Flying – Serenity Through Sweat

Thanksgiving

The crisp air felt refreshing, rather than the typical dry ragged burn of icy dryness down my throat. The sun came in blinding flashes through the trees, still clinging to the last leaves of fall. The horn section of the ska track greeted me with enthusiasm despite the combination of running earmuffs and headphones chaffing my cauliflowered ears as I bounded through the park.

Sometimes, the music just sets you up for the right kind of day.

I flew into JFK this morning and meandered my way through heavy traffic both, vehicular and sidewalk, to get to Central Park.

I’m not sure what it is, but there is something special about running there. All the other people enjoying the outdoors. The protected green space, surrounded by a concrete jungle. Running fast enough to pass all the horse drawn carriages (and avoiding stepping in their steaming piles).

It got me thinking about all the things I’m thankful for. The list is long. I am very blessed. But, at the forefront, I’m thankful for a life of adventure.

Raising kids is an adventure. Choosing a life partner is an adventure. Traveling to new places and actually exploring those places leads to all sorts of adventures.

These past few months, in particular, I have been seeking out more and more of those adventures.

Part of it was training and preparation for the six gap century ride, (a grand adventure in its own right). But, I think that training also reawakened in me the thirst for adventure.

What started as a way to get in some extra miles morphed into something beautiful. Opportunities taken, not squandered, and approached with reverence and appreciation.

I’m eternally grateful for these opportunities. To travel, to explore, to interact with these new and familiar places in new and exciting ways.

I’m grateful for the physical health and wellness that enables me pursue these passions.

Riding 90 miles around Lake tahoe, knowing I have an early morning and a long day of work ahead tomorrow.

Fumbling my way on a rickety hotel bike to a trailhead for a hike in Montana

Racing ahead of my new group ride friends on unfamiliar roads so I can get back in time to drink wine with my wife

Struggling up a sandy logging road in the back hills of Boise during wildfire season.

Riding through the fall foliage in Roanoke on the blue ridge parkway late enough in the season that it is closed for cars.

Taking Speedy and El Duderino on a boys weekend trip immediately after returning from a red eye.

I’m grateful for the joie de vivre, that gets me out of the hotel and out of the house to explore. Grateful that it is something I get to do, not something I have to do.

I’m grateful to both of my parents for instilling that sense of wonder and adenture in me. I hope that my words, and more so my actions, instill that same sense of wonder in my boys.

That they can see the plethora of adventures that await them. That they can see all the joy waiting for them to reach out and claim on their own paths.

I hope that they get a chance to explore the big, beautiful world i am just starting to explore.

I hope that they see the value in adventure and are inspired to follow their own passions

I hope that they find their own serenity, even if only for the briefest of moments, and maybe they even get a little sweaty along the way.

I’m grateful for the opportunity to watch them in that endeavor, for as long as I can, knowing that tomorrow is not a guarantee.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Recalibrate

Sometimes, ego gets in the way.

My heart rate strap, the large puddle of sweat underneath me, and my own intuition after thousands of hours on the bike were telling me one story.

My power meter was telling a very different one.

The same course and roughly the same intensity, with a recalibrated power meter.

I knew something wasn’t quite right, but I didn’t know how to fix it. As much as I tried to ignore it, the numbers on the display are there to be used, and when they are not right, it can be disheartening and distracting.

The whole experience reminded me a little bit of my days as a college flight instructor.

I can remember the flight instructor meeting vividly. Sitting in the conference room, a bunch of type A personalities in our matching flight instuctor polo shirts.

Having just sat through a training presentation on the new avionics suite that would be installed in our new Piper Warriors, one of my friends asked what our students would be expected to know and be tested on.

“So, air data goes in, and pretty colors come out?”

This was almost all of our first experience with a “glass cockpit”. All of us had learned and instructed on mechanical flight instruments.

A knowledge of how those mechanical instruments were built and how they functioned was critical to understanding the data they were giving you.

It was also important to understand the limitations of the mechanical systems. To learn any potential fail points or errors. How or why might the instrument give you bad data? What could you do about it?

So when those instruments are transtioned from mechanical devices to data computers, the fundamental knowledge of how those instruments were doing their respectively similar job went down.

