Notes from the Red Bird House

I'm easy going. In fact, I just might be the most easy going person anyone will ever meet. It's not that I don't care. I simply pick my battles because I know with the greatest certainty that other people care more than I do. And really, in the grander scheme of things, what does any of it matter anyway? Force my will and go ten rounds over where we're going to have lunch or what movie to watch? Yeah, it's not going to happen. It's just that easy. I'm blessed with a unique life. Ninety-eight percent of the time I spend away from work I can do what I want when I want. I don't know many people who can say that. They have to answer to someone - spouse, partner, significant other, children, parent, moody, possessive cat. I have two dogs and a roommate who don't give a rip what I do (well, as long as I serve breakfast by 6:30am, the dogs don't care what I do the rest of the day). This means that I am free - free to eat what I want, drink what I want...

I think I was motivated by boredom. Well, perhaps more correctly, my desire to not be bored. One day not too long ago, I looked out on the horizon of my life and I nearly fell asleep. Then I realized that, if I live to be my father's age (eighty-four), I'm only half way home. I've lived forty-three and have forty-one to go. I may not be one to crave an exciting life - I don't wrestle alligators or jump out of planes - but I don't want to keep doing what I've been doing lately for the next forty-plus years. Don't get me wrong, I have a good life. I certainly don't want to change that. I simply want different - a new challenge for the short-term which may lead to additional challenges in the long-term. I've worked for the same company for nine years. Thankfully, I haven't done the same job for all those years. I've been everything from a receiving associate to human resource manager, but regardless of the job I find myself bored. It's not...

Some days just call for a change. Maybe not a big change, but a change nonetheless. It might be more of a semantic difference than anything, but in reality the only thing that matter is that there's a 'difference', a change. Today is that day for me. I'm tired. Tired of this. Tired of that. Tired from my workout yesterday. Tired from people and their b.s. I guess in the common vernacular 'I'm over it'. If I could disappear, I would. It's just that there's no real way to do that. Money has to be earned and vacations have to end. Fitness has to be maintained and races have to be run. I guess to an extent I can take all that. It's the people that get me. They are unavoidable and, by and large, caustic intruders upon my solitude. I try so hard, love them, and forgive them and still... I am stuck, smothered and mired, trapped and hung, fighting for peace. Today, though, I'm going to pretend. No one exists but me. No one matters but me. Selfish...

I'm forty-three years old and not ashamed to say it. This probably has a lot to do with feeling like I'm in the best shape of my life. In fact, I told someone last week that I truly believe that I'm the prettiest I've ever been. Sure, I've noticed a little more gray hair as my hair gets longer, but otherwise I'm good with aging because I really don't see a physical downside. I know there are naysayers out there who are screaming, 'YET!!!!' in the loudest of their outside voices. They know my day will come, mostly because theirs already has and at a younger age. People tend to hit forty and start looking for the first signs of the Apocalypse.  Old age is on the horizon and they are damn well going to see it before it sees them. Oops. What happens now? Every ache, pain, memory lapse, and moment of irregularity is a SIGN and a harbinger of all the horrible things to come. For these folks, a sore knee means the beginning of the end. Soon enough they...

Yesterday in the pre-sunrise darkness of the transition area of the Danskin Triathlon at Decker Lake in Austin, Texas, I was approached by a beautiful blond woman.  Her question? Where is the 'bike out'? (meaning where do we leave the transition area to start the biking portion of the triathlon). I pointed to an area to my right and asked one of my teammates for verification. The blond followed up her initial question with a couple others that we answered. Her focus, however, stayed on me. I told her where she could find rack space (meaning a place to store her bike, etc in the transition area). She thanked my teammate and me and moved on. At the time, my answers to her questions seemed appropriate enough. Even though she appeared to be extremely fit and had kick-ass equipment, it may have been her first time at the Danskin event. And even though the first vestiges of daylight were appearing, it was still too dark to make out too many details about the transition area. It wa...

'Good things always happen to me.' The words were out of my mouth before I realized how cocky they sounded. Out of context. Luckily the friend I was speaking to had a bit of context, but I fear not nearly enough. She had just reassured me that (after a couple bumpy weeks) good things were coming to me. It was a very sweet gesture that I blew apart in typical Stacee fashion. I knew what I meant. Sadly, I'm not always the best at choosing my words or my moments. I can only hope that my friend took my words for what they were - the non-cocky Gospel Truth, as I see it. I may not always sparkle with pixie dust and sunshine, but regardless my glass is invariably at least half full. Good things do always happen to me. Take last night for example. While waiting for a friend to show up for dinner, I enjoyed a bowl of half-price queso. And a mango margarita. Following a big dip of a big chip, a large drop of queso slopped off a chip hitting my hand and..... wait fo...