TEN MILES!!!!! YIPPEE!!!!

Tim was right. Don't go for strength and endurance at the same time during the early training. Pick one or the other. For the last several weeks I have hiked Stone Mountain and Kennesaw Mountain - the actual mountain trails. Today I had intended to hike the mountain trail and add the loop to Dallas Highway. Instead, I parked at Cheatham Hill and hiked the 5.5 miles of that loop and then crossing over Dallas Hwy, hiked to Burnt Hickory. Nice rolling trails, but nothing as strenuous as the mountain. Sooo, I completed the 10 miles. Ten miles in one day was a goal for me this month. YEA! It is great to meet a goal. It took me four hours and 20 minutes. Tim, my awesome chiropractor does advise me well.

After my most recent hiking struggles, Scott and I have decided to do the Lenfoot Hikein trail in one day as our first hike together, and it is scheduled for December 19th. We had planned earlier to do Springer, or do to Lenfoot Hikein and spend two nights, making the sprint to Springer on the full day. Scaling our first hike together to a less strenuous hike is a good thing. I am beginning to have my doubts of whether I can do that this soon, but it is six weeks away, so maybe I can make it. For that trip I plan to swim on Thursday night before we hike on Saturday. I swam last night and was sore today before I started. With my working schedule and some increased social activities (Thanks, Larry...:-)) I haven't been swimming as much either. But life is good.

The marker at Cheatham Hill reads that 3,000 Union soldiers and close to 1,000 Confederate soldiers died there. That is absolutely incredible. War - what is it good for? My dear friend Larry, political science professor and military historian and I were discussing this only a couple of days ago. He suggested that perhaps if we reinstituted the draft we would be more careful of the wars we sent out children out to fight.

At the Illinois Monument I paused and spoke to three people, one who evidently was a historian of the Civil War, and he was discussing how bad the Union POW camps were such to be defensive of how bad the ones in the south were. I commented that a discussion of which was the least horrendous was pointless. My great-grandfather fought for the south (he was from Virgina) and he was a POW in Maryland. We have letters that were sent to him as a reply to letters he sent to a cousin in New York requesting a winter coat. The cousin remembered my great-great-grand mother (his mother) fondly and sent him one. I commented to the three people that the war was sometimes brother against brother, family against family. At what point are we willing to make our love for each other more important than our view? There must be a better way.

Something else I reflected on when I was hiking today. There are many people who were walking or running the trails today who were looking down. There are some times when looking at where you are going in the short term is important. There are rocks and roots, and uneven places where looking down is important to prevent you from tripping. It did not seem that some people were looking up for any reason. They didn't look up to speak or notice anyone else. The trees and sky were gorgeous today, and the critters were abundant. I started noticing how much I look down when I don't have to. And then I noticed how I can make the similar analogy to life. We get in our groove and keep the "nose to the grindstone." Not that it isn't important to be mindful of the step we are taking in the instant. However, looking up and being present to what is ahead in the longer term, and being present to the day provides something. I'm just musing again...