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And in that I have always been a work in progress.

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Daily writing prompt
How can you build a regular fitness routine?
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The building lay entirely within intention.

What are you willing to do – emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually – to make this how you live. Akin to making your bed in the morning. In my view, it is not at all about what you do. Moreso, it is entirely about who you become.

A little about me.

Challenged by bulk my entire life. Rigorous activity took command of it when circumstances were amenable to it. Or shall I say, I made room to allow those circumstances to appear.

Running and cycling were two of my favorites, and still are. But just not physically possible any longer. Thank you football ! I like doing the circuit training I created for PF. Trying to work that into days again is the obstacle. During Covid, I flipped a tractor tire up and down a football field for several months. Yard work is good for the core. Shoveling snow too. I love doing physical work.

Taken steps, literally, to raise the fitness level here. First, began walking with a weighted vest. Already need something heavier. The distance is increasing – already in the three to four mile range – so I will now focus on quickening the pace. In time, I think I could walk to PF, hit the circuit and walk home. That would be ideal.

Eating is being addressed as well.

Really into Cheerios, bananas and 1% milk in the morning. Some yogurt, even plain 0% is yummy to me. Lots of veggies – digging tomatoes, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots and peppers raw – with or without yogurt dip.

My snack driving from client to client? Hard boiled eggs. Salad burritos are good too. Never really a soda guy, cut way down on toast, steak once a quarter, mostly chicken, pork and fish. Pasta the way my bestie makes it is to die for. Maybe a burger on the grill once in a while. Tacos with black beans in the meat. Cut back on the tortilla chips.

All is in place to make progress, with the exception of increasing the portion size of the exercise while finding the correct level for portion size when I am hungry. That is happening.

But it is all a building process.

As I suggested, it is not at all about what you do.

Moreso, it is entirely about who you become

And in that I have always been a work in progress.

Don’t need to carry around that fossil anymore.

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What I felt like sharing today: what will I try to do better today than I did yesterday?

Not that I don’t like the prompts. I just felt like talking about this is all.

The past week has been trying to say the least. Some metamorphosis going on me thinks. Figures, it is spring afterall. Allegedly.

I am looking to find some peace of the internal variety. After spending so much of my life over functioning over everything, a dozen or so steps need to be taken backwards. Not so much to start over. More so, to remain in the here and now is all. Some days, I might find myself in a pair of soles from the 70’s or 80’s. Other times, I was in something so far ahead that they hadn’t even made it out the designer’s noggin yet.

That being said, there is a definite need and value to just staying right here. I may get a little agitated by the desire to go futz in the yard or design some screen to keep leaves out the window wells. The former comes as an aside when I got a spare twenty minutes. The latter is still on the drawing board. They are just fulfilling distractions.

But those have never fallen into the “over” category. More so antidotal by nature. So for today, I am going to remain right here. In my thoughts. Definitely in my words. And finally in my actions. I aim to avoid the crisis I can create within the top floor, that spills out of my lips and ends up being made into a mess.

Hallow happens to have a two week journey embracing peace and serenity. And if todays ten minutes is anything like yesterdays, then I am on a pretty dang good path.

So with regard to the actual prompt from today, my aim is to minimalize my over side into extinction.

Don’t need to carry around that fossil anymore.

My favorite four aficianadoes.

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Daily writing prompt
What is the best concert you have been to?
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Now there’s a question.

And I LOVE music.

Back in the 70’s and 80’s, I spent a great deal of time going to concerts.

My first one ever? Not gonna believe this. The Carpenters at Ravinia, maybe mid 70’s. Don’t remember a thing from that show. Not that we were toasty. Just don’t. Wore suits. With “dates”. Awkward to say the least. Yikes.

From there?

Let’s see.

Saw Uriah Heep open for Kiss at the old Chicago Stadium. Peter Criss spun like a hamster on some drum kit thingee they designed. Also saw Led Zepplin there, until Jimmy Page needed a chair because he was “under the weather”. A few songs into the set it was cancelled. Foghat and BTO at the old Amphitheatre, the loudest. I think Elton, Wings, Black Sabbath, Kansas and And for the Rush show, our tickets were for the main floor. But me and JSV were pretty much sitting up in the rafters that whole show, if you catch my drift.

Outdoor ones? OMG

Superbowls and World Series of Rock through out the Chicago area. The Police, Flock of Seagulls, Yes, The Fixx, Lynrd, REO, Ferocious Theodocius, Molly Hatchet and Guns n Roses. Tom Petty, Boston, Stevie Nicks, Phil Collins and the Hot Tub Club, Stevie Ray Vaughn at one of his final performances, Aerosmith before and after they maintained sobriety. Inxs three times in one year. Cheap Trick. Dire Straits. Pink Floyd for the Animals Tour at Arlington Raceway and Frank crooning as only he can at the Taste of Chicago. Had tickets for Mr. Dylan but couldn’t get there. Dang.

Willie Nelson played for three hours straight at Alpine Valley I think. In college, we developed a thing for David Allen Coe. He was to warm it up for Hank Williams Jr. in Chicago. But he also had a tendency not to show up. So me and three other suburban brats went to the show on the ifcome. Mr. Coe was a no show. But Hank played three hours straight to a crowd that was mostly motorcylists and tatted up if you know what I mean.

So yes. Concerts were big in my life.

