FRAMILY

I want to write about something that is very near and dear to me today: Framily.

Many of you might be asking why an English major insists on lumping two words together, but it's the best description I can come up with. Framily= Friends + Family, and it is a concept I have grown to cherish even more in my adult years since leaving Michigan, though it was important to me in childhood as well. For the purposes of this blog not being the length of War and Peace, I am going to limit my musing on framily to just the one in Kansas.

First of all, I have to say that I'm the lucky Michigan transplant-my mom is from out here and I have family two hours in any direction. That being said, I still elected to live in a "commune" with 5 other Michigan teachers in an old historical home we promptly named the Michigan House. The house then made the "New teacher" tour the following year! W00T! In this house was another Kappa Delta from Valpraiso, a couple of GVSU grads, one of the GVSU's sisters and her wife, all of whom had know the KD since childhood. We settled into a routine and built relationships with each other. One Sunday, a few of the Michigan external friends ended up at the house for breakfast...wheat pancakes, left over cheese enchiladas, scrambled eggs, and beer. This tradition came to be known as "Family Breakfast." Framily are the people who come to your house on Sundays, sit around with you, discuss classrooms and lives, over left over enchiladas-and keep the tradition alive to this day (though we're on hiatus). Framily are the people who call you when their alternator is finally dead, and you drive them all over Garden for almost two hours, helping them get the part and then have it installed at a back door operation for cheap. Framily are the people who come with you to your grandmother's four hours away and enjoy the whole trip. Framily are the people you have spur of the moment cook out withs, the roommates you combine resources with to make a full meal instead of one part of a meal. Framily are the people who make you a fruit pizza for your birthday and make sure you drink an entire bottle of wine AND get home. Framily are the people who sit next to you in church, for whom you babysit on a Friday night for free, the people who watch your dogs for you for nothing more than a thank you. Framily are the people who help you change out the bulbs on your car and charge you nothing more than a thank you, the people whose own families offer to do your house inspection for you for nothing more than a thank you. In short, "Framily" are the family you choose, the people who make your day to day life worth living.

I love mine!

It's Official!

Today, I signed up for my first 5K.

It's not that big of a deal-just a 5K here for the Pregnancy center. It's on a Saturday I have off from Forensics. It's in mid-April, so I have just over two months to bust my own butt into shape. I don't care what my time is. I care if I finish, which I will, even if I'm just barely still jogging the whole way across the finish line and collapse at the end, crying and panting (and you'd better believe that'll be what I look like). I'm excited and pumped, but terrified, too.

Here we go!

The Second Run

I'm not sure I fully understood the power of a good running mix until this morning. Sure, I've always preferred to listen to music while working out, but today, the music was what pushed me. I have a "Workout" mix on my iPod, along with my "in class" mix, my "feel good" mix, and my "breakup" mix (hmm....meant to take that off a while ago...). My workout mix is anything with a beat that makes me want to pound the pavement (treadmill, it's -40 here today with the windchill) or get up and MOVE. It's songs that inspire me to push and push harder. It's songs that remind me of people and times that I want to reclaim, or people and times that I'm better because I got rid of. I go from Shania Twain to Britney Spears to "Standing Outside the Fire" to anything quick by Glee. Heck, I have Darren Criss' "No Way" on there. My feet pound out a rhythm: Ash-LY. Ash-LY. It reminds me why I'm busting my butt on this machine when I could doing...well...ANYTHING else. I went a little bit farther today (just .06 overall, but that means I upped my running pace just a small amount). I sweated just a little bit more today. I did, however, hate it just a little bit more today. Dad tells me day three is the hardest and that it'll get better. My sunshine buddy tells me it's all mental-well, that's certainly true! Though I do have to say I love how loose my back gets after a run, and I can actually twist and move and feel things readjusting themselves the way they should.

I'm sure that the above paragraph could be shortened quite a bit, but today is an extreme weather today. So I don't care. I'm not an English teacher today. I'm just a couch potato, an elliptical nut, training to run. I hate it while I'm doing it, but I remind myself that I'm at least here and able to do it. Once I'm off the treadmill, I look forward to going back for another round.

I guess I should now tackle the stack of homework that is threatening to bite me. I remember this part of college-death by text book. I remember how when I couldn't deal with another thought going through my head, I could walk up those three stairs, through the double doors that separated third west from third west central, past Cutcher's suite, and collapse onto the futon of a girl who was always a friend. Sometimes we'd go cook, sometimes we'd just lay there and let our brains rest. Well, now she's here, telling me to get up, take all that Albion wisdom, and get moving. I hear you, I hear you! I'm going, I'm going...