Back to my sweaty bike trainer on the back deck, I knew something wasn’t right. I suspected my power meter, but my understanding of the decice was similar to that of the new air data computer. I push on the pedals, and pretty colors and numbers show up on the screen.

Why was I getting bad data? Was it bad data? How does the tool even work? Is it something I can fix? Am I just being a wimp? (The power data being shown was tragically low compared to what i was expecting/used to seeing)

Taking all the jerseys and bumping up the FTP numbers

These were all the questions going throughy my head. I decided to phone a friend and found that my pedals just needed a simple recalibration.

By recalibrating the pedals to a new zero set point, they immediately started showing the correct (and much more reassuring for my delicate ego) power numbers.

But I still didn’t really understand what I was measuring, or more accurately, how I was measuring it.

God bless the internet. What a time to be alive.

A power meter, measures torque using an electricity sensitive strain gauge. Basically, an electrical mesh is placed inside of whatever surface or tool is being strained. A small computer measures the electrical resiatance in the mesh. When torque (twisting force) is put on the surface or tool, the electrical mesh feels some of that force and the electrical resistance changes. The computer measures those changes and then transmits them to another device for display.

I had a basic understanding of pedal harder more power. Push on the power meter and pretty colorful numbers show up on my bike computer. Only the numbers were less pretty and more disheartening.

Even the idea of recalibrating, while it made sense, left me with an unfinished feeling. That went away once I researched how the power meter worked.

I think that’s an important part of the recalibration process that gets overlooked. Something is broken, or something isn’t working right. We recalibrate, and the issue is resolved, but we don’t know enough about why it was giving us bad data in the first place.

Without that knowledge, without that insight into the why and the how, we are left with input->computer->pretty color display. When things break down, that becomes painfully insufficient.

I try to remind myself of this silly lesson whenever I need to recalibrate. We all need a reset sometimes. Underatanding the why and the how, and getting back to baseline can help on the path to serenity.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

What could go wrong

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I admittedly got away from writing over the summer, and it is well past time to rectify that.

I used to fly quite a bit with a captain who would always end his briefing by saying, “What could possibly go wrong?”

It was said jokingly, of course, but with an all to telling note of seriousness. There are always things that don’t go to plan, especially when flying airplanes.

There are just too many balls in the air. Too many moving parts. Logistics that can seem insurmountable. And yet, flight after flight, day after day, we find a way to make it work.

We thin1k about and brief the things we think may go wrong, and how we plan to react. We train for processes and procedures for responding to unexpected problems. We maintain an awareness of where we are and where we want to go.

The question, though, is ever present. Nagging, like a fold in the sock under your foot. Just enough to remind you with a slight discomfort every step. “What could possibly go wrong”

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, but not as it relates to aviation. That nagging feeling has been with me my entire adult life. I’ve been thinking about the question with my upcoming bike race.

I have spent more than my fair share of time on a bike over the past decade of competing in triathalon, but over the last few years, most of that has been on an indoor trainer.

The indoor trainer is safer and more efficient. It is far more versitle than what I would have access to in my local area in terms of terrain. It allows for precision training without concern for traffic, weather, time of day, and road condition. It solves a lot of potential problems.

I’ve signed up and have been training for the 6 Gap Century ride. The race runs through the north Georgia mountains covering 103 miles with more than 10’000 feet of climbing. Needless to say it will be a long day.

Over the summer, I was able to scout out the course with some friends. We rode about half the course, including two of the biggest climbs.

Leading up to the ride, I had been simulating lots of climbing on my smart trainer, but descending down steep and winding mountain roads, would be another thing entirely.

Six gap scout ride with a special mountain top surprise

What could possibly go wrong?

The scenic highways in north Georgia are beautiful. Winding roads cut into the majestic mountainsides with spectacular vistas. They also feature very little shoulder, impatient drivers, and a small piece of fabricated metal between the edge of the pavement and a very long fall.

I dont think nervous is the right word. I would get nervous as a kid before riding my bike down a big hill. Knowing that soon, the exhileration would push that feeling aside even if there was a chance I could get hurt.

