Duxford Girl

Moooooo, splash, splash. You guessed it, another swim night:

http://www.shape.com/fitness/sports/training_triathlon_week_1_wednesday

Swimming can sometimes be daunting before I even leave the house. First of all, I don't want to wear my competitive suit right now. It's too tight around my chest and squeezes everything in exactly the wrong way. Even when my weight is down I look stupid in my suit. I almost welcome the fact that I'll have to be in a wetsuit for my tri. I'll know I've finally hit the pinnacle of fit and thin when I can put on a Speedo or Tyr and not look like a giant potato. So for now, it's various parts of tankinis that I wouldn't wear to the beach and don't care if the chlorine destroys them. Aside from my on-going body hatred is the timing of the lane swims at my local pool. The lanes don't open until 2015 and I'm ready for my day to end by that point. Tonight I had the added irritation of the spring blizzard going on. It took a lot of telling myself how much better I'd feel if I just sucked it up and went to make it out the door. I did make it out the door, though, and I did feel better for having done it. I even rewarded myself with a few minutes in the steam room. Thanks to the bad weather, I had a lane to myself as well as the steam room so there are rewards for being diligent.

I looked at last year's results for the Tri-It and my while my 350 meter swim time isn't stellar, it's within what the bottom of the pack did. If I can shave off just five minutes, I can get to the MOP. I know that the goal of anybody's first race should just be to finish but it would nice to not be dead last.

Our dinner tonight was sesame encrusted tuna with asparagus and orange sauce. Both were Laura Calder recipes although, because I couldn't find poppy seeds, I substituted black sesame seeds. When ES got home he sat down to feed the baby while I finished grilling the fish. We talked about our days and complained about the weather while drinking a nice blush. Junior was contentedly babbling as we ate what I had a hard time believing I had prepared because it tasted so good. Somehow, this leisurely culture around the dinner made the meal so much more filling. It's no wonder that when people eat fast food or a packaged dinner in front of the TV they're back up looking in the fridge minutes later. That was my habit for years but while pregnant I resolved that there would be no family meals in front of the TV as a rule. That decision has led to meals as described above and I'm thinking that along with the fact that people don't prepare and eat real food anymore, the whole culture of sharing a meal has been lost. It takes some effort and planning to have meals like this (and a whole lot less TV, internet and email) but I hope that even when I go back to work I'm able to create these small pockets of calm for the family.