Life – Page 15 – Unlikely Martha

Health• Life

Fitness Friday….I Just Felt Like Runnin’

Well you know there isn’t much that can hold me down…not even a bad report on my cholesterol. I keeps it moving. So now that I know there is an issue on to the solution.

I am going to start running. Just.like.that.

0:00-0:42 in the video is about how my decision to start running went down in my head

In high school I ran track and spent some time on the cross country team. I remember having a certain love for running and would look forward to practice and the freedom that I felt with my ear phones on and the wind in my face. My love affair with running ended for the dumbest of all reasons. I didn’t want to mess up my hair.

Well, in light of recent events I have decided that I will more than likely be committed to something I enjoy. I hate the gym, I always feel like somebody’s watching me, so that’s out of the question. So running it is. I am on the hunt for a good jogging stroller and new running shoes. I am signing up to run a popular marathon held in Atlanta each year on July 4th, known as the Peachtree Road Race. I have no choice, I have to do this. For me, and for my family. That’s all the motivation I need.

I’m excited!

Can anybody recommend a good stroller and running shoes. How do I start off building up my endurance. I know I have some runners reading…give up the tips in the name of low cholesterol.

Have a good weekend!

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Family• Life• Marriage• Me• My Babies

An Unlikely Love Story

*cue Mary J. Blige and Method Man “All I Need and loop in your head as many times as necessary to get through this post*

Once upon a time in June of 1998 I met a guy named A.D. Initially I was not impressed, he grew up very different from me and being as shallow minded as I was at the time I wanted nothing to do with a freshman college student who didn’t own a car, or who grew up in the mean streets of Miami, Fl. At the urging of a mutual friend of ours that actually went to high school with him, I agreed to ONE conversation. As cliche as it sounds the rest was history!

We dated from June 1998 to August of 1999. We decided to go our separate ways and rekindled our relationship in December of 2002. Amazingly during that time I never saw him more than two times and we lived in a very small town but people always said he would ask about me. We agreed to give it another shot prior to my graduating from college and moving from Tallahassee to Charlotte.

He graduated in 2003 and joined me in Charlotte

We lived in Charlotte for a year and a half before moving to Atlanta. About a year after moving here we got engaged..Woot Woot!!

Then a week later we discovered I was pregnant…After all those years, our luck ran out!

Shortly before Lil Man was born we got married at the courthouse.

You see my boy..Peace up, A town down

We had our own little family

Shortly after our trip to Disney in Summer 2009, We decided it was time to add to the roster

All of this because these two people fell in love….

Moral of the story is, if you haven’t found your “love” yet be patient and overlook the material things. If I had stayed hung up on the fact that he didn’t have a car and grew up in the projects this post would have never been!

Happy Valentines Day!

22 Comments

Family• Life

Can’t Leave Well Enough Alone

Sunday we went to church and the sermon spoke on the premise that once people are delivered from certain events in their lives they often forget the specifics of whatever it was that held them captive in the first place. This specific sermon resonated with me in a major way. Lately, I have found myself in a constant sense of retrospective thinking, while not being able to recall those things which I so desperately want to relive. Why? I don’t know.

I often find myself thinking back to the days when my husband and I were an unhappily married young couple struggling financially to take care of an infant and at the time my ailing mother. Nothing in our life was right, on a daily basis I often questioned why we got married and was often disappointed in myself that at the time my salary would never be enough for me to leave and care for my son and mother without my husband’s help. I cried and prayed and prayed and cried. I knew my life wasn’t supposed to be that way, but I didn’t see a way out, a glimmer of hope, nor a light at the end of the tunnel. All I saw were overdue notices, people who looked just as miserable as me on my train rides to and from work because we only had one car….and my son’s smile and milestones. Those smiles and milestones kept me moving, and praying that God indeed had something much better for us.

Then there it was, the pinhole. The light started shining, although not the brightest, but we were squinting. Love started conquering all, we bought a house, we were living the dream..sort of. Mommy died, while physically we were moving up, emotionally I fell back down. Grief ensued, I tucked into myself and one day I had the resolve to beat those feelings, pick myself up and continue on. We had come so far after all. New cars followed much deserved promotions, faith and determination fueled our conquests. The hard work was paying off, we kept it moving. We’ve done a ton in five years and if we got through that mess we can surely get through anything together. Life has surely dealt us its wrath and compassion through heartbreak and immeasurable rewards.

So why am I so enamored with the past? What was back there that is holding my thoughts captive. I speculate that I really want to know when the change came, but I can’t remember. I wish I would have blogged that part of my life to chart my growth, or maybe the pastor was right, and God allows us to conquer things to never revisit them again because their purpose has been served…to move us to the next level. I just wonder why my thoughts can’t leave well enough alone.

I know I’m not the only one out there..Have you ever overcome something and can’t remember anything except for the fact that it happened and some photos?

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Life• Me• Soapbox

I Won’t Be Needing That Box

Its that time of year..you know where you start evaluating all that you have accomplished, all that you didn’t, where you went wrong, what you did right, all the while strategizing on your moves for the upcoming year. I am no different and I have been giving much thought to where I am trying to go in 2011. In the process of reflecting, my thoughts ventured to the ideal that society functions way too much on labels. SAHM, WAHM, WOHM, AP, MBA, Greek organization affiliations, single mom, divorcee…and the list goes on and on and on.

While such labels can help define what we do, our accomplishments or what organizations we belong to etc., in my opinion they are never to be misconstrued as defining who we are. Unfortunately the latter seems to be the norm, and whether we choose to admit it or not, these definitions are often used to generate stereotypes about people before they even open their mouths. These stereotypes can needlessly tear down or undeservedly build up. On more than one occasion I have been met with the “brush off” until answers were given to questions such as what do I do, what does my husband do, where was I educated..blah, blah, blah. You can honestly tell when individuals are being genuine or they are trying to tuck you into a “box”…the box with the bow or the one that is set outside beside the trash can.

Honestly, I’m just sick of the “boxes”. In the new year I am trying to think of creative ways to put off those types of questions, when I feel the wrong intentions are fueling the nosiness. If a person can’t take out the time to truly get to know me, but instead chooses to base their opinions of me on such things I would like to politely tell them to kick rocks in the new year.

*drops mic and steps down off of the soap”box”*

Anybody with me on this or do you differ in your opinion and feel the boxes can be stacked up and used as stepping stones. If you’re rolling with me on this one, what is a polite way to divert these types of questions?

I’m done…your turn!

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