Apparently, exercise and volunteerism are mood-lifters. Who knew?
I'm feeling pretty down these days. Today I find myself with childcare and without work, and I made myself a to-do list (actually a teux deux list, because I completely love the app) in an attempt to keep myself from just dropping off the kids and then spending the day lying on the couch listening to The Swell Season and feeling sorry for myself.
One of the items on the teuxdeux/prevent-plummeting-into-despair list was to volunteer at the Friday Running Club at recess at Dutch's school. I'd done it once before - volunteers stand at one corner of the playground while the kids run laps, and each time the kids come around, they stop and present their laminated cards for you to check off another box. I loved it. I love seeing them coming toward me, with their wide-open faces, every single thing they feel written all over them.* Some of them are running socially, with friends, and some of them are running alone, and some of them are sprinting, and some are trotting, and they're all just intoxicated with it - with whatever it is about it that works for them, and maybe just with the pleasure of being out of the classroom for 20 minutes. They RUN, some of these kids, like no adult ever runs, like they're both running for their lives and running for sheer joy, at the same time. You should see them. They look like hope and joy and everything that's good about people, in the shape of small, sweaty, snotty, red-faced, screaming banshees. It's pretty amazing to me that so many of them participate; many of them run for the entire recess period. And I get to see Dutch, who loves loves loves it that I'm there,*** and her friends, so it's just all good.
So I did that. I left later than I'd planned, so I biked there at top speed,**** standing up on my pedals like I was a first-grader myself, and got there all sweaty and windblown, with freezing red cheeks, and it felt really good. The recess was just as fun as it had been before. Then I biked home, downhill, swooping around corners at daringly high speeds, and that was also excellent.
Anyway, now I'm home, with a cup of tea, listening to The Swell Season, blogging. But I put blogging on my teuxdeux, so it's okay! The take-home message of this post is this: If you're feeling depressed and hopeless, you should go ride your bike and cheer on some sprinting 7-year-olds. That'll fix you right up!
*I only volunteer at the first recess, before lunch,** which is only K-2. I expect the older kids are more jaded, having reached the advanced age of 9.
** This is a really welcome change from last year - the K-2 kids get recess before lunch, so they've burned off a fair amount of steam by the time they sit down to eat.
*** When I told her that my job had evaporated, she said "That's too bad. So can you volunteer at Friday Running Club now?"
**** That is to say, MY top speed, which is very slow. Grandmas out for constitutionals breeze past me. Damn you, grandmas!
One of the items on the teuxdeux/prevent-plummeting-into-despair list was to volunteer at the Friday Running Club at recess at Dutch's school. I'd done it once before - volunteers stand at one corner of the playground while the kids run laps, and each time the kids come around, they stop and present their laminated cards for you to check off another box. I loved it. I love seeing them coming toward me, with their wide-open faces, every single thing they feel written all over them.* Some of them are running socially, with friends, and some of them are running alone, and some of them are sprinting, and some are trotting, and they're all just intoxicated with it - with whatever it is about it that works for them, and maybe just with the pleasure of being out of the classroom for 20 minutes. They RUN, some of these kids, like no adult ever runs, like they're both running for their lives and running for sheer joy, at the same time. You should see them. They look like hope and joy and everything that's good about people, in the shape of small, sweaty, snotty, red-faced, screaming banshees. It's pretty amazing to me that so many of them participate; many of them run for the entire recess period. And I get to see Dutch, who loves loves loves it that I'm there,*** and her friends, so it's just all good.
So I did that. I left later than I'd planned, so I biked there at top speed,**** standing up on my pedals like I was a first-grader myself, and got there all sweaty and windblown, with freezing red cheeks, and it felt really good. The recess was just as fun as it had been before. Then I biked home, downhill, swooping around corners at daringly high speeds, and that was also excellent.
Anyway, now I'm home, with a cup of tea, listening to The Swell Season, blogging. But I put blogging on my teuxdeux, so it's okay! The take-home message of this post is this: If you're feeling depressed and hopeless, you should go ride your bike and cheer on some sprinting 7-year-olds. That'll fix you right up!
*I only volunteer at the first recess, before lunch,** which is only K-2. I expect the older kids are more jaded, having reached the advanced age of 9.
** This is a really welcome change from last year - the K-2 kids get recess before lunch, so they've burned off a fair amount of steam by the time they sit down to eat.
*** When I told her that my job had evaporated, she said "That's too bad. So can you volunteer at Friday Running Club now?"
**** That is to say, MY top speed, which is very slow. Grandmas out for constitutionals breeze past me. Damn you, grandmas!
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