 miles)

“That’s why you start where you are. Not where you wish you were. Not where you hope you are. Not where you think you should be. But right where you are.” ― Bill Burnett

 (daily ex. update, 20 min. shoveling light snow followed by 1.1 mile icy dog walk, pm tm run 5.2 miles)

"And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself.” Neil Gaiman

 No, 2023 won’t be the best year yet.

Nor will it be the worst.

You see, a year is a mosaic of absolutely everything.

Joy, fear, heartache, loss, beauty, pain, love.

Failure, learning, friendship, misery, exhilaration.

Each day, each moment even, is a tiny shard of glass in this beautiful, confusing creation.

2023 will be another mosaic to add to your wall of art.

A wall that shows the life, you are continuously gifted.

A wall that shows you are human.

A wall of survival.

I wish you many broken pieces of glass this year, my friends.

Because this is living.

And before you march on in to another year of ‘everything’, pause to look back, at the work you have created thus far.

It is quite something.

You are quite something.

Now onwards we go, my friends.

Onwards we go.

Donna Ashworth

‘Life’

(daily ex., morning dog walk 1.5 very icy miles. pm tm long run 5.1 miles. On my way to covering 2023 miles in 2023)