The calculus has changed a bit from those days. It is still just a hill (mountain) and a bike. But I’m not a kid anymore. I don’t recover the way I once did. I have a family to support, bills to pay.

So, without having ridden my bike not on a stationary trainer in more than a year, and on flat ground in FL at that, I set off with my friends for this mountain adventure.

What could possibly go wrong?

Despite some challenging weather and road conditions, nothing went wrong. We all had a great and very memorable day.

But that nagging feeling was still there. All it takes is one mistake. One unforseen problem. You hope that if something happens, it will only be a minor consequence. That isn’t always in your control.

I have continued my training and preparation throughout the summer, rediscovering my love of riding outside. Especially with the new challenging terrain.

I took advantage of some opportunities to train while on long layovers. With those incredible opportunities came added concern. Not just my health, and my family, but now this is an activity with inherent risk while I have an obligation at work.

What could go possibly go wrong?

I had dreams about it. Not nightmares per se, but the thought of crashing my bike while going down a steep hill is something my subconscious likes to remind me of.

So, it was a pleasant surprise, and a welcome change when my thinking shifted.

Flying down highway 50 at 40 miles per hour, with nothing but open road, cresting mountains, and the clear blue waters of lake Tahoe filling up my view, I had to remember to breathe.

In fairness, I frequently have to remember to breathe when descending. My senses are so enhanced and focused knowing that the stakes are raised. But the truly awesome natural beauty took my breath away.

I remember thinking to myself that I needed to snap out of it. To focus on the road. To avoid any myriad of potential mistakes that could prove catastrophic.

And I did snap out of it. But I also started thinking, I know what could go wrong. I’ve thought about it, dreamt about it, worried about it. But what could go right?

That is a much more powerful question. Even a harder one to answer, I think. We are wired to look out for threats. It is a survival mechanism. It takes a freeing of those powerfully ingrained survival instincts to think about what could go right.

There will still be nervous energy and hightened awareness as I approach each mountain crest, knowing the gravity of the potential consequences that lie ahead (figuratively and literally).

But more and more I find myself thinking, what could go right? It is a powerful shift. It just took a little push down a hill to get there.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Kindness

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Against all odds, I found myself in a central Iowa bar, in the middle of a snow storm talking about surfing this Christmas Eve, and I wanted to share the experience with you.

This trip was the first line choice on my bid for December. I should have known better, but as has been revealed here before, I am a masochist and a glutton for pain. This trip was set to have a 30 hour layover in cedar rapids Iowa, followed by a 15 hour layover in Boise, and then finishing on Christmas day in Orlando around 2:00 pm.

It looked good on paper when I was bidding it in early November. The bomb cyclone that appeared days beforehand had other ideas. We landed in Cedar rapids around ten o’clock at night in blowing snow and 40+mph winds.

The crew who was bringing in the airplane we were to fly out didn’t fair as well, and never made it in. So that is what set me up to be in a local bar on Christmas Eve, watching the Bills game with some locals, and engaging in the conversation I want to share with you.

The first couple that sat down next to me came from an army household and had lived all over. One of their stops was Patrick air force base in Florida. We talked about the changes in central Florida over the past few decades. We talked about surfing the warm water of the Atlantic in contrast to the below freezing wind chill outside.

We shared our fondness for the space coast. The welcoming and small town feeling it had, despite it’s continuing technological progress. We shared our appreciation for the sunshine state.

They left around half time of the bills game, to be replaced by another local mother and son duo. The son appeared to be around my age or so, heavily bearded and heavily jeweled. I think he was wearing more rings, with more gemstones than my wife owns in entirety. Granted that is a low bar, but every finger was covered in a unique ring with a different color stone.

His mother was a self proclaimed long muscled and lithe woman who would outlast me on the bar’s non existent dance floor. She was an ardent disciple of stretching and long muscles, and as I found out, a proponent of being “kind” to your body.

Despite my agreeing with most of what she had to say about stretching and long, lithe muscles, when I twisted my chair to show her the IronMan logo on the back of my jacket, and I told her this was the eleventh year of my annual Christmas half marathon tradition, she rolled her eyes in disapproval.

