Month: March 2021

Runners are a little bit crazy. Yes, I said it. All you have to do is scroll through the posts in any of the Facebook groups I belong to. We are obsessed.

I didn’t used to identify myself as a runner. Some days my body definitely does not define itself as a body that runs, yet I find myself falling into this crazy category. I love running.

Holy cow. My thirteen-year-old self would have rolled her eyes and laughed like crazy at that statement. I used to HATE exercise in any form. I was pretty much terrified of playing sports and getting hurt.

It didn’t help that my mother was crazy anxious about my health because of my father’s heart disease. I was forced to use his exercise bike and work out (I HATED THAT MACHINE.) The physical fitness tests in gym were torture (except for the stretching ones, I was super flexible), because I could not run a mile. I could not breathe when I ran. My gym teacher told my mom I was badly out of shape. My mom believed him and I ended up having even more forced exercise to do so I could get in shape. I was not out of shape. As an adult, I figured out that I had exercise-induced asthma.

I don’t exactly know why, but when I got an inhaler, I learned to control my breathing and I went to work. Couch to 5k was my first companion and then a training plan for a 10K run. I worked up to running an hour straight and then more than an hour. It was never very fast, but it was running.

In the work, I discovered a euphoria I never had experienced before. Running made me feel powerful. I was able to control my body and regulate my breathing and conquer my goals. It was amazing.

Then, I hurt my knee. I had to stop running. There was talk of surgery, but I didn’t want to do that. So, I resigned myself to not running. I could find plenty of other ways to exercise.

Fast forward ten years or so. I never found anything that came close to giving me the same thrill and sense of power. So, I started slowly and worked up to running again using the run-walk-run method.

For about a year now, I have been steadily working on it. I am in a bunch of running groups on Facebook and it is such a community. So many people are out there that really understand the compulsion and the runner’s high. I also love the Peloton app for run coaching. It has been so motivating.

I will never be an elite runner. I will probably never be very fast. There might also be long pauses in my running journey or even the need to stop again (that pesky knee sometimes rears its ugly head). However, I can firmly and proudly say that I am a crazy runner. And I hope I will be one for a long time to come.

Dear Andrea in March 2020,

Right about now you are starting to feel pretty nervous about that weird virus that is happening in China and that you are starting to hear about in other places in the world. Because of VIPKid, you have heard more than most Americans about the virus there and the precautions the Chinese people have been taking. You are checking a dashboard with the numbers in the few spots where there have now been outbreaks starting and the exponential growth in numbers of cases is starting to freak you out a little bit. Just wait, it gets worse.

In a couple weeks, you will be hearing about crises in New York and Italy. You will be worried about Ramón’s family in Spain. You will start to worry about going to school and about the field trip you have planned to do the model UN fair with other students from around the school district. You will start to understand that sooner or later they will probably be closing the schools and having people stay home, like they did in other places of the world.

Then one Friday, you will go home planning to come back to school the next week, and find out an hour later that the governor has closed schools across the state. You will not be able to go into your classroom to grab anything for a few weeks. You will not know what you are supposed to do. The state will then issue a safer at home order which basically closes everything. It will be so weird. You will do your best to communicate with your students and provide some enrichment and learning opportunities in the best way you can. You will direct the students and families to the free lunches and the packets of work being given out for students to have something to do at home.

Your trip to Spain will be canceled. All the festivals and races and games and concerts and big events will be canceled too. Summer fun will consist of enjoying your balcony, taking long walks with the dogs away from other people, and learning to entertain yourself at home. Don’t worry though, although the virus does continue to spread and the death tolls rise, it doesn’t morph into some zombie producing virus. I know it’s weird but I know that you are kind of thinking it, so I thought I would put your mind at ease.

On the bright side, you will excel at interviewing online. It is probably because of your years teaching online, or maybe just because you have less social anxiety over the computer, but you will have great success in the interviews this Spring, with multiple job offers to choose from. Congratulations! Do not hesitate to grab the VILS coach position. It is just the right fit for you and you will LOVE working at Audubon and connecting with the network of Verizon Innovative Learning Schools.

Training for this new job will actually start this Spring for you. You will get lots of chances to meet your new principal and work closely with him to help envision how the grant program will be implemented at your new school. Over the summer, you will continue to have trainings throughout the week and work to think about. I think this is part of what will help you to feel productive and not too bored.

Fall and winter will see you working from home supporting teachers who are teaching virtually. In March 2021, we still don’t know if we will be returning to the school buildings at all this school year. It feels like science fiction and it is a lot of work, but we are getting through it.

You know how you always joke that you could be a hermit and be completely happy? Well, you will sort of get a chance to prove that theory this year. And, yep, staying home all the time and away from other people does agree with you. Not having to force yourself to go to a social event has been very liberating this year.

Yet, you know that things need to eventually get back to some of what used to be. We will have to go back to the school building. We will want to travel to Spain to see Ramon’s family. People will want to have concerts and festivals and dine in restaurants again.

Enter the vaccine. Andrea, I know you will feel a little nervous about taking the vaccine, but do it anyway. Listen to your sister and all the other doctors out there that are reading the medical journals and trusting the science.

It is March 1st, and the first day in the state of Wisconsin that teachers can get vaccinated. We went to do it today. Ramón and I both got the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. So far, so good.

So Andrea, you are taking the steps to helping end this pandemic. Let’s hope that by next March the narrative changes for the better and we can stop living this science fiction reality.

With love from Andrea