The dish on climbing

I've been climbing now for a little more than 2 years. But I guess if you count the time I was out because of injuries (um, like this one and yeah, this one) you could say it's been more like a little over a year :) Obviously I'm hooked if not even breaking my arm is going to stop me from climbing again.

There are lots of reasons why I love climbing so much. But I think the biggest one is that (unlike when I'm running) when I am working on a climbing problem, I completely forget about everything else going on in my life.

I can walk into the gym at First Ave Rocks and leave all of the crazy and the stress in my life outside the door. Sadly it's all still there waiting on me as soon as I leave, but while I am at the wall, I zone in and focus completely on what's in front of me. I've never experienced any other activity that gives me this beautiful, simple type of clarity.

Another reason I love climbing are all the people I have met since I first started. I think it's safe to say that I have at least 30 more friends than I did two years ago and it's all because of the climbing gym. There's a real beauty of collaboration in climbing and the gym makes it even easier to reach out and ask those around you for beta on how to approach a problem. This exact scenario has led to some really amazing friendships for me. And then those people have introduced me to other folks and it just keeps going and going like that until pretty soon you feel like you know half the town.

And finally, I love climbing because it is such a challenge for me. I am honestly not that great at it. I have worked steadily to improve over the past couple of years, but it has been a very slow process. Unfortunately I am a bit of a perfectionist which usually means I don't like to stick around and continue to do things that are difficult. I like to be good great awesome at whatever it is that I do. So for me to continue to climb even though it is a struggle, that says a lot to me about how much I enjoy it and probably how I am finally starting to mature a bit :)

I was actually reminded just how hard climbing is a couple of Saturdays ago when I participated in my first competition. Because I had been improving and getting stronger a few weeks prior to the comp, I thought I would come in and perform well. I didn't think I would place, but I thought I would at least feel good about my performance.

I could not have been more wrong. Instead, I wasted time and energy doing routes multiple times because I kept making silly mistakes. This only fueled the doubt swirling in my mind. Apparently once I placed a number or points to a route, I choked. What a humbling experience. And quite honestly, I probably needed it!

While at the time, the comp didn't seem as much "fun" as I wanted it to be, it definitely taught me a few things and I learned a lot about myself. I learned I don't compete well and that I need to work on that. I need to take things less seriously and not place so much value on my performance and just have a good time with it. I learned to never drink a Red Bull before a comp ever again...maybe halfway through wouldn't be such a bad idea though :) I learned that my endurance is actually okay, because I was able to climb twice as long as I thought I could.

I also learned I have a pretty awesome group of friends who supported me by simply watching me climb for 4 hours or talking me down off my mental ledge in between climbs or by asking for a comp play-by-play via GroupMe. But let's be honest, I already knew I had some amazing friends.

And while I can't say yet that I will for sure do another competition in the future, I do know that you will still be able to find me at First Ave about three times a week. Just look for the girl flailing on the wall...or talking to half the people at the gym.

Climb on yall!

The dish on Birmingham: a love letter to my town

I can't lie. On Monday, when driving home from an amazing long weekend of camping at the Ocoee River in Tennessee, I actually groaned out loud as we approached town and I saw the "skyline" of Birmingham (that is, if you can consider four tall buildings a skyline?).

But the thing is, even though I groaned, I truly do love this place.

As I think I heard someone say recently, Birmingham is a city that is neither too big nor too small. But like the tale of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, it's 'just right.' I like that it's not so big that I am too timid to get out and explore roads to see where they will take me and who they will take me to. And it's also not so small that there isn't anything to do on a random weeknight. I always feel like I could run into anyone that I know at any moment when I'm out on the town, but suprisingly I very rarely do.

Don't get me wrong, Bham definitely has its fair share of problems. Traffic can be annoying (though I know we have it easy compared to many other cities), jobs (or at least really fun, cool ones) can be hard to come by and of course there is the always ongoing political mess that I don't even completely understand (or want to understand for that matter).

But as an optimist, I like to look at the bright side. I like to look at all the amazing things my city has to offer:

• Railroad Park, an award-winning urban greenspace that hosts free exercise classes, concerts & other events
• a beautiful new stadium downtown for our minor league baseball team, The Birmingham Barons
• incredible restaurants including those owned by award-winning chefs like Chris Hastings & Frank Stitt (but let's be honest, you're more likely to find me at the J. Clyde, Rojo, El Barrio, Saw's or Slice)
• UAB Health System—one of the top four largest academic medical centers in the country
• a pretty decent music scene thanks to venues like The Bottletree, Workplay and the new Iron City
• new developments including an entertainment district downtown and the revitilization of the Avondale area
• three top-notch colleges: Samford, Birmingham Southern and UAB, which was recently named the 10th best medical school in the nation by the U.S. News
• a variety of offerings for the outdoor enthusiast including 50 miles of biking and running trails at Oak Mountain State Park, more biking & running trails plus a zip line at Red Mountain Park and boulder fields for climbers at Moss Rock Preserve
• the unbelievably gorgeous renovated Historic Alabama Theater, which hosts concerts and their summer and holiday film series
• the Sidewalk Film Festival, which I think is the coolest event Birmingham hosts all year long
• and of course plenty of great shopping opportunities at both small boutiques around town and larger stores at the Summit

I swear my list could go on and on, but I'll stop here and hope that I've covered most everything I love about my (now) hometown. I'm sure I left a few things off, but I can always save those for another day.

