I have this picture of my mom when she was a couple years older than I am now. My life has taken a completely different path than my mom's life did, yet that picture often reminds me how much the same we are.

In the picture, Mom is sitting on a couch. Several of us kids are sitting on the couch, too, with Chris in the front. Mom is smiling but, oh my, does she look older than she is. When the two of us look at the picture together, she always comments about how stressed she was at that time. Despite the smile, that was near one of the low points in Mom's life.

I went to play ultimate at Kris' work today. I haven't played in a good number of weeks, and haven't played pickup in years. As Kris reminded me at the end of the house, I had forgotten how to play pickup, which is to say, "with lots of breaks."

When you're on a practicing team, you usually have enough people to play, then rest a point or two. Certainly at a tournament, you run hard, then rest, run hard then rest. Unless, of course, you're playing savage, but that's a different style of play entirely.

So, I forgot how to play pickup. It happens.

At the end of the pickup game, I pulled out my camera and took a picture of Kris and I. Kris looks the same as he always does, perpetually 24.

I, on the other hand, look every bit my age. I look at this picture and think, Geez, my years have finally caught up to me. It's not a flattering picture.

Adam Brown came over yesterday (geez, I feel like I'm always a day behind on posting). He stopped by to drop off a check for Regionals, and stayed long enough to chat. Somehow we landed on the topic of pushups, comparing regular pushups, and from-the-knees pushups.

From the knees? Adam asked. Pffft! They're easy!

Kris and I looked at each other, in that all knowing look that we have when someone asks, "How hard can it be?"

I laughed then, and said, sure, how about 200 girlie pushups?

Sure, why not, he answered, and dropped down to start them.

He made it to 40 before stopping.

Not so easy, eh?

There is something pretty magical about being able to go outside into the backyard in the middle of November, harvest some vegetables, come back in and fix most of a meal with them.

On the way to class yesterday, I commented to Kris that, if I had enough money, I would buy up a large part of downtown Gary and organize groups of neighbors to help each other, in sort of a barter system. Sure, the people there may not have a lot, or be well educated, but everyone can learn a skill and everyone can do something to give to the next person (even if it's just raking leaves to continue a compost bin). Most people just need help figuring out what to do.

Kris looked at me briefly, then looked back to the road, and was quiet for a while. Eventually, he asked me, "When did you become such an idealist?"

Uh...

Me?

An idealist?

Most definitely not. More like the biggest cynic Kris knows, more of a pessimist than an optimist, that glass is always half empty, if not more than.

On my journey home from Velocity today, Kris dropped me off at the local train station for me to ride the commuter train back down south. I much prefer leaving my car at the station and riding up with Kris (only to take the train back down and hopping in my car), to sloughing up in my car through the crappy traffic (made particularly bad this morning by an accident that blocked all the lanes but the carpool lane and backed traffic up no less than 6 miles of stopped traffic) and drive back. Besides lost time in driving (can't be (text) blogging if I'm driving), with my car, the train fare is less expensive than the gas used. Ideally I'd have a light enough pack that I could walk home, a 45 minute walk from the station, without collapsing under the weight of my pack. I'm not there yet.

But I (completely) digress.

As I was going to validate my ticket at the train station, I noticed a woman standing close to the ticket vending machine. When I set my bag down to fish out my ticket, she grabbed her bag, which was a good four feet from me and well outside of my personal space and, since my personal space is larger than most people's personal space, I assumed outside of her space.

I was wrong.

As she reached down to move her bag, I noticed she had a large can of Coors Light in her hand. Not the 12 oz cans, not the 16oz cans, the giant 24oz can, and she was swigging from the can. Swigging while trying to engage the other commuter sitting on the far side of the bench, trying hard to read and not encourage this woman.

As I fished out my ticket from my bag and went to validate the ticket, I kept watching the woman. I have no idea if she noticed my watching, I can't say I care, though I'm sure she heard my camera click as I took a picture of her. Alas, not of the giant can she was drinking from.

Coors Light. At 9:45 in the morning.

In the morning.

Of course, the Coors might explain why, when our train arrived, the woman bolted from the platform. I assumed because she realized she was standing on the southbound side and her train, which was going north, was arriving on the other side of the platform. The other side, which requires a giant staircase down, dash under and another giant staircase up to be on.

No idea if she made her train, which was arriving from the opposite direction just as ours was.

A beer. Before 10 in the morning.

Might be for the carbs?