Parents

There are not many things in life that we get to do all for ourselves. There is one thing I do each day for me. It is my zen at the end of the day. It is my moment to breathe and process what happened each day. It is just for me. It is my daily run. Multiple times in the past few months I have had individuals ask me why I work out. Do I do it for myself? To lose weight? For Chris?

I run all for me. I work out to take care of me, to stay healthy and fit. I do it because it is the one hour of my day that is entirely for me. I can make the choice to just listen to music, or to read (yes I read while I run on the treadmill), or to zone out and meditate. It is my time. At the end of the day it does not matter how much I weigh, or the tone of my body, it matters how I feel about myself. Am I confident about who I am and how I treat others? Yes. That is what matters, not the curves or the sag of what the years have done to my body.

I am a health nut. My parents passed on when they were in their 50’s. I never once remember seeing my parents workout. Of course, my dad being a contractor had plenty of physical activity, but I never saw them consciously focus on what they ate, or specifically thinking about physical fitness. I want to be different. I want to be active. I want to think about what I put into my body. Is it good fuel, or crappy sugar that does nothing to give me energy throughout my day?

What do you do all for you? I hope there is something.

I found this on someone’s Pinterest page and it brought tears to my eyes. I am not sure if it was the photo or the letter itself:

Letter from a Mother to a Daughter: “My dear girl, the day you see I’m getting old, I ask you to please be patient, but most of all, try to understand what I’m going through. If when we talk, I repeat the same thing a thousand times, don’t interrupt to say: “You said the same thing a minute ago”… Just listen, please. Try to remember the times when you were little and I would read the same story night after night until you would fall asleep…..

It made me think of my mom and my grandma. It made me think of all the times I was not patient with them. The times a few years ago when my grandma would call me at 4 a.m. confused and ask why I had not come over yet. Even though I was on the West Coast and she lived in the Midwest. I would talk to her and get her calmed down and she would call me back an hour later confused again.

I am sharing it with you today, in hopes that you will be patient with your mom or dad, grandma or grandpa. That you will listen and understand when they repeat themselves. That you will love them anyway. And, for those of you with little ones, that you will read the story again, and again, and again.