And honestly, when you get down to it, it's not just about the awesome things I can do in Birmingham, but it's more about the awesome people that I get to share my adventures with. I have been so fortunate to have developed my framily here in Bham and now I've started to branch out with other great friends, thanks to the tons of people I have met through the climbing gym and church.

Basically what it all comes down to is, if they say 'home is where the heart is', then my home is in Birmingham—whether I live here forever or not.

Or to make that a broader statement, as the group Alabama sings "My home's in Alabama, no matter where I lay my head."

ps. If you want to see/read an entire 40 page piece on the state of Alabama which will be featured in the upcoming Delta Sky magazine, you can find that here.

The dish on getting older

It's official. I am now 32 years old.

It's weird though, cause I don't feel like I am in my 30s. I hope I don't look like I am in my 30s. And I think we all know I don't act like I am in my 30s!

But nonetheless, here I am. Officially in my 30s.

It's funny how in my 20s I loved birthdays. Each one was a reason to celebrate, get dressed up and go out with my friends. But nowadays, birthdays are getting harder. I'm certainly not near as excited to celebrate. Which is sad, because I should be!

So even though I wasn't extremely excited to celebrate my birthday this year and I tried to downplay it as much as possible, I've decided that I am going to be happier about being 32 than I was about being 31.

I'm looking at this birthday kinda like most people look at New Year's. It's a fresh start. A time where I really evaluate who I am, what I am doing and who I am helping. Because I realize as I get older that different things start to become more important to me. Things that honestly should've been more important to me before, but as I mature, I hope to start getting some priorities right.

So while I can't say that I am excited to turn another year older, I can say that I am excited about what this new year will bring. Here's to hoping 32 will bring about much more clarity with an awareness of how I can improve and a willingness to always accept the challenges that come with change.

The dish on running

After almost seven weeks post my injury, I finally laced up my running shoes after work yesterday. It felt good. Kinda like I was reconnecting with an old friend. And then I went and literally reconnected with an old friend.

It ended up that Joy and I talked so much we didn't even bother starting our run, but we walked the entire five miles instead...followed by a lengthy dinner too, of course. By the time I got home four hours later, I left my workout clothes on and didn't even want to take my running shoes off. This is not normal for me. Usually I kick those suckers off the second I walk into my bedroom. But clearly I missed these guys. And I realized that just by wearing them, they made me feel productive.

I haven't always been a runner. Something clicked after I graduated high school and one day I just got up early and went for a run around the pond across the street. I've pretty much just kept up it with ever since. I'm not gonna lie, sometimes running and I "break up." Sometimes it's because I just need a break. And other times it's because of some lame injury. But I always come back to it. And until the recent broken arm injury, my relationship with running had been pretty solid!

A lot of people don't understand this relationship. It requires you to be disciplined and leave late night fun times with friends in order to meet your early bedtime so you can get up at the crack of dawn just so you can drip with sweat in the disgustingly hot summer. Or in the winter you have to leave a nice warm bed while it's still dark outside and put on insane amounts of layers just to endure the freezing cold temps.

I'm not good at math, but even I know that when you think about it like that, it doesn't all add up right.

But what does add up are the miles that I have logged with friends. And the conversations and stories we have shared. We are bonded. My running girls know entirely too much about me and vice versa. There's definitely been some group therapy sessions on those short and long runs. Just two weeks into my injury and not spending time running with those girls and I can tell you that I felt different. And in a bad way. My mood was altered. There's certainly something to be said for a runner's high and the ability to simultaneously verbally vomit everything that's been going on in your life lately. It's a pretty killer combo.

There's also something to be said of a friendship that you know you can count on. You say, "I'll meet you at 5:15 at the Trak Shak." And you know they are going to be there. Sure, we all bail from time to time, but when I think of the past five or so years I've had with my running partners, I'd say we've had a pretty positive percentage of no bails!

The more I run with my girls, the harder I find it to make myself go on solo runs, but those are pretty important, too. I remember coming back from Africa a year ago and being like, "ok, I'm doing this." I needed that alone running time to process everything I saw and experienced over there. Plus, it had been more than two weeks since I had ran, so I was jonesin for a run. I have never felt more "free" in my life than I did on that first mile. It was the highest of runners highs. And then the next four miles were brutal, but ya know, I managed to make it through!

