Posts Tagged ‘cycling’

Anniversary Week

Posted: June 30, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Our wedding anniversary is in October, and last year, we decided that one day wasn’t going to be nearly enough to celebrate not only reaching our 14th year, but all the love we had found in just the few months prior.  We began planning far in advance, and it just so happened that, while our actual date was on a Wednesday, there were events on both the weekends before and after that we wanted to do anyway.  The fact that they book-ended the week of our anniversary was just the excuse we needed to go all out.

Our anniversary week – which actually ended up lasting 9 days – began in St. Louis the Saturday before.  We were going to be in the Halloween 10K race that I wrote about yesterday, and it was on the Sunday morning before our anniversary.  Since it was to be early in the morning, and in St. Louis, we went up the day before and got a hotel room for the night.

We spend a lot of time in St. Louis, and try to go up there for at least a day trip once a month.  There is an Italian community there called “The Hill,” and it was what brought us to St. Louis the first time we ever visited.  We eat in the restaurants there and my wife, who is Italian, shops in the family owned grocery stores and bakeries.  It’s as close as you can get to being in the old country around here, and we both love it.

We also enjoy Forest Park, which is larger than New York’s Central Park.  It hosts the St. Louis Zoo, The Art Museum, The History Museum, miles of running and cycling trails, an outdoor skating rink in the winter, and much more.  Most of the attractions are free, and the scenery is very beautiful.

The day in St. Louis was purely for enjoying ourselves.  We picked up our race packets in the afternoon, but other than that, nothing was scheduled.  It was just a day for the two of us to spend in any way we wished. It was the kickoff day for the restoration tour’s week-long anniversary celebration, and we were spending it with the person we loved, in a place we loved.

The hotel we were staying in had a free hot food bar in the evening, so we took advantage of that even though it wasn’t the type of stuff we usually ate.  They also had an indoor/outdoor pool and the weather was actually nice enough to lay out in the sun for a while.  I had bought my wife a new bathing suit and was glad that she got to wear it.  She did get in a bit of trouble in the hot tub for calling other people’s kids “critters,” but no real harm was done.

In the morning, it was fun to put on our costumes and go down to breakfast at the hotel.  Naturally, it sparked a lot of conversation, seeing two people wearing huge quarters.  We got some pictures taken, shared a little bit of what was going on, and headed downtown for the race.  I knew that my knee might not hold up, but I hoped it would.

The race wound around downtown, went through the grounds of the Anheuser Busch plant, almost took us into Busch Stadium, and provided great views of the Arch and the Mississippi River.  Some of the costumes were fantastic.   There was a zombie, Two people dressed as peace and quiet (a hippie and a mime), when pigs fly (you’ll just have to imagine), Gumby, a praying mantis in a cage, and too many others to mention here.  We didn’t win any of the prizes, but we had a great time hanging around and seeing it all.

It was only the beginning of anniversary week, but it not only left us with a lot of great memories, it got us looking toward the future, as well.  For next year’s Halloween 10K, we’re thinking of either the tortoise and the hare (think a dorky looking turtle and a playboy bunny here) or Beauty and the Beast (my wife’s favorite Disney fairy tale).  Two days down, the rest of the week to go…

A Historical Stop On the Restoration Tour

Posted: June 24, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Today, the restoration tour took us by bicycle to the Wilson’s Creek National Battlefield.  It’s a historical site of a civil war battle that has, in a roundabout way, played a role in our lives ever since we moved to Missouri.

Our first house in Missouri was located on about 80 acres that the landlord ran cattle on.  Just to the north was the Wilson’s Creek Battlefield.  If you walked straight out our back door, you would come to the boundary of the battlefield, where Terrell Creek merges with Wilson’s Creek.  That was the house that was destroyed by the tornado on March 12, 2006.

The history and effects of that tornado have already been documented in this blog, but that event was the single biggest factor in the changes in myself that led to the downfall of our marriage.  The fact that the battlefield was there was incidental, but it did provide the backdrop for many good hours of fishing, hunting, and exploring before the tornado.