Running for any length, but certainly a marathon (which she thought was 25 miles, but that may have been the 2-4-1 happy hour talking) was being ‘unkind’ to your body. Why would you ever want to be unkind to your body? What good could that bring?

We had a very nice conversation, agreeing on many fronts and agreeing to disagree on many others. It was a refreshing human interaction. But, it also got me thinking about the primary point of contention. Certain activities I was participating in were deemed as ‘unkind’ to the body, but then what is kindness?

Her argument was that running, biking swimming, triathlon, and certainly weight training, were unkind to the body. That their short term benefits did more long term damage. That the practice of them was unkind to the body, in pushing it beyond it’s limits.

It was difficult to pin down exactly where limits where pushed. Where was too far, or what was too heavy, or when a limit was exceeded. But in her mind stretching, lengthening exercises that promoted mobility and flexibility, and the ability to dance in her 70’s were all that mattered.

By this point the Bills game was wrapping up with the Bills coasting towards a division clinching win over the Bears. The 2-4-1’s had been flowing steadily throughout the duration of the game and my normal excitement to engage in debate was wanning.

Still, I couldn’t help but wonder, what is it to be kind to your body. What is it to be kind to your children? My five year old loves to tell me that making him do difficult things by himself is not being kind. And in a sense he is right. I could do it for him with greater efficiency and effectiveness. The immediacy of that kindness, would in my opinion, be dwarfed by the disservice it would do him for future development.

I feel the same way about my body. Treating it ‘kindly’ at the expense of future development doesn’t seem like a good option to me. Sure the masochistic tendencies might seem ‘unkind’ to the outside observer, but they come from a place of love. I love my body and all of the incredible things it can do. All of the grand adventures I am able to have and share in because of the ‘unkind’ stresses my body has endured and grown from.

No one watching a parent talk a toddler through a ten minute shoe tying session would deem the exchange ‘unkind’. Providing the parent was coming from a place of love and respect and engaging the toddler on an appropriately challenging level.

Be kind to yourself. Sometimes that might mean a little bit of a break, but sometimes it might mean a kick in the ass. And, it will always include a little serenity.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Summer

What is a summer day made of? The dog days of summer are here. My wife is back in the classroom as a teacher for the first time since the pandemic emerged. El Duderino, my little linguistic four year old has started VPK at the school at the end of our neighborhood. I spend my mornings at home corralling him and Speedy, getting them to their respective school and daycare on time so my wife can have a sembelance of normalcy in the morning at least part of the time. When im working all of those duties fall to her.

Speedy generally gets dropped off first at a small in home daycare. “GiGi” has been as much a part of the boys life as I have. During particularly busy periods, maybe more so than me. Then it’s El Duderino’s turn. The elementary school sits at the end of our neighborhood. Maybe a half a mile following the sidewalks as they twist around gator filled retention ponds, and wind their way through suburbia. El Duderino rolls ahead of me on an aqua marine three wheel scooter with light up wheels. He is becoming skilled enough that I can’t keep up with him at just a walk anymore. Wearing sandals is no longer an option. I need closed toed shoes and a gait somewhere between a prance and a jog to keep up. Awkward enough to get second looks from the seniors and moms power walking at 8 am. But, I’m sure endearing none the less. Seeing an obviously uncaffeinated and disheveled father chasing his son down the street. Dinosaur backpack and spider man lunchbox in hand, so he can focus on the scooter.

About half way to the school he pauses to tell me this trip is annoying. I’m not sure our personal ideas of annoying line up, but I think I can empathize. The dog days of summer in Orlando mean that even this 8am short scoot to school is already sweltering in the upper 80’s. The air is sticky, and clings to you in an oppressive way. Like you owe it a favor and it is here to collect. It wont take no for an answer.

When I first started college in Melbourne Fl, around the same time of year, in the dog days of summer of 2005, I remember those same feelings. The excitement and anticipation of new adventures and opportunities. The social anxiety of a new places and new people. The growing laundry hamper as I would change my clothes after every single class. The walk from my dorm to any class and back, regardless of the time of day would leave me soaked, sweat stained, and contemplating my educational choices. I think I called my mom at some point and told her that I wasn’t sure I was up to this. I’m no stranger to sweating, but normally it is in athletic wear and a setting more of my choosing.