I felt almost the same way this morning when I met up with the neighborhood crew for my first run in about two months. Once I hit the pavement, it was on. I broke ahead of the girls a little bit, but stayed close enough to hear their stories. Then I dragged towards the end of the run, but it was a good kind of drag. I mean, I hadn't ran in almost two months and I just finished three miles. Not too shabby. I definitely suprised myself with that.

I have to say, it feels good to be back. It took me a few days after being cleared from the doctor to make myself get out there and get started again. But now that I have, I know that first run just kickstarted the addiction and I'll be setting my alarm clock for ridiculous times again—five days a week.

But sleep is just a tiny sacrifice for everything I get in return from running. I guess the easiest way to say it is what my friend Casey says on her blog: "I like to run. It makes me happy."

The dish on being injured

In short? It sucks.

I could honestly probably leave it at that, but let's count the ways how much I hate being injured.

1. I can't run
2. I can't climb
3. I can't shower (ew, gross. I know you probably could've done without that, sorry!)
4. I currently look like a half storm trooper (no more purple cast, I've got a new fancy brace gadget)
5. Since I'm pretty much stuck with strapless dresses, it means I'm also stuck with strapless bras (ugh! seriously! do you feel bad for me now?)
6. And clearly I can't post new blog photos b/c who wants to see pics of someone who can't do the above things?!

The pluses? (is that a word? is it even spelled correctly?)

1. I have a cool story (I fell while rock climbing....even if it was in the gym)
2. I get to "sleep in" since there are no early morning runs
3. I have amazing friends who do sweet things like cook me dinner, wash my hair, send emails & texts to check on me and buy me little presents to make me feel better when I am completely bummed out by all of the above (seriously, you try wearing a strapless bra for 3 weeks straight and tell me what kind of a mood you're in! :)

All in all, I am trying to be positive and patient. Throughout this process the most positive takeaways I have is everything that I am learning. I have discovered who my friends are/how awesome they are, how much exercise plays a role in my happy daily attitude and (sadly/quite honestly) the extent of my vanity. I've also discovered just much I really do need to work on that whole "patience" quality! And I've found out I'm pretty stupid resilient, because I totally plan on climbing again as soon as I am all healed up and ready to go.

Of course I might get on the rocks and freak out...we'll see. Hope yall stay around for the rest of the ride!

The dish on Framily

I've been giving a lot of thought to my blog lately. Maybe too much. Mostly I waver on the idea of whether I should keep it up or not. Not because I don't love doing it, I totally do. It's just a lot of work and a lot of time and so I start to wonder if maybe I couldn't be doing something more "constructive" with the time it takes to plan outfits and photoshoots and scour the internets for deals and steals. You know, something like volunteering. Or studying my Bible. But in reality I think I know I'd just use that extra time to either hang out with friends or spend it crushing struggling improving at the climbing gym.

So ultimately, the blog continues to win (for now).

This means I spend the other part of this 'blog thinking time' of considering that if I do keep up the blog, how can I make it better. So I started thinking that it seems that I don't share much personal info with you guys. And how can I connect with readers if I don't share something a little bit about me other than what type of clothes and accessories I like and how little I like to spend on them?

That's why I've decided to do a new column called "The dish" once a month where I will dish out just a little something on who I am and what's really going on in my life. Excited? Yeah, you should be! (sarcasm. it doesn't read well online does it?)

So this month's dish that I am sharing is about my framily. I have a super close knit group of friends and we refer to ourselves as framily. Because we are just friends, but we're so close that we consider ourselves to be family, too. So put it together and boom, you've got framily.

I love these guys. I think back to my mid-20s to present day and I think about how different I am because they have been such a positive influence on my life. They keep me grounded. They hold me accountable. But most importantly, they make me laugh along the way! I truly can't imagine where I would be now without them in my life.

Sadly we all have to grow up eventually and the past couple of years or so we have been a little bit split up with some of us here in Birmingham, others in NYC and others in North Carolina. But no matter how far apart we are, we manage to make time for each other.

We email. We call. We text. We skype (ok, so not as much lately, we need to work on that!). We visit each other. And we use abuse the heck out of an app called GroupMe that allows us to all be on one huge long text thread that we can all see and chime in on.

Sometimes you feel closer to each other than other days, but I never feel too far away. And honestly, there have probably been times when we have been too close and all up in each other's business! But you know, that's what framily does. We care, so we intervene. And it's always done in love. And I am thankful to have friends who love each other so much that they will tell each other when they think you're making a mistake, but are there for you in spite of those decisions.

And that's my love letter to my framily.

I miss you guys and I am excited that most all of us will be together soon for the upcoming holiday. Em, quit your fabulous new job and join us! Kidding of course, but you know you'll be missed. We'll just have to skype you in!

ps. I also have other amazing friends that aren't technically part of the "framily" but that doesn't mean I don't love or appreciate them any less. You know who you are!