Muscles!

Well, THAT threw you for a loop, didn't it?

I'm starting to appreciate mine.

When I was younger....much, much, much younger....the cool thing was NOT to have muscles, but to be tiny, feminine and hollow cheeked.

I come from a family (on both sides, really) with strong, muscular women. As a teen, I always hated wearing shorts or shorter skirts because my calves looked SO BIG!  I stayed away from tank tops because my arms had noticable biceps. I couldn't wear leggings with the long shirts...it looked like I had sausages for legs! It was NOT cool to have muscles in the 80's....or the 90's.... 

When I lived with Yosts, and worked at the arena, Kellie Y. and I regularly packed portable corral panels, individually. (Made of pipe, about 5 feet tall and 10 feet long)  We wanted very much to have Ty and George's approval and they did appreciate it, I think.  And lifting the 50 pound gate to let steers in the chute certainly toned our arms up, since we did that about 400 times in a day, 2-3 days a week, 12 weeks in a row. 

It came to our attention, though, that we were always the chute help and never the dates.

That's right! The delicate, feminine chicks went to the dances afterward, while we rubbed our sore muscles and fell into bed.

We got the big jobs that broke fingernails and made you smell like steers as early as 8 a.m.

Drats.

It appeared muscles were a big detriment, when dating cowboys.

(Real ranchers, however, choose wives BASED on their muscles and cooking ability...lucky for me!)

So most of my life, I've been ashamed of my muscular body, hiding anything that resembled a strong shape under long sleeves or jeans.

Heaven forbid I venture near a swim suit!

The last couple years, however, have changed all that.

First, it has become REALLY COOL to have muscles! 

Have you picked up a Shape or Fitness magazine, lately? Or an Athleta catalog?

Muscles are becoming....well.....can it be?.....sexy!

Bout darn time!

And then, my daughter has been showing me her muscles. 

She stretches, bends, flexes, runs and checks to see if they are bigger...

and asks me if I like her strong, fast legs.

They are beautiful, baby.

She delights, absolutely thrills, in the muscles I hated all my life!

They're a source of strength and beauty, a symbol of ability and speed!

Now, when I look in the mirror, I still first cringe and think, "too big". 

But I've learned to look again, with kinder eyes.

I see arms that can still lift panels, carry growing children with ease, beat eggs, row a kayak and heave salt sacks.

 I see my mom and my grandma.

I see legs that can run as far as I ask them, dance with great joy, act as springs when I ride the wheeler, climb hills, power a shovel, and kick balls back to my babies.

I see my Dutton cousins and great aunts.

I'm enjoying seeing what they can do, now that I've made peace with them.

I've found I'd much rather push them a little and feel them ache, than to neglect them and forget they're there.

I show Maggie my muscles, after she shows me hers, and she hopes that someday hers will be that big!

So do I.

Between the lines...

Aunt Rosie sent me a Red Raider hat around Christmas time and Angus had SERIOUS Guns Up envy.  To the point I had to hide the cap in my running shoes to be able to keep it. 

A couple weeks later, another package showed up in the mail with two more Red Raider hats!

We love them!  So, for Rosie, here we are in our Guns Up hats (as Angus calls them). 

(Had to take it with the tri-pod and timer, so it's a little...off.)

I guess you all know that the Red Raiders won their Ticket City Bowl game, 45-38, against Northwestern.

I'm Back!

My friend Sara, who apparently has even less of a life than I do (bless her heart), wrote me an email yesterday asking, "Are the Chronicles dead?"  She checks them daily. 

The Chronicles are NOT dead, but they are clinically depressed. 

"Do you have any ideas?", I queried, back, after assuring her that it was a lack of inspiration and not permanent closure of the site.

Well....as a matter of fact.....SO glad you asked.....
She had about 24 ideas and counting.
And she sent them back FAST! 

Sara would like to see more book posts, for starters.  Like, what books am I planning to read in 2011? 

Rubbing palms together, pencil in my hair, tea by my side, I proceeded to do some research.
(One mustn't rush into literature posts, you know.  That would be incredibly irresponsible and the repercussions could be severe, should a Chronicles reader walk up to me on the street and tie into me about, say, The Treasure of MontSegur, claiming it caused them permanent mental distress and several sleepless nights.  Ask my bookclub girls...)(That's a GREAT book, by the way.  But you have to be a big girl/boy to read it. And no, I can't tell you why....)

I've always wanted to say I read War and Peace.  Don't you think that's the mark of someone well-read?  If you ask them, "So, have you REALLY read War and Peace?" and they confidently say, "YES.  Several years ago..."  (Never mind that it actually TOOK them several years...they took on the challenge and did it.)

So, I'm going to read War and Peace.  I feel confident that I can, having taken Anna Karenina and Les Miserables on and finished them.  They were little old starter books, I think.  Gulp.

I want to read Mark Twain's Autobiography, published as per his request 100 years after his death.  Doesn't that intrigue you? It sounds positively juicy to me!

The Woman in White, by Wilkie Collins is next.  I really should've already done this, but I was busy with Les Mis....(That's my standard reading excuse, now.  Just WAIT until I finish War and Peace! "Oh, I didn't get to that; I was on page 1058 of War and Peace...  Maybe next year, darling...")

I try to read some contemporary books, too; not just dusty, pretentious old classics.

I have my eye on David Baldacci's Hell's Corner, The Sweet Life in Paris by David Lebowitz, Minding Frankie by Maeve Binchy, and the next #1 Ladies Detective Agency novel. 

After looking at 100 Books You Must Read Before You Die, and noting it didn't have any Calvin and Hobbes, Louis L'Amour or Patrick McManus, I threw it out and decided to make my own list. 

What about you? Any literature goals for the year?
(Want to read War and Peace with me?)