It was a nice surprise for
me that Christine Holyoake, my newest triathlete, made an unexpected appearance
at this morning early swim session even if she was just a tiny bit late for the
start. None of the few women that regularly join me in those sets seem to have
quite got to grips with The Warm Up. So the swim set starts with a bit of a
bang and then they wonder why the first item on the schedule seems a bit hard.
I usually swim at the back but this morning I was pushed forward by Bekka and
Christine and so it was me who had to try to keep up with Lane 1 drop out,
Sandra. I have no chance of keeping on her feet so to put it simply, Sandra was
impossible to draft even though I tried my best, I could not hold her feet even
for one length. Bex and Christine then swam behind me and strangely enough I
felt ok today.
After the first swim which
was : 300 then-
200
200
300
200
200
300
Christine, who is German,
performed a demonstration of how good her colloquial English is by looking at
me as if I was the lead monster in a horror movie and grumbled loudly “Blimey,
you’re just a torturer”. And later she said that she had been wondering to
herself during the set, why she had looked forward to coming over to train with
me again when I was so cruel. Later in the changing room, I told her in front
of witnesses, that there was a simple fact that she had not yet grasped, and
that was that actually she doesn’t have
to do what I tell her. Just after I made
that announcement I thought of my mother who would so often say ‘Don’t do as I
do, do as I tell you’. Not quite the same I know but that was where it flipped
me to.
Steve and I hit the Arundel
run again today and he was not comfortable at all but this week he is working
long and hard to get things that need to be completed at work finalised.
I know that I have been
training hard, but had enjoyed the swim set and the run was not too bad really,
even though my legs reminded me that we have trained every day for a while. We
will be missing out this Saturday because we will be on the road most of the
day and somehow that is tiring, even though not much is being done, apart from
watching the road.
Yesterday the little boy
next door wandered in through our garage and back garden with a bit of help
from Steve, who had been talking to his mother, Hannah. Steve told little
Héctor to go in and find me,
show me his new tractor and ask to see my teddies. I have a terrific collection
and each time I think about selling some of the special ones or giving one away
here and there I have a moment like this when it is good and helpful to have
them to engage with a little person through. Hécto,r is only a wee mite and is
big into cars and trucks, so I didn’t know how teddies would go down with him.
I wished I had a camera in my hand when I showed him the first group of them,
because his little jaw dropped and he was frozen for a second or two which was
a lovely thing to see, the wonder of a child. I asked if he wanted to see some
more and he literally had to climb the stairs to see the others with me.
It was on the way back down
the stairs that this next subject came up. He is the cutest little pixie and
had to come down the stairs on his bottom, feet down a step first then slide
off the step. I was of course in front of him. At that point, he told me that
it was squashing the poo in his pants!!!!!!????????? So… where I am going with
this is; that it had me wondering why it is these days that parents do not
toilet train their children, seeming to me to leave it until they are
approaching school age.
Héctor was a bit of a
surprise to me since he is such a bright little boy and can hold a fair conversation,
so I thought he was a bit late on the toilet scene. I know that the training takes time and a lot
of patience because I have been there and done that and maybe I was just very
lucky with my little girl, who was completely out of nappies very early.
Is it
clever brain washing by the baby goods companies telling mothers to take their
time and wait for the child to be ready? There was no such thing in my child’s
early life as disposable nappies. I had to wash them; and perhaps that was the
kick up the bum to young mothers in my day. Maybe that was a job we made an
effort to get out of having to do. Wiping poo-ey bottoms was never a job I
looked forward, to so I made to time to do the training. It is really not that
hard.
No comments:
Post a Comment