When we moved back to Republic in 2007, we always talked about going out to the battlefield some day, but we never did.  Then, last Spring, my wife got into cycling right about the same time we were splitting up.  We also got interested in becoming triathletes and we heard that the trail through the Wilson’s Creek Battlefield was a good place to train because of the hills and conditions.

I got my wife her first road bike for her birthday that year, and I also bought her a pink cycling jersey.  This was during the time that we still lived together, but that she no longer thought that she loved me, and things were already in motion to break us apart.  I took her and her bike out to the battlefield so that she could ride the trails while our son and I ran.  We took pictures of her with her bike and her jersey and I tried to be happy for her despite the circumstances.

About a month later, she bought a new bike and moved out.  We only went out to the battlefield a few times together, and I went several times by myself after that.  I still have those pictures, and they’ve always made me kind of sad because of the memories they invoke.

Since we’ve been back together, cycling and fitness have been, once again, a big part of our lives.  We both have nice road bikes now, and during the summer, we practically live at the gym or out on the many trails near our home.  During the school year, it’s not uncommon for us to cycle the 18 miles to work.  This August, on the day of our renewal ceremony, we plan to spend the morning riding the 62 mile Tour De Cox.

Just recently, after much indecision, my wife decided that she does want to compete in the Tiger Tri this August.  Since we really do need to step up our training, we decided that this morning, we would ride out to the battlefield, do some running once we get there, and ride back.  This led to a comedy of errors, thanks to the navigator on our phones and some unmarked country roads that we may or may not have been supposed to have taken.

We did eventually reach the battlefield, and as we rode into the parking lot where we used to unload bikes from the back of the car, I realized that my wife was wearing that same pink jersey from more than a year before.  I hadn’t intended today to be a restoration tour stop.  I just thought it was going to be a long ride and brick workout, but when I saw where we were and the memories came flooding back, I realized that this was a part of our restoration just as much as the planned stops.

Sometimes that’s the way restoration works.  Sometimes you’re just doing work that needs done, and you discover something you didn’t expect.  It could be a color of paint underneath that shows up while scraping.  It could be a discovery of something that was built over, but is still there and can be incorporated back into being part of the house again.  The great thing is, those discoveries happen, and then you get to choose what to do with them.  Whether it’s a house, a life, or a marriage that’s being restored, it will almost always end up being a combination of the things you planned to do and the things you discover along the way.

What Goes Around Comes Around

Posted: June 18, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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I completed a sprint triathlon in Willard, MO this morning – my first since the Tiger Tri last August.  For the first time since I started competing in races, my wife was there to support me and cheer me on.  During the transitions and at the finish, she was there today, taking pictures and offering encouragement.

In my other events, she was either competing also, or simply not there.  I went to all of her events last year while we were having our marital breakdown.  Every time she ran, I was there supporting her and being excited for her.  I was glad to do it and didn’t ask for anything back.  Last year, it was disappointing not having that from her, but I understood it based on where she was (or wasn’t) in the relationship.

There are a lot of things that have changed and turned around completely since then.  It would be one thing for us to have simply worked through our differences and decided to give it another try.  What happened, though, was something different altogether.  During our separation and reconciliation, we were changed. We became new and different people.  Things are not like they were before.

My wife has always had difficulty with empathy.  She was never one to show her feelings, and always kept up the “I’m tough” appearance.  Some of this was a survival technique arising out of an abusive background.  She had a sense that no one had been there to comfort her or empathize with her.  No one made her feel better when she was hurting, so she didn’t really have it in her to offer that to anyone else.

She also never did well with sickness.  She has a very strong immune system and her kids seemed to inherit those healthy genes.  Since she was never really sick growing up, she never experienced a lot of being cared for.  In the same way, her kids were rarely sick as they grew up, and when they were, they would usually recover quickly.  Her attitude tended to be, “suck it up and get better,” because that what was pretty much what she had always done.