This morning was quite different. The dog days of summer in Burlington VT remind me of what a summer day is made of. In Fl we have it everyday, it isn’t special, because it is the norm, rather than the exception. I have grown to really like this layover, seeing it in both the depths of winter as well as the picturesque day I have enjoyed today.

The sky over Lake Champlain is that faded gray blue of optimism. Not the story book blue that looks so bold and perfect to be cartoonish. The faded and more realistic duller version. The one that inspires adventure because it is lacking in that crisp perfection. There is still room to grow. The breeze blows gently. Just enough to flitter the leaves along the running path and keep the mid sixties air from feeling stagnant. The lake and the mountains silently battling for your attention in the naturally beautiful background.

After my admittedly optimistic and subsequently failed attempt to get out and run a half marathon this morning despite not running in close to a month, I strolled down the street to my favorite local breakfast place here. I have written about it before and will do so again. Handy’s lunch is the Cheers of local dining establishments. I think I have eaten there three times, every time ordering the Chuck Norris breakfast sandwich and a cup of coffee. The owner came over this time shook my hand, and thanked me for visiting again and for our last conversation when I visited a few months ago. Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. It doesn’t hurt that it is one of the best breakfast sandwiches I’ve ever had and I’ve accrued a serious calorie deficit either.

While sitting at the counter watching him interact with the other local, mostly regular customers. One of the men says he grew up in Buffalo. It turns out he is only a few years older than me. He probably played high school football with my step brother. We talked about growing up there and how the city has changed. We talked about high school glory days over carb laden breakfast delicacies.

What is a summer day made of? Optimism, adventure, nature, camaraderie and celebration, in my case obviously some heavy sweating. All of them important and impactful. All of them fleeting.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Philology

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. As part of my language and communication project I have been doing a lot of reading. Most of it overly academic, and written solely for the academic community. Every once in a while though, a gem will shine through that affects all of us in a profound way.

I didn’t know what philology was until I was introduced to the word while reading John Marco Allegro’s The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. Marco was a scholar who helped translate the Dead Sea Scrolls, and compare them to original source languages, (think Sumerian, Aramaic and Hebrew).

This was very interesting stuff in my mind, but I understand it is a niche audience. But shooting down the federal mask mandate, that might have some mass appeal. Coincidentally, also a task based in language and philology.

Kathryn Kimball Mizelle is the Florida district court judge whose summary judgment declared that the Federal Mask Mandate exceeded the CDC’s statutory authority. To understand why this is pertinent to our discussion of language, a little background information on both the history and timeline of these regulations as well as the legal system are important. (my mother and my wife have often told me I should have been a lawyer, turns out I’m more interested in arguing linguistics, which is more annoying and less lucrative)

The CDC relied heavily on the Public Health Services Act (PHSA) of 1944 as the statutory basis for their authorization to issue mandates to help manage the Covid pandemic. In Mizelle’s decision, she relies in part on the plain language and context of the PHSA to determine if the CDC’s action where in line with the intention of the original act.

While you and I as everyday non legal types might not be familiar with this process, you have probably heard some political pundit or politician say something like “this is what the founding father’s intended”. Same idea here. What did the authors of the PHSA intend with the act? What powers were granted or restrictions placed? And, more importantly for our purposes, what language was used, in what context, and what was it’s meaning at the time of writing?

When examining the plain language and context of the PHSA, the court found that the relevant portions authorized regulations to prevent the spread of diseases for specific limited circumstances: (1) individuals traveling from foreign countries into the States; and (2) for the purposes of “inspection, fumigation, disinfection, sanitation, pest extermination, destruction. . . and other measures”.

The court referenced the Corpus Linguistics database to verify the meaning of ‘sanitation’ in 1944, and determined it’s primary use was ‘to make things clean’ rather than ‘maintain a level of cleanliness’. The court concluded that “wearing a mask neither sanitizes the people wearing the mask or the conveyance”. There are other procedural and legal issues that are at play, but again they are beyond the scope of this language focused discussion.

