incoming: cheesy running metaphor

i know i'm gonna be that dude lol

hi friends,

it’s been a while. my life has been pretty fucking intense between the strike, gender transition, dad grief, and some personal stuff i’m not quite ready to share yet. thank you all for allowing me the space to write when i feel compelled as opposed to on a schedule. trying not to push myself these days, but to be kind and compassionate to my own needs (spoiler alert: this is the hardest thing i’ve ever done and requires infinitely more strength than just pushing myself to the edge and burning out over and over again.)

which kind of brings me to my cheesy running metaphor. for those of you who haven’t been bombarded by my instagram stories, i’m currently in Santa Fe working on a few sample chapters and the proposal for my next book, which i’m super excited about. it’s about my gender transition, and life, and grief, and all of it, with far too many random pop culture references squeezed in seemingly randomly. anyway, today… my running. i’ve been running in santa fe and today was day 6 of said runs.

initially i was just happy to be running. i’m not a runner. it’s nice in santa fe, not too hot, not too cold, and all you need is a light jacket (lol, see what i mean about the pop culture references.) santa fe is high desert which means it’s actually 2000ft higher than denver is which means the air is thinner and running is harder than at sea level. but luckily for me i’m terrible at running no matter what elevation i’m at so i just went with it.

the first couple days were fun, i only ran like .7 miles and tried to run as fast as i can, you know to maximize sweat or something. it felt good to push myself. but yesterday one of my buds, rachel scanlon, who apparently is a secret runner that i didn’t know about gave me some advice on running. she told me to go super slow.

i asked her if she meant pace or like go slowly in increasing my distance. she said pace. run slowly. so today i did. i ran slowly. so slowly it hurt my ego. but i kept thinking about what she said, run slowly. it gave me a sense of permission not to push myself for no reason. annoyingly and unsurprisingly today was my longest run — 13 minutes longer than yesterdays run and an extra .6 miles of distance. but again, usurpingly and annoyingly (in the way that life always make you learn lessons for yourself that you’ve heard but didn’t want to learn) my pace was almost a full two minutes slower… and i already was a slow fucking runner.

yuesday run

all this to say, and remind both you and me, that pace doesn’t matter, it’s just the getting up and doing that does. for the last five days i’ve been pushing myself, running through cramps, shin splints, and sore muscles. all for what? so i could run 30 seconds faster? WHO AM I COMPETING AGAINST LOL.

wednesday run

anyway, run, grow, heal, and enjoy your life at your own pace, and annoyingly, you’ll probably get closer to where you want to end up by being kind to yourself rather than beating yourself up.

xx

ASH

also happy would have been 63rd birthday to my dad <3

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once again thank you to all who are subscribed to me. unfortunately i’m still a writer on strike, and unfortunately being alive isn’t free, but i really appreciate all of y’alls support. xx