This morning I got up at 4:15 not to get paid like I normally am when I get up that early but to fly to Minnesota for a 36 hour family trip. I’m flying solo as per usual and I’ll spend the next day and a half with my siblings and a little time with my mother who haven’t spoken to in a while, probably over a year. This is by choice but not out of any sort of malice towards her, just ambivalence because there is so little left of the parent I knew in childhood that any mother/child relationship isn’t viable. Sophie did get a birthday card sent to the wrong address, something that used to end up in trash so the kids wouldn’t be confused, and she thought it was pretty cool especially now that she’s old enough to understand complex family dynamics without really having a desire to figure out who this mystery figure is.

Not gonna lie, I really don’t want to be sitting in this plane. I knew that the holidays would be hard, they usually are, but this year was different. I went over to the kids apartment yesterday morning and things were fine, eerily normal feeling and I’m ok with that. I was good talking with my ex and watching the kids open presents and about 90 minutes in used the “I have to pull some rolls out of the fridge for dinner with my dad” excuse I had planned to leave before things fell silent. It’s the longest conversation, the least emotionally charged conversation that we’ve had in almost 7 months and I was good until I got in the car. A couple of deep breaths and I had things back under control for a while.

I headed over to my place and pulled the rolls out of the fridge, played some sad songs on the guitar and cleared out my emotional space before heading over to Denise’s place for breakfast. After I dropped the kids off on Christmas Eve, Denise and Liz and I met up for a run and a drink since we were all more or less alone for the holidays and were going to see the new Star Wars movie on Christmas Day after breakfast. We had a nice little collection of run club folks at breakfast and at the movie and it was nice to be in a relaxed holiday environment for a while. After the movie, I headed home to bake the rolls and load some new race information onto the club website and play some more music. The rolls came out well, they were a little over-proofed but they were tasty at least.

I headed over to my dad and step-moms place for dinner and let them know it was a tough day for me and I had planned a run for the evening with some friends to shake off the holidays. I left dinner a little early and headed home to get ready for the run and headed over a little early. I was sitting in my car listening to some sad music, things got away from me for a minute and I decided to go ahead and get some miles before the group run.

We had a small group show for a run since the social run was canceled for the holiday and I really enjoyed spending a bit more time with the group before heading home to pack and get prepared for the flight. We are taxiing down the runway and I’m going to be alright, it’s not really an option. So I’ll breathe and focus on being in the moment and Saturday I’ll be back in Denton ready to get some big miles leading up to Bandera in a couple of weeks, something to work for on break.