Philology is the study of literary texts and of written records, the establishment of their authenticity and their original form, and the determination of their meaning. So when Allegro is studying the Dead Sea Scrolls and validating the original Sumerian and its intention before it was translated into Hebrew or Aramaic, he is engaged in a philological task. Judge Mizelle, when referencing the Corpus Linguistic database for the context and meaning of sanitation in 1944, is engaged in a philological task. One that has a tremendous impact on my day to day life in airports.

As I have said often on this platform, and will continue to repeat, words are important. The intention with which they were spoken or written is important. The study and exploration to determine that meaning is a noble and worthwhile pursuit. A pursuit which has an effect on our everyday life via our legal system disproportionately more significant than I think most of us understand.

When analyzing laws and regulations like the PHSA, a single word can change the context, meaning, and intention of a whole section, having major implications. The same is often true for anyone who works in business contracts, or (as this work is sometimes focused) in aviation.

Aviation is heavily regulated and standardized, and most of our processes and procedures need to be approved by the governing body the Federal Aviation Administration or FAA. The FAA, being a federal government agency, is governed by, you guessed it, laws. The Code of Federal Regulations or CFR, is the codifcation of the general and permanent rules published in the Federal Register by the departments and agencies of the Federal Government. Because the FAA is tasked with governing the aviation industry, the rules it makes become federal law. This is why you hear that it is a federal crime to tamper with lavatory smoke detectors every time you get on an airplane. It also means that a company manual, specifying a company procedure, that has to be approved by a federal regulating (read law making) body, is going to require a specificity of language akin to a federal law or a business contract.

Full blown summer mode in the sunshine state

Words like “may”, “must”, and “shall”, can be easily slipped into the middle of a lengthy and convoluted sentence, in the middle of lengthy and convoluted manual, but they represent, not just a company procedure, but a Federal mandate for how to operate an airplane. So when the captain tells me to select the required flap setting for our takeoff and I reply “flap handle one” instead of “flap lever one”, I am not operating my airplane in accordance with our company, and thus federal, requirements.

While that may seem a bit anal and pedantic, (it definitely is) “flap lever___” is in quotations, and thus is a required call out. There are areas where (as Austin has said) “a certain laxness in procedure is permitted, otherwise no university business would ever get done!”, and where a strict adherence to procedure, no matter how anal or obnoxious, is required.

I am reminded of this important distinction as the instructor smacks my shoulder for the fourth time today for referring to the flap lever as a flap handle, or the thrust levers as the throttles. Learning a new airplane is fun, and I have spent an inordinate amount of time proclaiming the importance of words and meaning. Still even a linguistics nerd like me is more than a little frustrated by the minutiae that we can get hung up on. I can appreciate the origin and necessity, and despise the outcome and how it impacts my life for the next month in training all at the same time.

Language literally creates, shapes, and defines our world. Searching for the original intent and meaning of language then, seems like a natural step toward serenity. One I’m excited to be taking and happy to share with you.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

New relationship

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I mentioned last week that I was training on a new aircraft. This week I want to reflect on that process.

Training on a new aircraft is always an exciting and nerve wracking experience. It is very similar to starting to date someone new. There is an excitement attached to the newness. There is anxiety of the unknown. There is a hope of good things to come in the future together.

My happy little corner in the hotel room for the month

Just like a real relationship you show up with your past baggage. After all, you are getting out of a long term serious relationship with your last airplane. You learned what she liked and what she didn’t like. You learned her strengths and her weaknesses. The areas where you had to help her along, and the areas where she had your back, even when you had screwed something up.

You have to learn all of those things all over again. You have to get to know each other. You have to learn how she reacts to your inputs. What can you do to make her happy, and what you can avoid doing that will make her cranky?

In some cases it is like learning to speak a different language. Talking to your new airplane the way you talked to your old airplane is like calling her the wrong name. Nobody ends up happy, and the reaction is going to be undesirable at best.

On this Mother’s Day Sunday, I count myself very blessed to have strong women in my life. Women who set an example for my boys and I to follow on how to interact with the fairer sex.

Despite my interest in communication, and my academic endeavors into language and theory, this is still an area where I need all the help I can get.

The mother’s in my life have always been there with a firm but kind reminder. My mother was always reminding me, “It’s not just what you say but how you say it.” My wife is a miracle worker with my boys and I, making sure we are communicating with each other in a clear and respectful manner.

