The Bow That's Continually Bent...

I vaguely recall a story which ( believe) was written by Eusebius, Origen, or one of the early writers of the Christian Church, about St. John (please keep in mind this is from a text I read back in my former life as an aspiring pastor). (I guess) there was a philosopher who went (in disguise of an outdoorsman/hunter) to visit John later on in his life, & was amazed to find him sitting in relaxation stroking a partridge. He asked John about the frivolity of his present activity, to which John responded with a question of his own. 'I see you have a bow in your hand. Do you always carry it about unstrung?' The philosopher replied, 'yes, if I were to keep it continually strung the tension would weaken the bow & I would be unable to use it to down stronger prey when the time came.'

John replied, 'worry not about my present state of relaxation. As you have rightly said, "the bow that is continually bent will cease to shoot straight."'

So, I guess it's necessary for each of us to take time away from our pursuits in order to recharge, redirect, reevaluate, & sometimes even reacquire a perspective we once had or discarded. The hard part is what I like to call a painfully obvious fact: The more time we have away from working out, training, running, bicycling, swimming, just plain flat-out doing, usually provides us time & opportunity for stoopid things...those things which get us in trouble.

And if you're not careful, you can burn up those spousal approval units during down-time, when you probably should be earning them by doing those quality time things. I've found a few of those QTTs can also provide some much-needed perspective on how other people see us...us being defined as athletes, coaches, & athletic event participants...I guess even athletic event providers can be fit into the definition. And I have to admit the first week or two of I'm not getting up early to... is pretty nice, but after a while it does become a nasty little habit. Sleep, as my wife has told me, is one of her guilty pleasures in life. In the past month I've probably increased my sleep time to nearly ten hours a night, much to my d-a-w-g's displeasure.

But worry not...this is the end of the month & I truly intend to be back on the chain gang.Honestly, it has been nice in many ways. Unfortunately, it also means I've spent lots of time on activities which are simple, but much higher in impact (more running, less cycling or swimming). So my body has really had a tough time adapting to a decreased, but different form of stress.

On top of all that, the temperature has gone not so much through the roof as much as it has increased a minor amount. But, the humidity in our area has definitely gone up. Much harder to breathe when you feel like you need gills. Must scale back effort levels or move indoors for a time. That means more boring. I know many who take the entire summer to unbend their bow. While it might work for them I'd rather loosen the string some rather than take it off completely. That way I'm not looking for the notch when September arrives...believe me, it cannot arrive too soon.