My immune system isn’t so efficient, and I’ve had my share of illness during our marriage.  It took me a while to get past the idea that she wasn’t going to pamper me when I was sick.  Eventually, I came to accept that, in our marriage, I was going to more or less have to deal with being sick on my own.  It’s not that she didn’t care.  She just wasn’t wired that way.

Last year, I spent months giving to her in every way I could and asking for nothing in return.  I poured myself into her day after day, week after week, just trying to show her how much I loved her and what that meant.  My only intention in it all was to love her enough that it would break through the wall that she had built between us, so that we could be together again.

Last week, I got sick, completely out of the blue.  I came down with a fever right when I was trying to push my training for the triathlon.  For several days, I was burning up and weak, unable to do much of anything.  It was the first time I’ve been sick since we’ve been back together, and the difference in the way she treated me was astounding.

She constantly asked me how I was doing and if there was anything I needed.  She put blankets over me and held me at night when I was shivering.  She was kind, compassionate, and attentive.  In short, she treated me the way I’ve always wanted to be treated.  Then today, she was my cheerleader as I swam, cycled, and ran.

So how did this happen?  What made the change?  In contemporary language, they say, “What goes around comes around.”  People call it karma.  They say, “What you give out will come back to you.”  Jesus said, “Whatever you sow, that you will also reap,” and “Give, and it will be given to you.”  These are spiritual truths.  When you give from a pure heart and unselfish motives, it changes things.  People still have a free will, and nobody forced my wife to change, but in the context of receiving so much love from me, she wanted to.

The Tour Begins

Posted: June 10, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Waking up that first Saturday together was a miracle on so many fronts.  I have had more than one person tell me, both before and since, that they have never known a couple who has gone to the place we did and come out of it together.  There were times that my best friends made their doubts evident in things they said.  They stood by me and prayed for our marriage, but also said things like to be prepared, “just in case this thing goes badly.”

While the outward miracle of my wife and I moving back in together and re-committing to our marriage was in every sense spectacular, the things taking place on the inside of each of us were even more amazing.  I was literally living the final phrase of the famous “footprints” poem.  I was being carried by my Savior and I knew we were going to be all right.  There was going to be some work left to do, and more that we would need to heal from, but I knew that if He was carrying me, He would carry both of us. 

The most wonderful miracle for me, though, was what I saw in my wife’s eyes that next morning.  There was a transparent honesty, a release from some long-standing fears, and a vulnerability and openness that I hadn’t been sure that I would ever see.  It erased all my doubts about our reconciliation working out.  Her eyes have captivated me since the first time we met, but looking into them that morning, there was a depth and a newness that was more beautiful than I could have even imagined.

It was then that our “new” relationship truly began.  It reminds me of the very final stages in the restoration of a house.  The inside is never completely finished until after the outside is done.  There are always those details on the inside that put the finishing touches on the place and make it completely ready to be lived in. 

For the neighbors, and for people driving by, the outside being finished is the signal that it’s ready.  They see it looking done on the outside, and they want to see the inside, or they wonder why no one has moved in yet.  The people doing the restoration know that it isn’t finished, and they know what still needs to be done to make it just the way they want it. 

Some people live in the house during the restoration process.  Others move into temporary housing and then come back when it’s done and ready.  We always stayed in the houses while we worked on them, no matter how big the job was.  It was difficult and beyond inconvenient (think bathrooms and plumbing here) at times.  Often it was very tedious and seemed like little or no real progress was being made.  Other times, though, a lot came together at once and you could see the transformation happen. 

Once such moment is a favorite story of ours, when a friend, who generally didn’t knock, opened the front door and suddenly backed away.  She looked around in confusion, as though she’d gone to the wrong house and didn’t know where she was.  What had happened was she had stepped right into one of those moments where a lot had changed seemingly overnight.  It really didn’t happen that quickly, there was just a lot of work that had gone on unseen before the visible part appeared.

Paul’s letter to the Philippians contains the line, “I’m convinced that God, who began this good work in you, will carry it through to completion.”  The work in our marriage wasn’t finished, but the outcome was no longer in doubt.  My wife and I were both being transformed on the inside, and those changes were going to make our future so much different from our past. 

