Not Quite a Blog…Not Quite NOT a Blog
My Thoughts and Stories…
Happy New Year Everyone! I’m starting off 2019 by immediately looking backwards into 2018! In 2018 I set some New Year’s Resolutions and for the first time in my life, made a semi-conscious effort to adhere to them. This may make you feel really good about your own resolutions!
Let’s recap with letter grades…
It’s been awhile since I’ve written anything, so I wanted to make sure that I got one or two more written before the end of 2018.
I was trying to think of a story to write that I thought everyone would enjoy and my wife suggested “The Mattress Story”. So here it goes…
This past weekend, I was swimming in a hotel pool with my 3-year-old daughter Grace. She can’t really swim, so I was basically holding her life jacket while she kicked and splashed. She loved it. I’m not big into swimming, but I love watching my kids have fun; so it was really enjoyable. The pool was warm, a bit crowded; but we had fun.
About 10 minutes into our Saturday morning swimming, a very quiet and shy little girl wearing green arm floaties came directly up to me and very quietly asked if she could play with us. She softly said her name was Destiny, and I would guess she was probably 4-6. I did a pretty thorough glance around to see if I could see some sort of parent figure looking at her or me; and didn’t see anyone that caught my eye. Regardless, she seemed pretty harmless, I asked Grace if she cared if Destiny played with us. Always one to make new friends, she said “Sure!”.
Well, Destiny was much more interested in me helping to hold her up by the strap on the back of her arm floaties so she could swim better (as I was doing with Grace), than playing with Grace. Since Grace is my daughter, I’m obviously going to be much more attentive to her and making sure she was having a blast. Unfortunately, I got to the point where I was almost ignoring Destiny. Not because she wanted to play, or anything like that; she was a sweet, albeit a little awkward, little girl. Because I wanted to make sure that I didn’t have to rescue my own kid from the bottom of the pool. Now, conversely, in the back of my mind during all of this was “what happens if I look over and this little girl goes under while I’m playing with my kid”. The whole ordeal is getting a bit stressful at this point. I glance around for some sort of parent/guardian for Destiny…nothing. :(
Parents, am I wrong to admit that in a situation where my kid and your kid are both going under water; that I’m saving my kid 10 times out of 10? Once mine is safe, I’ll go for yours, I promise. But am I a terrible person for admitting that? Look, I’ll save as many people as I can-given the opportunity, but my kids are going to be my first priority in a safety situation. Please tell me I’m not a jerk for thinking this way.
About an hour later Destiny was still there, but I think she was slowly getting the hint that if she didn’t want to play with Grace, I wasn’t really enjoying having to watch her as well. I felt really bad, but I’m not very good in those situations. Still no parent figure that I could see either, and I’ve had Lasik.
All of a sudden, out of nowhere, this giant inflatable ball appears! This thing was so cool!! The kids in the pool, young and old, loved it. So I grabbed Grace and we ran around the pool with the other kids ‘booping’ it back in the air like we were at a rock concert. This went on for about 20-30 minutes and then it was time for us to head back to the room to eat lunch, and I was out of breath.
As I’m getting out of the pool, Destiny floats over and again, very quietly says something to me: “I haven’t gotten to touch it”. I didn’t really know what she was talking about (I’m not bright), so I think I looked at her a little weird before realizing that she meant she hadn’t gotten to play with the ball that all of the other kids were playing with. I didn’t know what to say to her, so I said “well, keep trying!”. As you can tell, Tony Robbins and I are basically the same person…
As Grace and I are walking away, the ball comes flying out of the pool right towards us-slow motion style. I got my hands on the ball and this 10-12 year old girl comes running up to throw it back in. So, I stopped her quick and said “NO RUNNING BY THE POOL!!!” Just kidding. I actually said: “Hey, this little girl right here (pointing to Destiny in the pool) hasn’t gotten to touch the ball yet”. “OK!” the girl said and pointed right at little Destiny and under hand threw it right towards her!
It went over her head.
https://giphy.com/embed/OWpMbuG5W4r4Y
BUT! Since kids now days are becoming more awesome because they’re being forced to (See: Parkland, Florida). I know, I said no political talk, but let’s be honest; when you were in high school, were you doing/thinking the things that these kids are? No, the answer is no-you weren’t.
Anyways, The other kids all heard the conversation that I had with the girl outside of the pool, so they caught the ball and walked it over to Destiny so she could throw it in the air.
You guys, she lit up like the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. It was so much fun to watch her instantly being able to play with the rest of the kids around her. It made me really feel good that Grace was able to see the whole thing as my wife and I always stress being nice to everyone to her. Now, I’m not telling this story to make myself sound like this great and wonderful person; I can do that on my own-just ask me. I wanted to tell the story to remind people, that sometimes a very small act of kindness can make a person’s entire day. Not only will I remember how much fun Grace and I had while we were swimming, I’ll also remember the look on little Destiny’s face when she finally got to be included with her newfound friends.
Also, I still didn’t see any parents to watch their child have the best time of the their swimming session. I’ll blog more on my thoughts on THAT particular issue and other observations from the hotel later this week.
