Against my better judgment, the Xman is playing football. While I still think it isn’t the sport for him, and that he’s just a pound or two over the halfway point of the “can’t be more than this” weight, he’s enjoying playing the game and he is always fast enough that I pray he isn’t squished like a bug.

One of the plusses for me though is that now I have two plus hours to sit in my car. So, of course, I have been doing what comes naturally to me – reading for a luxuriously long amount of time. The second thing I’ve taken to doing is, instead of walking the treadmill, walking around the track for 10 laps, which takes me about 40 minutes, and I think is about 2.5 miles.

On the book end – I’ve read Tess of the d’Urbervilles, The Kalahari Typing School for Men, Innocent Traitor, and Circle of Quilters. All good. All very good. I’m very excited to be picking up the fabulous Bev’s newest book Royal Monastic tonight.

On the walking side of things – I have been learning a bit about myself. One of my motivators for walking on the treadmill is that I can read while I do so. I have not yet quite figured out how to read while I walk on a track without falling off the track, so I’ve been just alone with my thoughts. I know that there is a goal to “pray without ceasing”, and I have tried to put that into practice. However, I am not very good at it, finding it much easier to contemplate things that I’ve been needing to think about, watch the footballers and cheerleaders practice, pay attention to the birds and wonder what kind they are, think more about those things I need to be thinking about, and oh yeah, pray for those who cross my mind and throw in a Jesus Prayer now and then.

The only down side is after two plus hours out of my night spent thusly, my time at home is just about nil and I feel like I’m really running behind on my “to do” list. And, I must admit, yesterday I declined to walk around the track in the rain and just read more.

(photo credit)