Readiness

"Are you waiting for lightning,

A sign that it's time for a change?"

-- Steven Curtis Chapman, "Waiting for Lightning"

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Some quick words before rehearsal:

Been trying to exercise daily. Like my pregnant co-worker, it's not yet showing, but I am feeling more energized on a regular basis, even though I wake up two hours earlier and do a lot more.

As a guideline, I'm following the Navy's physical regimen for candidates for the Officer Training Command. This means for my age group, I would be expected to do (each in two minutes) 71 push-ups and 87 curl-ups, and to run 1.5 miles in 10 min., 30 sec. The push-ups are going fine, and the curl-ups would be easier without this persistent gut (had it since high school), but it's the running that has been a killer. I ran around the block three times yesterday morning, and by the end my throat was so dry and my passages so full of mucus that I had to stop; all this, by the way, after having run .9 miles in 12 minutes.

Gotta do better. Been stretching before and after everything (no sense getting shin-splints in the dead of winter) and just the flexibility is reassuring. I keep remembering my junior year of college, when I was in the best shape I've ever been in, and that wonderful, exhilarating 10-minute chunk between four hours of modern dance and three hours of rehearsal. I felt like I was moving from hard labor to soft, and I want that feeling when I get ready to go to work in the morning: Great workout. Now what?

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Got a new iPod. It's been a godsend during this whole process. So, oddly enough, has cabbage.

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My sister is flying out here to visit me! She's leaving Omaha to spend her winter break with me in Cincy. I'm seriously excited, looking up all sorts of activities (Ballet? Theatre? Hockey?) we can do together in this city. Not only am I finding things to introduce her to, I'm also discovering more about the place where I live. If you want to learn about your environment, pretend you're about to teach someone else about it.

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Rehearsal's approaching. Gotta learn these lines of narration. "And so Jack went back up the beanstalk..."

And so Chris goes back to work.