The plan for the restoration tour began to form in my mind almost immediately.  Nothing could be done about missing the bike ride, but I knew that it was an annual event and, much like I had set the Tiger Triathlon in my mind as the time that we would get back together, so I began to envision a year of restoration leading up to the next Tour De Cox.  We had a year to heal, to grow, and to repair our past mistakes.  Where I had been working on restoring our marriage alone, we would now spend a year of restoring together, ending with our renewal ceremony after the 2011 Tour De Cox.

Moving In… and Moving Forward

Posted: June 9, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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I have to confess.  When I left Macy’s the following Monday, my thoughts were running wild with the reception I would receive on my first night “home.”  I imagined my wife waiting for me, breathless with anticipation.  I pictured her taking hold of my tie, pulling me close, and leading me upstairs.  Even though we had been together for more than 15 years,  I was as nervous as a new boyfriend. 

When I got to the loft, absolutely nothing happened.  No joyful reunion.  No passionate encounter.  Nothing that suggested that this was anything other than the most ordinary night in the most ordinary of marriages.  I was confused and let down.  It was all very surreal after Saturday morning.  I had no idea what to think, but it was infinitely better than being separated, so I decided to take it as it came and let it develop.

As the week went on, things became increasingly awkward between us.  There wasn’t nearly enough communication, and we were tiptoeing around each other, unsure what to say or do, or what our roles were to be.  We took some bike rides together and went to the gym, and we were getting along well, but there was an uncomfortable feeling to it all.  It was as if we just stepped from one life into another with no transition or adjustment period.

For me, there was the obvious adjustment of moving “my stuff” into “her place” and trying to not completely disrupt everything that she had worked so hard to accomplish.  I wasn’t sure what the boundaries were.  She would casually say, “It’s our place now,” as if it was all completely natural and expected, and for her, it may have been.  I wanted to make sure that my moving in would be a blessing to her and not a major disruption. 

For her, the issues were less clear, but I could tell she was dealing with some fallout from the separation.  I didn’t want to push her to talk about things she didn’t want to, and I kept trying to reassure her that we were going forward into our future, not back into the past.  We both had some fears and doubts after what we had been through, but I had no intention of letting anything stand in our way now that we were living together and committed to one another again.

The Tour De Cox, a 62 mile annual bike ride, was scheduled for the upcoming Saturday and we were planning to participate.  It was to be the first organized cycling event that we would ride in as a couple.  By Friday, the tension was nearly unbearable for me.  I had moved in and there were way too many elephants in the room to ignore for much longer.  At some point, we needed to talk.

I prayed a lot throughout the day that Friday, asking God what was going on and what to do.  I wasn’t getting any answer, so I figured I must already know. I was listening to Flyleaf’s second CD and the song that was playing contained the line, “We’ll cry tonight, but in the morning we are new,” and I took it as a sign.  When I got home, my wife was sick to her stomach.  I almost changed my mind and decided to let it go, but I had resolved that we needed to get this taken care of, so I told her we needed to talk. 

I told her that I needed to know why she had called me and asked me to move back in.  I needed to know what had happened and why she had left me and now had come back to me.  I needed to know what was going on in her head and her heart and her life.  We simply had never talked it through and we needed to.  I felt really bad because she was feeling so sick and I suspected that this would keep us up for too much of the night to be able to make the bike ride in the morning, but once I asked the questions, there was no backing out.

We talked everything out, and we did cry together, just like the song said, over the pain we had caused each other and the choices we wished we could take back.  After a time, my wife was able to fall asleep.  I held her for a while, then went downstairs and sat by the window.  I spent some time praying and meditating and looking ahead to the future that I could foresee.  I finally came to bed for good around 3AM, knowing that the bike ride was out, but that we had needed to do this.

In the morning (also just like the song said), it was if we had somehow hit a “reset” button during the night.  The air was clear and everything looked new and beautiful, like it was the first day of a brand new marriage.  It was then that the restoration tour truly began.

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