Have a great rest of your week everyone.
-ML
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Weight, that is.
I wouldn’t say that I jumped on the “New Year’s Resolution” jam-packed bandwagon, but late in 2017 I kind of made a decision that I wanted to get down to a more manageable weight. Winters in Minnesota are prime weight gaining time, and I wanted to avoid it this year. Throughout my life, I have had weight that has fluctuated fairly drastically. My freshman year in high school, I was around 140lbs, when I graduated I was hovering around 200. I’d like to say most of that was muscle (and honestly-some of it was), but a lot of it was Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. You guys, I ate it like it was candy; and I made it per the instructions on the box, you know, with 1/2 a stick of butter. At night–I’d eat it at night!! The WORST possible time to shove anything in your face. A tongue-in-cheek “thank you” to my parents for having a steady supply of it in the pantry. Not their fault, however. I made it, I ate it. To this day however, it is still absolutely delicious–let me state that fact.
In college, like most people-I peaked. Not mentally, athletically, sexually, or spiritually; I’m still waiting on those. I peaked weight-wise: Senior year, 218lbs. I realize that for many people-that isn’t that bad. Hell, my youngest brother is cut like a Greek God and weighs about that much and looks skinnier than I do. For me, however; 220lbs was the “OMG” moment. I had gotten engaged at the time, and I told her that at the wedding I would be 180lbs. 6 months, no problem. She was supportive and decided it would be inappropriate to laugh directly in my face.
The day of our wedding, I was 179.8. BOOM! I’m not sure that 40lbs in 6 months is healthy and recommended, but I did it anyways.
Fast forward 9 years I had gotten back to about 197-199. When I gain weight, I tend to gain it in my chest, back, and face. It’s not a good look, unless your, I don’t know–Santa(?). I also have a family history of males having heart problems as well. My dad had a heart attack in 2007 I believe, his dad had open heart surgery, his dad had a heart attack, so on and so forth…. I had also just had a routine physical and the Dr. told me that my blood pressure was borderline high, I had slightly high cholesterol and I was overweight (the last one wasn’t shocking). Knowing that I have 2 little kids that I want to be around for in 65 years and that I was probably exiting on to Heart Attack Alley, I needed to change.
I reached out to my aforementioned brother, Matt, who is a personal trainer and asked him how a dad of 2 young kids with a full time job can lose weight. His response was simple: “Stop shoveling food into your face hole”. Point taken, Matt…thanks. #brotherlylove
So, I made a “lifestyle change”. I stopped eating so damn much. Basically, my meals for the past 3-4 months have consisted of this routine: For breakfast I have a piece of toast (no, its not organic or gluten free or whatever…It is whole-wheat bread heated up), with 1/2 an avocado spread on it, with a fried egg on top, and a banana. Lunch is usually a salad that I bring from home; usually no meat, no cheese; 6 croutons. Dinner/Supper is whatever I want, I’ve had like 400 calories all day! I also try not to eat after 8pm. For snacks I have fruit, carrot sticks, and I drink a metric ton of water. Dammit, it’s working; I’m down almost 15lbs since mid-December.
“But Mike, how do you keep your muscles?” Terrific question, thank you for asking. I knew that I would probably need to work out a little bit, even though I hate it. Muscle burns more calories than fat, so it made sense to do something. I researched that push-ups are a terrific at-home workout because they work a ton of different muscles around your body if done correctly. So I have an app on my phone called “Push Ups (genius!)” that reminds me to do push ups every day. So far, since Jan 1, 2018 I have done almost 5,000 push ups. My mom told me that she can tell–I’m not sure if that counts or not, but I’ll take it. I’m swimming in a hotel pool this weekend with some family that hasn’t seen me in a while, I’ll keep you posted. I’m sure you’ll be anxious to hear the update.
In an interesting twist, I went to the dentist the other day (my dental health is a whole ‘nother blog…I’ll save you the details, let’s just say–I have another appointment) and they do what they call a “courtesy blood pressure check”. They checked mine and rattled off some number over another number, said “hmm”, and wrote it down. “Is that good?” I asked sheepishly, expecting an ambulance to back up to my chair. “It’s almost perfect!” she said. My blood pressure had gone from borderline high to perfect (basically) in under a year. Keep in mind, I haven’t really done anything outside of eat healthier and do a stupid number of push-ups. This was the first time that the whole “feed your body with good food, and good things will happen” had ever had an effect on me. Also, I’m not sure if that’s an actual quote or not…if I just made it up right now, I’d love credit–I need some followers. :D
The entire reason for this post was that I saw a very overweight gentleman at the store this morning buying 8 (EIGHT) 1.25L Mountain Dews, and I was buying a case of water. I didn’t even mention that encounter until right now…oh well. That’s what happened and somehow it brought me to this. If you want to lose weight, you can; just stick with it and eventually you’ll get there! People now days are learning how to be kinder and more supportive, they’ll help you! Thanks for reading.
Please eat responsibly.
-ML
Not Quite a Blog...Not Quite NOT a Blog 