I remember as a kid hating to color. I never seemed to be able to find the right color. The crayons were always broken. And more importantly, my fine motor skills never allowed me to quite execute my vision. So I opted out. When I was asked to color, I would kind of scribble something up and call it a day. When I got to middle school, I choose to take an elective art class. My brothers could do better at what I was doing even without a class. After six months of attempting to draw a barn and never making any better than a C, my belief that I was smart rather than artistic or creative was cemented.
Fast forward 15-20 years and I really needed some artwork for Audrey's bedroom. Looking at the artwork in little kids books had me convinced that I could maybe make a passable attempt at making it myself. So I painted up the walls. And came out of the experience thinking that maybe I wasn't completely shorted in the artistic gene. Making cakes has also helped me find a more artistic side of myself. I still find myself struggling with thinking that I am not particularly creative, since I don't generally come up with designs or ideas myself, but instead search for inspiration or ideas in others. I also have found that since I don't think of what I do as artistic, when I am asked to put a price on what I do I am likely to seriously undersell myself.
The same thing has happened with me when it comes to running. I remember racing as a kid and always coming in last. I would NEVER win a foot race. So I didn't like to do them. Then when I hit puberty I REALLY hated to run. My chest was too big to be comfortable on the track. Add a dose of middle school self consciousness and I didn't want to get all red in the face and sweaty while I was running so much slower than my classmates. So I decided I don't run. Ever.
That edict changed when Carl died. I realize that I need to work on making my lifestyle as healthy as I can reasonable live with if I want to be around for Audrey in the long haul. She has already lost one parent, I don't want her to lose another sooner than is absolutely necessary. So I took up jogging. Strap the baby in the jogger and just go. At first it sucked. I won't lie, I hated it. But after a couple of weeks I started to realize that it didn't suck quite so much. In fact it was kind of cool to be able to breathe a little easier while running than I had the week before. Unfortunately, life happened and I had to stop my running program for a while. But this week I restarted it (indoors on the treadmill). And it sucks again. But not as bad as the first time I took it up, and I look forward to finding the day when it doesn't suck again. Maybe I will even do something monumentous for me and sign up for a race. I may come in last, or close to it, but I will be able to do it. And that's pretty cool.
Since I have tried these two things I have hated since childhood and found that they are actually not too bad, I have been looking around at other things I have written off as not for me and wondering what I should try next. And I wonder if anyone else has had the same kind of realization that something is pretty cool even though you remember it as a totally sucky thing. So tell me, what have you tried and found you liked?
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