October

New England foliage is always spectacularly beautiful. This year it seems brighter than usual. On the way to work yesterday I was startled by a red maple that was so bright red it seemed on fire.

It's a gorgeous season, and also a melancholy one, I think. The weather has been great lately; in the 60s, sunny and clear. Today was gloomy, but really this October has been perfect so far. Still, the leaves turning always makes me sad. They worked so hard, these leaves, from their birth in the spring. They brought energy to their host tree, and they were bright and green and happy all summer. Then, in fall, they become really beautiful for a short while, seemingly just to say "I'm here! Notice me know before I die!" And then they fall. Soon they will be crunchy, brown, crumbling into compost for next year's growth.

I feel my age in the fall.
I've got to keep moving to avoid crumbling.

I'm still riding outside, but open water swimming is over now. It feels as if I should be winding down, taking a break, baking cookies and chilling out.

I'm not. Clearwater is in just about three weeks.

I've been really working to keep focus. Jen has me doing really specific workouts that force me to pay attention to what I'm doing and force me to work. I'm going to make it. It's going to be good.

And then I'm going to sleep for about two weeks straight.
And then I start training for the Big Kahuna. Oh boy! I'm excited and I'm terrified.

I have a half marathon coming up this weekend. I'm running it with a bunch of members from my running club, GNRC. I haven't been in a road race since last winter. It's funny; I think of a half marathon is a pretty substantial race, but really it lasts only a little longer than a longish sprint triathlon. My goal is to take it out at my goal pace for Clearwater and then speed up a little bit every few miles, so I negative split. I'm not expecting a PR. My running has been much better lately, but I don't think I'm close to PRing yet. Soon enough.