February 2019 – Judith P Roberts

For a decade now, I have identified myself as a runner.

I’m not a crossfitter or a cyclist or a walker – I am a runner. I run. I have shoes specifically designed to run. I have a running partner who apparently is as crazy as I am because she and I like to run at 5 a.m. in my pitch-black dark neighborhood.

Running, like any type of exercise, has its own community and own sense of words – fartlek, PR, intervals. How’d you do in your last half marathon? Oh, I made it in right under 2 hours – and you, as a runner, know what that means. You as a non-runner can understand a bit, but a runner who hears that knows if that halfie runner is faster or slower than you. You know the amount of time and effort that went in to prepping for that half marathon. You know how limp that person’s legs must feel right now – they feel like gelatin.

For the past three weeks, I have not been able to run.

It started mid-January, when I hopped on an athletic club’s treadmill and started to run. Immediately, I felt a sharp, unyielding pain in my right knee. It was not some random pain or one that I thought I could ignore. I sometimes, to Kyle’s chagrin (and probably most medical professionals’), “play through the pain,” but I couldn’t this time.

There happened to be a trainer nearby, so I asked him his thoughts. He, as politely as he could, suggested that it could be that I hadn’t warmed up. I tried hard not to scoff, as I never warm up (which, of course, may be a problem, but I digress).

He also suggested tendonitis.

I tried warming up. I walked for five minutes. My knee didn’t hurt at all walking, but the moment I started running, the pain returned.

So I stopped.

Last week, I actually went to see a PT, who also determined that I have extremely weak hips, which could be adding pressure to my knees. Therefore I started hip strengthening exercises.

So for the last three weeks, I’ve rowed a little on a rowing machine. I’ve done the elliptical. I’ve lifted weights. I’ve done Zumba. I’ve done everything that hasn’t made my knees hurt.

I haven’t run.

Running has always been the easy exercise, the one I could burn 300 calories in 30 minutes and add a piece of cheesecake to eat after dinner. I could burn 500 calories in under an hour. But – only running is not good. This is coming from a self-identified runner, too. I’ve always known I needed to cross train, to participate in other activities. But I haven’t because it’s just been easier to run.

Now that’s come back and bitten me in the rear.

I’m trying to enjoy other exercises. I like running on my lunch break. I like doing Zumba on the TV in my bedroom. I love rowing (go figure). I’ve thoroughly enjoyed doing something different and not feeling the pressure of getting a certain mileage in every week because I physically cannot right now.

But I do so miss running.

It’s time, it’s time, it’s time, it’s time!!

It’s my favorite time of the quarter! The time when I get to see my students’ hard work come to fruition! The time when I sit back in awe at how creative and brilliant our future as a whole really is! The time when I get so excited because my students have once again gone beyond the necessary and gone to the extreme! It’s dress rehearsals for group projects!

This quarter, my social media class divided into six groups to partner with six start-up companies. And when I say start-up, I mean one-person operations. One is a photography business, one is a prayer journal (that I have mentioned before), one is an online boutique, etc. These are businesses that would benefit greatly from social media management skills. My students will, in one week, propose a social media campaign that will show them what platforms they need to use, what audience demographic they should target, and give them examples of posts for each platform.

Tomorrow – tomorrow – I get to critique their dress rehearsals for these pitches. Dress rehearsals are vital to get all the bugs out of the system before the clients see the finished, flawless project. Not only will they see any technical difficulties they may have with the presentation, but they will receive feedback on their presentation as well as with their hard-copy pitch. These are all intelligent students with fantastic editing skills – but nothing is perfect. I am a pretty dadgum good copy editor myself, and when I was close to graduating with my undergraduate degree, I asked several editors to look over my resume. They tweaked a few items but overall praised it. I took it to a technical writing firm, and before I sat down for the interview, one of the interviewers said, “Hey, you have a proofreading error on your resume. Did you know that?” None of my proofreaders saw that.

Obviously, I did not get the job.

But I digress – the point of that little rabbit trail was to explain that even group work editing needs assistance.

They had a team workshop last week, and as I flitted around from group to group, I was so impressed with their ideas. They’re working with such a variety of creative businesses with a wide range of social media capabilities. One businesswoman is quite adept at social media, and her posts are already amazing. Her group is working to help her take her business to the next level, using her knowledge to boost her sales even higher. Then we have businesses whose heads are not sure how to use social media or what to do to increase brand awareness on any platform – and those students are working on a game plan that gives specifics of what to do, where to do it, and when to do it. And – wait, there’s more! We have business leaders who don’t have time – they have a family or another job or this profession is a side gig – at any rate, my students are working on a plan that will help them grow their social media engagement with a time management plan. It’s great – it’s so great, y’all. This week is exciting, and I am already so proud of all of their work.

And, yes – this is me this week.

It’s time, it’s time, it’s time, it’s time!

Month: February 2019

Another running injury