run on sentences

...but death is so damn final. It was weird not visiting Bob and Deb on Saturday like I usually do. I didn't get to tell Bob about the 21 miler that Suzanne, Paula and I did the day after we said goodbye to him, or how I found a shotgun in a case in the school parking lot while I waited for Paula and Suzanne. I called the police and while they were grateful that I called them so some kid didn't find the gun, they were irritated that I had touched the butt of the gun and even more irritated when I said I should have known better cause I watched CSI reruns. That same run, we saw a bride to be standing on a rock in her front yard - no one was taking pictures...she was just standing there. All of these things I would have told Bob, as well as how an old guy last week told us we were breaking the law. "Did you know you are breaking the law?" he said as his car slowed down. "How so" we asked, thinking he was going to be one of those cranky old farts who was mad at...

My friend Bob died on Monday, the 22nd, just the way he had planned. His funeral was today. I spoke at it and my talk is below. What a shitty disease ALS is. The picture is of him getting his medal at the finish line in Boston in April 2007. What a marathon my friend Bob ran these past few years! And what a privilege to have been part of his final marathon. The first time I met him was when he was running his first half marathon with Tom Loken. He quickly became part of our running group. On Saturdays, we ran anywhere from 6-20 miles. We trained together for Bob’s first marathon – the Salt Lake Marathon. Over the many miles, we talked about our families, how we could run better and faster, kids, just about everything –except horses. Bob loved his family, was proud of his kids. I always described him as someone who emanated kindness. To me, he was “Sun News Bob” because of his email address but also because he was always positive – with that great sense of humor that even ALS didn’t tak...

....said my little girl at about age 18 months (and 30 years old today) as she watched her grandma who was visiting us get out of the shower. Happy birthday sweet sis! How did this happen to both of us? I am not old enough to have a child of 30! Thirty years ago Bruce and I were at the hospital trying to have our first child. We didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl because ultrasounds were not commonly done in those days. We went to the hospital early the night before Kseniya was born and were sent home because they figured I wasn't ready. The doctor said to go home and drink some beer and he gave me a sleeping pill. Bruce has already given me an enema...we were the yuppie parents of that time who did not want to have an enema in the hospital. Now no woman has to suffer the indignity of her husband giving her an enema or even having one in the hospital. We were sent home two more times and the third time they kept us. I told Bruce I would not go home again without a b...

Last week I ran a half marathon that started up in the canyon, at 7 Am. I have done this run a few times before. The first time I ran it was the first time I met my friend bob, who will die on September 22nd. He didn't have ALS then and probably it was the last thing on his mind as he completed his first 1/2 marathon which really started his running career. I thought of this as I ran my first 6 miles up hill - up the back of Emigration canyon on a beautiful soon to be fall day. My friend Suzanne and I were going to run together but she is faster up hill than I am. I am faster going down. I watched Suzanne run effortlessly up the hill (or so it seemed). She is tall and slender to my short, kinda slender, but stubby self. I am not putting myself down, I know I look pretty okay for an "older woman", but I am what I am or at least I guess I am how I see myself. I always have admired her running outfits and a time or two I bought tops like hers only to try them on and be force...

This morning when I put my running shoes on, they felt all soft and lumpy. Taking off my right shoe, I smiled when I found some Seaside sand from our finish of the Hood To Coast Relay last weekend....the second one for me and also for Bruce, who drove the van both years - a hard job because he can't relax and he is a good sport about it. The Hood to Coast has about 1000 vans with 6 runners per van - that's a lot of vans and a lot of runners. The one picture here is me just before my first leg on a bike path in downtown Portland at 11 PM or so. The other is of our team at Mt. Hood, getting ready to send our first runner down the hill. What an experience! How lucky can you be, at 54 and almost 55, to be able to run 15+ miles in a 24 hour period with no sleep? And do 8.5 minute miles besides? Life is good for sure. I know it isn't all about luck cause I work hard to keep running. The luck part is probably in having my dad's good strong Finnish genes and a lot of SISU . I a...

I discovered my nurse face when I was a nurses aide in a small 22 bed hospital some 34 years ago. I first used it when I was asked to change a dressing on a woman who I knew...the mother in law of a lady I babysat for. She had had abdominal surgery and had an open wound that was oozing fecal material (poop, in plain English). It smelled horrible and none of the "real nurses" wanted to be bothered with it so they sent me, the lowly aide in nursing school, to do it. I remember looking at this woman who watched me carefully to see if I would show any revulsion. I decided then and there, to do whatever I had to do, but I would not gag or let her see any signs of how I was feeling (nauseated, horrified, and sorry for her all at the same time)- to allow her to keep her dignity and feel like a human being rather than a woman with poop coming out of her side. I don't know what we talked about but I cleaned it, redressed it, and cleaned her up. We sat and talked for a while and I ...

I think we should practice the art of simmering more often. Simmering is a rule I have about writing. A person should never, ever just write something up and consider it done after the first draft. It should simmer overnight, and maybe longer if, when you taste it, it needs more salt, or is still kind of tough. Don't let it boil or turn the heat up too much. Let it simmer. And if it needs to, let it simmer for several days. Ask someone else to taste it and then consider following their suggestions for making it tastier. Or....if it doesn't taste write (ha ha) just toss it and start it all over. This seems like good advice for life in general. We should let our emotions simmer before putting them on a nice plate and serving them up to the unsuspecting folks who are expected to clean their plates. Decisions should simmer too...what's the hurry anyway? We all eat too much and the portions are too large and we are getting fat with too many unexpressed and over expres...