At the end of the day, isn’t that what the cornerstone of a new relationship is? Learning how to communicate with each other effectively. Falling into the patterns of familiarity where you know the right questions to ask, and the right answers to give. Where you know what is expected of you and your partner (or airplane as it were) knows what is expected/asked of them.

Regardless of the airplane you are flying, monitoring the flight path and ensuring the safety of flight is largely an exercise in those two questions. What have I asked the airplane to do, and what is it doing?

Have I actually asked it to do what I think I asked it to do? Is it doing what I think it should be doing? If it isn’t doing what I want, why not? Did I not ask the right questions or provide the right inputs?

These are questions I am asking myself on a daily basis here in training, with regards to the new airplane. How much of a better communicator could I be if I took the same approach with my wife and kids? Double checking my inputs before executing. Wouldn’t life be easier if you could try out your words in a temporary flight plan page to see how they look first?

Zwift sweat sessions maintaining my sanity and serenity while training

Training on a new aircraft necessarily takes up a lot of mental bandwidth. Maybe after this new relationship is established, it will help bring some lessons learned and serenity to my existing ones.

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

A Thousand Ones

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I was listening to Joe Rogan conversation with General H.R. McMaster and he made a comment that reminded me of something an old boss used to tell me

While describing the recent US military withdrawal frome Afghanistan, McMaster posited the question, “did we fight a twenty year war, or did we fight a one year war, twenty times?”

My old boss, a man who is largely responsible for my professional and career development, used to ask, “Do you have one thousand hours, or one hour, a thousand times?”

The things you learn in those thousand hours

The thought being, there are components of experience, familiarization, and competence that are gained with the accumulation of hours. But that accumulation only takes place if you learn the lessons rather than repeat the same processes of your first time. In other words, have you grown and progressed?

This seems like it should be a given. If you have flown an airplane for a thousand hours there is bound to be some growth and learning. If you have fought a war for twenty years you should have picked up a thing or two.

Learning is hard. Growth is not automatic. The human condition often defaults to the path of least resistance. This is how you end up with “one hour, a thousand times” without some of the requisite lessons learned.

Sure that might be something of an exaggeration, but the concept is there. That’s one of the primary reasons why we have assessments. Every child in a classroom receives the same number of hours of content, but they are assessed to measure their growth and proficiency.

Pilots have intermediate assessments (stage checks) and check rides. There are defined minimum hour criteria to be eligible for a check ride. The check ride itself is a way of verifying that you have accumulated the skill and mastery of those combined hours. Rather than merely repeating the same hour over and over.

This was something I struggled with in the beginning of my professional aviation career. I was a great student in the classroom, and in the airplane. When told what was important, I could immerse myself and learn. The professional world is not always so cut and dry. There is a reason academics tend to stay in academia.

If you are fortunate, someone in the professional world will take you under their wing (aviation pun intended). They can help you sort through what is critical. What to focus on. Push you to grow.

Without that kind of mentorship. That professional nurturing. You are left to your own devices to accumulate knowledge and experience. The risk of repeating your solitary hour grows.

Daddy made it home and he brought treats

I see that lesson more clearly now as a father. My boys need to “build their hours”. But, I can be there to guide them. Making sure their hours accumulate rather than simply repeat.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

This week’s SerenityThroughSweat, zwift double headers and a few days at OBJJ

Misogi

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I try to write weekly, so this would have been for the week of Nov 28-Dec 4, one week out from IM FL 70.3. because life often gets in the way it’s being written on Dec 9, three days till race day.

Despite being a notoriously braggadocious group, I have never heard a pilot claim to have a perfect check ride. There is always some small detail, or some overlooked aspect that could have been performed better.

As close as we get to white Christmas in FL

I think the same is true of triathletes, runners, and cyclists. Even after winning an event, beating a goal time, or setting a new PR (personal record), there is always some aspect of the race or the preparation that could have gone better.

Neurologically, when we stress our body, especially the type of heightened stress that comes with the fast speeds and hyper focus of racing, all the details of the event get imprinted onto our memories. The same neural pathways are triggered when flashing lights, bells and whistles start going off while moving hundreds of miles per hour across the ground in a metal tube.

