One clicker short.
A little over a year ago, Mr. Shortpants and I moved into our new house. Moving into a new house comes with all sorts of responsibilities; some are good, some are just awful.
On my list of awful responsibilities are most kinds of yard work and any kind scorpion interaction, as you may recall.
Sometimes though, the things that I deem to be awful are really just things I think are going to be awful.
For example, the garage.
We have a garage, fortunately, but the garage only came with one door clicker. It all didn’t really matter, because for a while our garage was merely a staging area as we unpacked and moved in for boxes and other junk. We couldn’t put one car in the garage let alone two.
So a year rolls by and the garage is still a dump. After one of those days, you know the kind, we, or just me, I can’t remember, got a bug up our butt and decided to organize the garage. The boxes went on the shelves, the bikes got hung on hooks, and the stuff to donate went to the donation place.
Later that day, Mr. Shortpants and I surveyed our hard work from the driveway like proud parents. There it was. A garage. With space for cars. Imagine.
“We should park the cars in the garage.” Mr. Shortpants said.
“But we only have one clicker.” I exclaimed.
In our old house, the garage door broke. Not the actual door, but the mechanical bits that make the door go up and down.
It was a very complicated process getting the door fixed. Not only complicated, but expensive. To be honest with you, I’m not sure why it was complicated. It seems like it would be relatively easy-call the repair people, give them money, get fixed garage door. But it was complicated, so now, the task of getting a second clicker seemed impossible.
Months and months went by without a second clicker. We tried to work off one clicker, but let’s face it, one clicker isn’t enough. Inevitably the clicker gets left in the car, or in the house, or the other person winds up being out when you thought they would be home. It’s tricky business, this sharing thing.
At the beginning of December, I went to Rochester to see my family and to do some work. Of course, while I was there, I had to visit the local Fleet Feet. My dad tried on running tights while I perused the snowshoes and wished I lived somewhere cold.
I found this cool journal at Fleet Feet. It is basically just a running log, but it is fancy. Plenty of room to write in, lots of pages, inspirational quotes and the whole bit. It is awesome.
I struggle with logging my running. I’ve tried just letting my nike+ keep track, I’ve tried Mr. Shortpants created spread sheets, I’ve tried old fashioned pen and paper and nothing seems to stick. I’d like to implement a method, so this cool Fleet Feet journal seemed as good as any. So I bought one, and with hope I tucked it away in my suitcase and decided to start using as soon as I got home.
And, as you might suspect, I started out strong.
This is the story of my life, I think.
She started off strong, that How Many Miles, she did. But no one knows where she is at.
I dutifully recorded my workouts. I filled in the careful spaces with times, dates, mileage. I even flipped a few weeks ahead and created workout goals for myself. I felt proud, of course. I was sticking to it.
But then, life happened. I got sick and missed a bunch of workouts. We had out of town guests. I had to travel for business.
But my journal sat on my desk. Taunting me. Laughing at me. Daring me to crack it open. Whispering to me as I walked down the hallway.
Good intentions, HMM. They pave the road to hell. But you already knew that, right?
Of course, after awhile, the pressure is too great. All those missed workouts. All those forgotten goals. It is really stressful.
Before I know it, the journal has spring boarded into other areas of my life.
I can’t sign up for another marathon.
I can’t run.
I can’t write.
I can’t workout.
I’m paralyzed with this fear. Fear of failure.
Stupid journal. Stupid running. Stupid goals. Stupid fear of failure.
A few weeks back, Mr. Shortpants dropped me off for an appointment and went off to run errands while he waited. When he picked me up, there was a bag on the floor by my feet.
“What is in the bag?” I asked.
“The new clicker.” Mr. Shortpants said nonchalantly.
“What?”
“The new clicker. For the garage.”
“For the garage?”
“Yep. You just have to program it.”
“What?”
Without hesitation, I ripped open the package and inspected it. I casually read the instructions looking for the complicated caveat. I programmed the new clicker right there in the car. When we got home, I jumped out of the car and pressed the new clicker.
Garage door opened. I pressed the new clicker again. The garage door shut.
I was amazed.
As if there might be some hole in the universe, I pushed the old clicker and waited for it to fail. It didn’t. The garage door opened without error. I pushed the old clicker again. The garage door promptly closed.
I must’ve stood out there for 10 minutes opening and closing the garage door.
It wasn’t complicated at all. We could have had a second garage door clicker months and months ago.
All that pressure, for nothing.
I went in the house, grabbed the running journal and scratched out the pages that had missing workouts or unfulfilled goals.
Why should I let something so simple stop me from achieving my goals? Even better, why should I let something so small snowball into something that cripples me?
Instead I’m taking one day at a time. I know that sentiment is thrown around a lot, but it really does ring true.
Instead of filling out the journal weeks in advance with goals that are surely setting me up to fail, I do it the night before. No pressure. And when I do miss a workout, because life happens, I let it go. Without inflicting self punishment. Without excess guilt. I let it go.
Because sometimes things are really as simple as going to the store, buying the second clicker, programming the second clicker, and opening the garage door.