Today, upon running my five mile loop, I went to Oliver’s Produce and purchased some honey for my tea as well as several pretty flowers. One of the flowers is a sunflower, and the three colorful flowers are something I am not familiar with, nevertheless they made me very happy to admire and walk a mile holding. I love having cream with honey in my black or chamomile tea every day. I put my flowers next to my moon flowers of the day.

Earlier this morning, I sight read through some old pieces and I am pleasantly surprised with what I remember. It takes me a few months to go from sight reading to playing an entire chunk of anything new as performance ready. When I am using my other violin, it will be so much easier after playing on my harder violin for such a long time. It’s like running in different pairs of sneakers, playing on different violins. Whether it is giving lessons or being home and playing the violin at your parent’s house, you feel the difference between playing an instrument versus an instrument luxuriously playing for you which makes me giggle. For practicing, I do not use vibrato all he time because it hurts my wrist, another thing in practice I do to save myself is break my perfect posture sitting at the end of my chair and lean back for back support. It is very strenuous to play violin which is something that a lot of people do not think about, so there is a vast difference between practice and performing (depending on the person). Sometimes, it actually is easier for me to play violin standing up, everyone finds those little ways to save energy practicing, I don’t know after my back surgery I could not play my violin for two months. You would think this was the year for me to have extra time for running and violin, yet I needed a break from all of it. Last summer I took a break from running just to do my grad math work, I never really had a break before since I was about 18 unless it was 4 weeks off for an injury. Just to make the assimilation with using difficulty to make your norm more easy later on, I have a variation of the ‘cheater sneaker’ which ironically make running more difficult, so when I put on my race sneakers I run much faster as the result of running in the difficult sneakers so much. Welcoming the difficult on a welcome mat, makes it easier for me to adjust to change as well as accelerate later into a process. I try not to take myself too seriously, like I am sure whatever my project turns out to be it will be fine!

Basically, my highlights today were running and violining.

If you told me eight years ago that I would still be running marathons trying to reach my all time time goal, I would have cried. I feel ambivalent about my time goal, and weird about it not happening already or by a certain age, because I really thought that 25 was the age I would run my best marathon time and then after that all I would need to do is my PhD. Luckily, it works with my long lasting routine to be a marathon runner and have another side to life as well, so I am comfortable with putting myself out there at this stage of life. When you devote so much of your life to something, it needs to happen. I am a firm believer that when you stride towards perfection, you will fall pretty close. In the marathon, it went from being the longest distance that I have ever run, to an event that I am capable of running very well. Always having been a strong runner, I thought that the marathon would feel like a race as the 5k felt during the cross-country years. My first time, the marathon felt like a race until twenty miles in when I felt like I was in the deep end. After becoming comfortable with longer distances over years and years, I still feel like anyone could feel in the deep end in a marathon, but I am more comfortable racing or risk taking knowing what to expect. Running a marathon well really does take years of hard work, I feel like I was just as good of a runner eight yeas ago yet I am in a higher place tackling my favorite event now than back then. If the question is, Do you feel comfortable running a marathon? My answer is no one feels comfortable running a marathon, but at the same time I probably am as comfortable or confident in running the marathon as someone can possibly be.

Taking a break from racing this year, gave me fresh legs to have a plan for the next year and a half of racing. Where as before, I never really took a break for a very long time in years and my body was so worn out. I could have raced very injured, and I am sure that last Spring would have been my last season. Perhaps I wanted last Spring to be my last season and should have just run injured. At the same time, I foresee myself really getting it within this next year, so maybe the unexpected break will equip me with the tenacity to run even faster than I have ever dreamed of. Marathon running sure does build character if nothing else of the career. You do not know what healthy feels like until you feel healthy again. God is good all the time, and hopefully has a wonderful plan for my running in this season back because I am already committed. Everything is happening at once after years of hard work, running my world majors and recording all my violin pieces in addition to filming them professionally, next summer I will feel on top of the world. You know, this really is not how I always envisioned those goals working out if you will, however at least they are working out just because they can. Sometimes, just being able to do something is enough, flow through the motions.

By next summer, I will have my favorite Vivaldi and Tchaikovsky and Christmas music recorded with some kind of corresponding videos. How fun is that?! I really should do it all, just for my mom and instructor after all those years of driving around or practicing forever and ever. All my playing will be on the record, plus I can play dress up too. All of those classical pieces that I learned really are like running a marathon, that mindset to do very long things came in handy. I also want to try making shorts of my favorite sections of pieces that my friends who are not into classical music would enjoy listening to on my back deck if I insist and give them enough to drink first. After we record all of my things this next 365 days, we are going to have a party with balloons and confetti. I am such a lucky girl to have these long term goals to look forward to all year after this year being the worst especially. Whenever I see my aunt whom is an orchestra conductor/ instructor/ violinist in the big apple aka NYC, I always tell her to tell her elite instrumental students to record the special pieces that they play just because they can, not everyone can do it so playing is very cool. Even the other day whilst enjoying my favorite Finger Lake Winery, I could not take my eyes off of the string bass player par ce que I love strings so much, you can use instruments to meet people which is very funny. My aunt’s violin prodigy going off to college will probably find their first girlfriend serenading her with Salut d’Amour or something. I just fixed up a baby violin so I can take on a student this year and have a prodigy in ten to fifteen years from now too, with like expensive strings and everything snobby on the market. I think that Gold Flex rosin is worth the twenty dollars, because it really does improve tone quality on cheaper instruments immensely.

The next time I see my little cousin/sister Lauren, I will play some nice classical Tchaikovsky on my violin whilst she dances her classical ballet with whirls & twirls & leaps, she can do so much more than plié, relevé and curtsy which is very impressive; another reason we were always besties. We will rehearse again, again, and all over again together avec a piano accompaniment too. Playing the Waltz of Sleeping Beauty on violin, makes me think of nothing other than beautiful Lauren dancing in her ballet studio in Kodiak, or in front of the majestic mountains and ocean; leap, plié, and whirl. You become mesmerized watching Lauren dance, dancing is her life. J’y pense que elle va use her MBA to open up her own ballet studio, just because she can especially if she settles on Alaska of all places. I remember how happy Lauren was to finally have as many pairs of pointe shoes as she wanted instead of just one pair, that was such a big deal to go from one pair a season to one pair a week with three alternatives just in case. When we went to NYC together, instead of finding Balto that time, we found ballet dancers and actually purchased a biographical book signed by the author on the steps of some profound building; she was so cute & little & hopeful & happy (afterwards we had crêpes with strawberries somewhere fancy which is why we had to make them with Bailey back in Kodiak later on, I wish Bailey were the only friend allowed on all our trips hahah). NYC & Disney World are mine and Lauren’s happy places de temps en temps, and nothing is ever going to ruin that for us girls, nor having coffee walking down 5th Ave upon the opportunity presenting itself. Mon fée princesse ballerine, and star of the Alaska Ballet Theatre, I think she was the star dancing in Disney World too. We could probably make a really gorgeous stunning video together by next summer with my violining her Chanel make-up, Gaynor Mindens, and custom leo.