The streak lives, though my knee started hurting towards the end of my run this evening. Was another beautiful evening here; in the 60's, partly cloudy (rain is rolling in now) and, dare I say, a nice night for a run? If you read down to the earlier posts on this blog - you'll see me make reference to the runs getting a bit easier. Well, I haven't said anything about that it quite sometime as it is no longer true - I've hit a plateau - the run is not getting any easier...probably could use a day to let my muscles that haven't been used in so long regroup, but that's not going to happen for another couple of weeks. On a somewhat related note, I jammed my finger tonight and bent back my finger nail - really hurt! I mention these things as a way of admitting that I am really not a very tough guy...
Speaking of nails - remember Lenny Dyksrtra - aka "Nails" - of the New York Mets and, later, the Philadelphia Phillies? His off-the-field life was and continues to be quite a disaster (he's been retired for quite sometime now), but the toughness he displayed on the baseball field (perhaps arguably) earned him this nickname. Why do I mention this? Susan, Noah and I are in the midst of a car shopping endeavor to top all car shopping efforts...we have been actively looking for months, heading out just about every weekend to test drive or talk to sales guys. We have an idea of the car we want, but I have a price in mind and I'm one of these people who will keep negotiating with dealerships and going to different dealerships until I get the numbers I want. I hate the process - who doesn't - but some part of me does enjoy haggling with car salesman....I guess I just like to turn the tables on the stereotypical carsalesman whenever possible on behalf of the rest of society. Anyways, since we aren't going to install Noah's carseat in each and every vehicle we test drive, Susan and I have been taking turns test driving while the other watches Noah. Today, while Susan was test driving a Chevy Traverse (not going to be "the one"), Noah and I were hanging out drooling on the salesman's desk (I won't say which one of us was drooling). We had a couple of toys for Noah to play with and I put a plastic chain of rings around Noah's right wrist. He normally loves to shake these as there are three rings hooked together and they make great noise when he does - but it's always with his left hand. Today, while hooked around his right wrist, he started shaking the rings around! I was soooo excited and cheered him on....he got more excited as I cheered and kept shaking them more and more! It was fantastic and it got me thinking about how tough this little kid is. Noah suffered a sizeable stroke in utero and survived....today he is 7 1/2 months old and, through sheer will and grit, he is able to move his right arm/hand/leg a little bit. We've continued to be optimistic about his longer term prognosis, but shorter-term our hopes have certainly been tempered. At this young age, it's very hard for him, his movement is uncoordinated and limited and he has good days and bad days. But, he is moving it a bit. I don't want to get too excited about this as this will likely be a life-long effort for Noah, but sometimes it's hard not too. This little boy has no idea what he has been through, nor does he care. And I couldn't be more proud of him.
In life I think we all have the one person (or perhaps more than one) who make us feel almost invincable...that person who makes you feel like you can do anything when you're around them. Noah is now that person in my life....little "Nails".
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