Two truths and a lie

You know that game called two truths and a lie? It’s an ice-breaker kind of thing. I’d never heard of it until my boss, on the first day of school, walked into a classroom and said, “Which of these three things about me is not true?” She went on to say something about a cookie contest and classical piano. I was puzzled. I thought, how would you know, except by making a snap judgment, a judgment founded only on appearance and a smidge of intuition?

I didn’t like it.

A few months later, I sat in a circle of folks on a gym floor. We were all about to go on a service project together, but we’d never met. The group leader suggested we play two truths and a lie to get to know one another. There was a mix of elementary-aged kids and their parents, plus one baby (we didn’t make her play). The adults quickly caught on that we were going to have to make it somewhat easy on the kids or we’d be at it all day.

You see what’s coming, don’t you?

My turn rolled around. I said, “I’m from Los Angeles, I love chocolate, and I run fifteen miles a week.” The woman sitting to my left looked at me. Her eyes narrowed. “You don’t run fifteen miles a week,” she said.

Yes. That was a lie.

I wish I’d thought of something else to lie about, something like how much I love roller coasters (lie!) or how good I am at math (lie!) or how much I adore this game (lie!).

Or how impervious I am to other people’s judgment. How it affects me not at all. How I fully comprehend, in every moment, that I am precious now, not someday, and that my worth has nothing to do with how I look or what I do or how many miles I run each week.

Lie. Lie. Lie.

Her words hurt. They lodged in that place where I swallow, the spot I only feel if I’ve got a cold, or I just tried to eat something I don’t like.

The reason the words hurt is because they confirm something I’ve been worried about for a long time: that my running days are gone. That the swingy business going on in my upper arms is here to stay. That I need to just accept the changes in my body that have come from an early menopause and be okay with them.

I am grumpy about all of this. No, grumpy isn’t the right word. Disheartened. Even ashamed.

Things happened to me, to my body, that left damage. I am eighteen days away from my forty-eighth birthday. So some of these things came with age, with time. Others just happened. I didn’t do anything to cause them. They just happened. But the after-effects of broken bones, of surgeries, of cancer are evident. Daily.

So the lady sitting next to me on the gym floor was right. Not mean, for sure. But she was right: I wasn’t running fifteen miles a week. I wasn’t running one.

During the Thanksgiving break, I put my running shoes on. I huffed and puffed my way through a mile. I let Matt come with me (we were both a little afraid I’d fall and break something).

And the next day, I did it again. And the day after that, I ran two miles.

Little by little, I am running.

I say very particular things to myself when I run. I pray and I notice the birds and I try not to look at my watch. (In fact, my running watch died a couple of weeks ago, and I haven’t replaced it. I might not ever.) I have bad runs, runs where my left knee locks up, or I push push push to improve my time, or I replay unsatisfactory conversations in my mind over and over.

And then I have runs like the one I went on the other night. I’m not sure how far I went because I didn’t keep track. I watched the sun set over the lake in Rose Isle. I passed a colleague from work, but we didn’t stop to chat because it was clear that we were both lost in our thoughts, so we smiled shy smiles and kept going. A dog licked my calf. The wind off the lake was cold and made me catch my breath more than once.

When I got home, I sat down in my favorite chair and ate an apple.

I have been afraid of failure and disappointment for so long, that I didn’t make any goals or commitments about running. In fact, I haven’t made goals or commitments about much of anything. I’ve been puttering at my life—my marriage, my work, my relationships, my body. I have been guarded.

There are seasons of safety, times when being careful with our hearts is wise.

And there are seasons of why not?, times when we are called to be brave, to try, to risk.

I see myself cutting a path between these two. Some days, not all, I get out of the comfy chair and put on my running shoes. Some days, I say the scary thing to someone I trust. Some days, I admit, out loud, that I really like my job, that it fills me up in ways that nothing else does. Some days, I run for the joy of it. Some days (not many), I look at my body, and say thank you, dear heart. Thank you.

All days, I want to be a truth-teller—to myself, most of all.

In this season of resolutions, it is very tempting to muscle my dreams into a timeline. My natural inclination is to SET GOALS! and BETTER MYSELF! A very real part of me fears that if I don’t, I will permanently fall into the oblivion of apathy, that I’ll build a little nest of sweet quiet and crawl into it forever.

I love the nest. Some days, I need the nest, and I most certainly should tuck myself in there with a delicious book and a hot cup of tea. In the nest, no one will hurt me with careless words. I won’t fall. There will be little true disappointment

But I won’t love and live abundantly, either.

So, hey, let’s walk in the rain even though it will ruin our hair. Let’s buy the plane ticket even though the trip might be canceled. Let’s run even though we might fall and sing even though we don’t know the words and love with our arms open wide even though … even though.

In the words of sweet Annie Downs, let’s all be brave.

The nest will be there when we need it.