Choices

I started Weight Watchers yesterday morning again. I was surprised to see that it had been almost a year since I last went to a meeting. I didn't do too bad in a year. I held my own. I had only gained 4 pounds. It could have been a lot worse. It's important that I come to the meetings. Weight Watchers holds my portions of food accountable. It's hard for me to do it on my own. I eat pretty healthy but I can easily overeat and put heaping portions on a plate or eat an entire watermelon in a day.

After Weight Watchers, I put myself back on active status at Timberhill Athletic Club. I decided that this was another essential choice for my need to be healthy. Health must come first and since I have no health insurance or savings, my membership in this club is my insurance policy. I hadn't really exercised in nine months so I was a little surprised that I was able to swim slowly for 30 minutes, do 15 minutes on the exercise bike, 15 minutes on the elliptical runner, and 15 minutes of lifting weights for the arms. That's not a lot and that's not as much as I was able to do before I left but it's a start. It felt like heaven to be in deep water in the pool. I think I broke my foot in a fall at work at the first of the month. My husband said there is nothing you can do for it. He had a broken foot once. He walked our daughter down the isle with a broken foot. All they do is put on a padded foot brace and it heals on its own. The padded foot brace costs several hundred dollars so it will just have to heal on its own. It doesn't hurt as much but it does prevent me from yearning to go out there in the garden and walking on the uneven ground. My feet and legs felt better after exercising yesterday so I will be fine.

I do regret one choice yesterday. Bob Welch spoke in Newport last night at 7 p.m. I didn't check the time in my e-mail writers announcements until 5:30 p.m. Newport is at least 1 1/2 hours away from my house and that's if I know exactly where to go in Newport. Traffic would have to be just right for me to make it on time plus I wasn't ready. I'm ashamed that I wasn't more organized and ready to go because I missed out big time. Bob Welch is the author of nine books, a columnist at the Eugene Register-Guard, and a professor at the University of Oregon. He spoke on "persistence: the marathon of researching, writing, and selling non-fiction." This was exactly what I needed to hear. Why do I let myself miss out? I reach for the brass ring and fall short. I hope I have another chance. Opportunities like this don't happen every day. I wish Willamette Writers and Oregon Writers Colony would have speakers in Corvallis. There are so many writers in Corvallis. It's hard with gas prices going up so high.

After chiding myself inwardly for not being more organized and going to Newport, I turned my anxiety into my writing and finished my assignment seven for my novel writing course with Long Ridge Writers Group. I finished it and it's good but could still use some revision.

This morning I was reading the book Daniel gave me for Mother's Day entitled, THIS IS NOT THE LIFE I ORDERED--50 WAYS TO KEEP YOUR HEAD ABOVE WATER WHEN LIFE KEEPS DRAGGING YOU DOWN. It's a great book of inspirational stories. I got it in the mail on Monday and I'm on page 100. This morning I came across two parts I'll share with you that have great meaning for me.

"All of us have had to confront an individual or organization that 'wronged' us. It wasn't easy. Yet we are all glad we didn't suffer in silence and allow the inappropriate situation to continue." page 98

And then here's a quote by Ayn Rand, one of my favorite writers that I discovered in college in the late 60's at Oregon College of Education, now Western Oregon University.
"Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have not been able to reach."
--Ayn Rand, Russian-born novelist and philosopher (1905-1982)

Insprired by Rand and a quote that came in my Writer's Digest Book Club booklet to remember that talking about writing is not writing, research is not writing, planning to write is not writing, reading about writing is not writing, and that only writing is writing, I'll go and write.