Panic Attack

21. December 2011 · Write a comment · Categories: chaos, fear, noise, winter blues

HIP_312491832.420444Every single cell in your body feels as if it will explode.

Your heart beats faster than seems possible.

There is at once a feeling that you are falling from a great height combined with the sensation that you are being hurtled through thin air in the upper levels of the atmosphere.

Your shoulders tighten and jaw clenches.

Something in your stomach feels like it’s swirling around rapidly, like the blue water in the stainless steel toilet bowel on an airliner at 30,000 feet when you flush.

Limbs tingle, and feel like they might move uncontrollably.

There is a sense that the blood in your veins to flare up and rage in a violent boil at any moment.

Your breathing becomes short and quick.

A tingling sensation starts in your stomach and rises like the bubbles in a bottle of seltzer water, up through your throat and neck. Some of these bubbles seem to be released just below your nose — the rest rise up through your skull and are released out the crown of your head.

This is a panic attack.

Post Holiday Cabin Fever — Wanderlust

02. January 2011 · Write a comment · Categories: daily life, self, travel, winter, winter blues · Tags:

The itch begins between the temples, reverberates back and forth inside your head until your eardrums start tingling and your eyes start to burn.  No, you can’t scratch this itch, it’s deep in your subconscious.  This itch gnaws at you and you can’t explain why you can’t sit still. Everything should be cool, you tell yourself, but it just isn’t because you’re a maelstrom of activity on the inside.

This is post holiday cabin fever.

Wanderlust is ever-present, I’m constantly dreaming of getting away for a while.  In these dreams I travel solo.  No wife. No son. No one but me.  The destinations vary – sometimes I’m fishing flies in a cold river in the mountains, sometimes I’m sailing solo around the Chesapeake, sometimes I’m on my bike cresting a ridge in the Appalachians — but I’m always solo.

I’ve never followed one of these dreams.

Recently, I told Mrs. TKD that this was the year for a big fishing trip.  I don’t know where it will be, or when I’ll go, but consider it on the books.  I suppose this is a fourth goal for 2011.  And with that in mind, I better formulate an action plan, or this dream will collapse in the vortex of life. I’m not gonna let that happen this year.

I don’t know where. I don’t know when. But I am going somewhere solo sometime in the next 363 days.

Come on Springtime

26. December 2010 · 1 comment · Categories: cycling, daily life, exercise, irritants, mr. grey, mrs. tkd, snow, spring, struggles, weather, winter, winter blues

The hacking started sometime around the 22nd of November.  Coughs and phlegm punctuate our conversations. One of the three of us has been sick for the entire month of December.  The days are short, the weather is cold, and I’ve not been on my bike since November 7th.  This is becoming a drag.

That ride on November 7th was a great solo ride.  I’d received word of my new job offer on that ride.  It was a glorious day with temps climbing into the mid 60s by the end of the ride.  I expected that I’d be riding the rest of the month and then throughout December.  I’d not counted on sickness and cold weather getting in the way.

The truth is, I probably could have ridden more despite the cold, if it weren’t for the sickness.  For three weeks, breathing was labored just sitting around.  The idea of actually getting the lungs pumping was well, out of the question.  But the real stumbler has been the new job.

I’ve admitted it before: I am a consummate perfectionist. When I started my last job, I stressed so hard over doing a good job that I developed migraines among other aliments that lasted for months. I hoped not to repeat that performance when I started this job, and I’ve been relatively successful, but I’ve put forth a full court press for sure.  There has not been a lot of down time.

So, I find myself here, the day after Christmas, looking out the window of my office at snow starting to softly fall in the cold winter air, and I’m looking forward to April. I’m hoping that I will be back out on the bike, and that I’ll be able to find some coverage of the Tour de Flanders.  That will indicate the kickoff of another great season of cycling.

Spontaneous Mini Vacation

21. February 2010 · Write a comment · Categories: daily life, family, fatherhood, good things, maryland, mr. grey, mrs. tkd, sidetracks, slowing down, smiles, snow, weather, winter blues

Taking flight is something that I rarely advocate, however sometimes it makes good sense.  We have been burried by snow and beaten down by cold weather this winter in Maryland.  Mr. Grey has been stuck inside for weeks.  Two year old boys with lots of energy don’t deal well with being trapped inside. At first he liked the snow, but then it got too big for him.  Hell, it was too big for me too!

I have a business trip to Cary, NC this coming Monday and Tuesday.  Mrs. TKD’s family lives in Charlotte.  Friday morning around 7:30 AM, before I’d even gotten my first cup of coffee down the hatch, Mrs. TKD says, “Hey, I’ve been thinking, why don’t we go to Charlotte this weekend and I’ll take you to Cary on Monday.  Then you can catch a lift home with the rest of the boys from work on Tuesday.”  My gut reaction was not just no, but hell no.  It’s an eight hour drive to Charlotte and I hadn’t had any coffee yet.  But then I asked what the weather and found out that it was going to be in the sixties this weekend in Charlotte.  That pretty much sealed the deal. More »

muddy boots

01. March 2009 · Write a comment · Categories: america, daily life, environment, frowns, frustration, incongruities, struggles, winter blues

I want to get my boots muddy.

Why are all the trails paved in the parks nearby?

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