But to name favorites, I would have to jettison years ahead, to the days my kids played.

When I was in grade school, I didn’t pass a test to allow me to learn an instrument, though my dad was an accordionist and pianist. But I did sing in a barbershop chorus, and was lead for a quartet in middle school.

My kids though?

They must have gotten my dad’s genes. My oldest daughter, son and youngest daughter played the viola, cello and viola in the orchestra from grade to highschool. Once in highschool, the orchestra took trips overseas to play in Europe, going to Czech Republic, Austria, Italy and Spain. Their rendition of “Ashokan Farewell” still remains in my heart.

My youngest son was a percussionist for the band and the orchestra. He still is. So he played drums for the marching band and whatever they needed for an orchestral concert with his siblings. He was the whip in the Christmas song, “Sleigh Ride”. He said that one part was nerve wracking. He and the band went to Hawaii and played at half-time for a bowl game his senior year.

I still grin when I think about sprinting across the infield at Arlington at 7:00 AM to capture a spot to watch Pink Floyd at 7:00 PM.

But my heart smiles most when I remember watching my four play their concerts.

My favorite four aficianadoes.

Wherever.

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When I got it going this morning, the prompt was one thing, albeit a wee bit of deja vu in it. Since then, my noggin has been in overdrive down that path of prose. But alas, it to has changed. But what the heck. It did prompt me to offer something. So gird your loins.

I mentioned that it was sort of like a rerun, something to the effect of how you like to be active or participate in the community. I recall sharing something about my experience in youth sports, Boy Scouting, publicspeaking and the like here at home. But a pot or so of coffee and about 150 miles later, I arrived at this perspective. Whoa, that pun arrived right on schedule. Like it was in Maps.

Community goes far beyond where one lives. It is situated all over. Where, how and what we are meant to be when we just simply live. We are all different in some fashion. That is just the way it is. But in reality, we are all the same. The mold is essentially identical. From a Master drawing perspective, it is still rev. 1. Has been for, what, thousands of years? The only difference is how we come out of the finishing department. Exteriors aside, we all have the same engine, frame and suspension systems.

So you can be traveling on business, to say Pekin, Illinois and your rev. 1 model will then become a part of their local inventory. How you go about embracing them and their way of life in the Land of Lincoln even if for only that one overnight stay casts impressions that may extend far beyond your time there. Both on them and on you. What you do as a foreigner in that foreign land of Cardinal fans can be defining in many ways.

Say you check into the Holday Inn there on Kelly Ave. and no know strangers, they will likely respond in kind. In a few minutes of shootin’ the feces, you can become one of them. Like a Bears fan in Wisconsin, meeting a Cubs fan there will stoke a great rivalry conversation. Steer clear of 1969.

Smile and share puns and open doors. Say “thank you” for their help and dropping their guard. Make friends. Maybe they have kids graduating or getting married too. Perhaps they just lost a parent or a sibling. Could be that this is there side gig during retirement or their first job out of high school. And should the tunes in the background elicit a response or sing along, share the concert you went to growing up. Your favorite kind of music. Or how you love to listen to Led Zepplin at “11” on I55 with the windows down.

For some strange reason, we forget that we are all one. As one. The only difference is a zip code. Don’t matter where, how or what.

Just be active in them.

Wherever.

I am worth it.

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Daily writing prompt
What’s a mystery from your own life that you’ve never solved?
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A mystery.

Hmmmm. Let me see….

I don’t see any Poirotesque connections in this one. Plus, how in the heck does he make his moustache stand at attention like that. Good God. One booger search, sleeve sneeze or an asiago bagel piled with cream cheese and that stache would be histoire. I wonder if I could do something like that with my 4/0 eyebrows. Mon dieu, mais je m’éloigne du sujet….

At this stage in the game, it appears as though my personal search discernment party has found it self at a cross road. There are still acres to be trod and perseverance to be deployed, but sense is being made regarding this life mystery. Not that I know the answer. Just that I am getting better acquainted with the question.

For some reason, that still lay outside my grasp, I have allowed my value and worth to be determined inan open and albeit unconcerned market. To ensure “proper consideration” through out this external assessment process, I then add to the calamity by using “over” as the requisite prefix to every thought, word and deed I enjoin.

Over-functioning is how my counselor termed it. Figures, since it fits perfectly with all manner of functions. Like – thinking, – trying. – doing, – extending, – caring, -carrying, – attempting, – giving, and so on, ad nauseum. When unleashed into a field with no fences, this fuzzy little guy just wants to run all over, seeking a look, some attention, a semi-smile, heck, even a passing pat on the noggin. Should those affirmations be of short supply, then it had to be something I did or didn’t do that produced that level of inattention, disaffirmation and neglect.

So fill up the tank, get off your ass and get back to it Hahn.

Over, and over. And over.

And over.

And over.

The Hercule en moi is still pondering this one.

But by the grace of God, I at least have a starting point. That may take me to its origins. To “why?” Maybe. Or perhaps its take was to simply make me aware, so that I can just learn, appreciate the value of its lesson and begin to leave it. At the very least, I am now aware of its dissonance when it starts approaching me from a distance. I can gird them, remain in the moment and make some much healthier choices. Protect myself for once. And just let me be.

It took some time to unravel this mystery of my life. Still a few more layers to go. But I do know one thing with absolute clarity and certainty.

Pour une fois.

I am worth it.