18 | April | 2012 | Mama Cormier

April 18th! This would have been Mom’s 81st birthday. Hard to believe that she’s been gone for 19 years. She taught me everything; how to cook, knit, sew, clean a house (how I hated that) but more importantly how to love and be patient with the ones you love. We had our differences over the years. The teen years were particularly hard but as a young woman and wife (pretty much happened at the same time) we became closer.

I remember in the awkward preteen years she always told me I was beautiful and I always responded by saying “you’re my mom, you have to say that!” She encouraged me when I tried to lose weight but she didn’t realize that it was never going to happen until I was ready to do so and that it had to be my idea. I know she only wanted the best for me. She herself struggled a little bit with weight, especially as she got older.

After the birth of our first daughter, I did lose a lot of weight and got down to 132 pounds. An all time low for me. Many of my family friends thought I was too thin but in hind sight I think it was a good thing because soon after I became pregnant with twins. That’s a story for another time.

Thanks Mom. I miss you. I know you’re watching over me.

In the 60’s with Mom and my sisters.

My sisters, me and our Mom.

The phone rang at 6:30 this morning. It was my friend L reminding me that I had to be at school by 7:30 for soccer tryouts. It’s never good when the coach is late. After a quick shower, I grabbed a protein bar and hurried out of the house by 7:15.

I pulled into the parking lot by 7:29 and could see that about 20 of the girls and two of the assistant coaches were already waiting on the soccer field. I grabbed my 3 bags from the car and dragged myself into the building to drop off my stuff and fetch the bag of soccer balls from the gym. When I finally got back outside we discovered that most of the balls needed to be inflated. Luckily many of the girls brought their own balls so the drills were already underway.

I never did find time to eat my protein bar. My first meal of the day happened at lunch. I thought that I could find a minute to read over the activity sheet for tonight’s Girls on the Run meeting but I made the mistake of trying to read it in the staff room. What I did read looked rather straight forward and the story attached to it inspired me to share it with my library classes in the afternoon.

When 3:00 came around I looked over the activity sheet again and went into panic mode because I was suppose to make a special box for one of the activities. Luckily Coach C had it under control and she decided that both teams could use the same box and do that particular activity together. Thank Goodness!

The day was colder than it had been the day before but not nearly as bad as the week before. We worked on negative traits that we wanted to change and focused on the positive things that we do and want to continue. It tied nicely into the story whose message was not to listen to negative or pessimistic comments when trying to pursue a goal or dream.

I think Coach P and I make a good team. During the run we encourage the girls and I even ran/walked a loop of the track today. After the girls left for the day the four coaches sat around and discussed the activities and how well the girls participated. I feel good about the program but I’m not sure it’s getting me ready for that 5 km walk/run.

It was a long day today. After Girls on the Run, Coach P and I had a parent council meeting and I didn’t get home till 9:00. At around 6:00 I finally ate that protein bar and I made supper when I got home. Way too late to eat but I knew that if I didn’t eat something I would graze for the rest of the night. It will be interesting to see if the scale has me up again, at the same weight or down somewhat. When I eat irregularly, like I did today, my body goes into starvation mode and I usually gain weight.