A Thanksgiving

Last year at this time I was trying to wear out my gym pass by visiting as many Zumba classes as possible.  I was walking by pie, eating serving sizes and going running when I wasn’t prepping food or at the gym.  I was a whole lotta different Shazam.  I tell ya.  


This year I’m a whole lot more Tamara than Shazam.  I’m much more human than superhero these days.  I look back to a year ago and I was gearing up for races, getting ready to make my 2016 miles in 2016 and was determined to not gain weight through the holiday season.  I was a force to reckon with!  An exhausting, relentless force, oh my goodness!  Running here!  Riding there!  Training for this!  Making that class!  I never had time for anything but working out, it seems.  There’s nothing wrong with that, but I’m realizing that I’ve missed a side of myself tremendously.  Crafting and creating and making is therapy for me, just like running is, and I need to strike a balance.


My injury changed me.  That may seem silly, but it forced me to slow down and fill my time with other stuff besides running.  I was going stir crazy at first, not knowing what to do; picking fights with my poor husband and paying way too much attention to the election or my iPad.  What’s a girl to do who doesn’t want to exchange an injury for 150 pounds of fat on her body?  She plugs in her glue gun, finds her hammer and level, mines her supplies and goes to town making anything that pleases her fancy on Pinterest.  (Link to most of the printable tags here.)

So that’s what I’ve been doing.  I’ve been taking short runs and occupying the rest of my time with my paper cutter, my sewing machine and cricut.  I’ve redesigned our Christmas using things we already had around the house and have just been getting down and dirty with homemaking.  


That said, tomorrow Gigi and I are taking the first trial-longer-run since October.  We are planning to take on ‘extra large’.  It’s a 2.8 mile loop that is the furthest you can go without taking on some major hills or wooded areas in our neighborhood.  I don’t foresee a problem and am excited to prove to myself that I can still run. And craft.  I keep pushing myself to be a distance runner, when really, I feel much more like a 15k, tops, runner.  I’m still planning to train up to the half marathon this year, and maybe I’ll change my mind and want to keep going that distance, but after that I think I’m going to relax it for a little while and see what my life looks like as a life-lover rather than life-chaser.  I think distance became what I did because I didn’t know how else to fill my time but I think I’m figuring that out. Because that’s what I think Tamara Shazam needs to be about from now on: I need to be a person who runs within a balanced, healthy life. I think that’s because there’s this other part of me that’s pretty important too, and I need to see what she’s got up her sleeve now.  

One Comment

  1. Paula

    Thanks for writing this post. I am where you “were”. Trying to run more but losing myself. I love what running has done for me, but feeling like a loser or failing because my speed isn’t there & the longest run I have ever completed is a 10k. My back has been very painful. Maybe I should allow myself time off without guilt.

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