Chilly treadmill work in Montreal, and speedo weather at the pool in FL

This is an evolutionary trait that helps us learn from what were typically life or death encounters in our ancient past. Hunting to feed your family, escaping a predator, traversing a difficult landscape to find shelter, all fit the bill.

Where those types of events might have happened somewhat regularly to our ancestors, it is relatively easy to avoid that kind of stress and discomfort in today’s society especially if you are above the poverty line in the U.S.

Enter Misogi. (You can read more about it here) An ancient Japanese practice that originated with a myth and has been adapted to a modern concept of challenge. The idea is to pick a challenge for yourself once a year that tests your physical and mental limits. A challenge that you don’t know if you can actually complete.

Part of the thought process is that you don’t know where the end of your potential lies unless you push up to the failure point. Part of the magic is that the neural imprinting from such a challenge stays with you long after you cross the finish line, or don’t for that matter too.

While I’ve finished a full Ironman triathlon, and finished a few half Ironman distance races, this one feels a little different. For starters I haven’t raced this long of a course since before I had kids. My priorities and responsibilities at home, and my time and ability to train are all drastically different than they were when I crossed the line at IM FL almost a decade ago.

Despite wrestling in hundreds of matches and grappling for closing in on 30 years, I still get butterflies in my stomach before ever match. I’ve been racing for less than half that time, and I get butterflies at the starting line too.

I’m sure when I’m on the beach at Lake Eva state park in just a few days I will have butterflies for the trial that lies ahead. Right now I have the thought of Misogi, a challenge with an uncertain outcome, that lingers in my head.

Like an old friend who has perhaps overstayed his welcome, the excitement of the challenge along with the uncertainty and doubt have become an unwelcome guest, but one that I cannot force to leave before the time has come.

I’m nervous and excited. I’m proud that my boys will be able to share this challenge with me, even in some small way, and I hope that one day I can share challenges of theirs with uncertain outcomes.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Bourbon dreams

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I’ve been reading a lot about America’s favorite drink since my wife and I visited Louisville last week. And while on a lonely Thanksgiving overnight I found this gem by Wright Thompson.

The following is an excerpt from his book Pappyland (which I ordered immediately upon finishing the article). Multiple times throughout the short read I was struck not only by Thompson’s prose and command of language and imagery, but by the deep and meaningful themes he connected to bourbon.

The beauty of the holiday season in FL, you can look at Christmas lights in the park and still enjoy a snow cone

“A career that aligned with my deepest wants and protective urges, both in how it would let me roam and how it would let me avoid myself by diving into the lives of others. I’ve always been happiest when dreaming of escape. From my earliest memories, my greatest solace and focus came while moving, or planning to move, from small actions like pacing while answering flash cards to planning elaborate road trips I knew I’d never take. When I look back at my early life, everything I read and watched and love and hoped and even feared came from this desire to fly far away.”

The idea of avoiding oneself by diving in to the life of another is something I think journalists and maybe actors can relate to, but as Thompson points out everyone can get out of their own way by immersion into their craft. And if that craft is movement based (pilots, journalists who have to travel, or athletes) so much the better.

I wrote back in May about restricted movement. Whether it is injury for an athlete or quarantine or lockdowns, I think there is a part of all of us that wants to rebel against movement restrictions in any form. This is what led me to the world of endurance sports and specifically to IronMan FL 70.3 taking place in less than two weeks.

But more than just wanting to move when we are otherwise unable to, Thompson’s words capture an emotion that I think most triathletes and most pilots live with but struggle to balance and convey.

I look at my work schedule when it is posted each month and plan out adventures that may or may not happen in the layover cities I’m supposed to visit. The schedule often changes whether by my action, my company’s, or external factors like weather or maintenance, but I’m still always moving to a different city and some new adventure awaits.

Most of those adventures involve some sort of movement, a hike, a running path, a walk through a different city to a restaurant or bar I like. My next trip has a layover in Chattanooga where I’m hoping to get in a scenic fall 5k before stopping at a local diner with a desert case that would make the Cheesecake Factory blush.

Rode the first half of the IM FL 70.3 bike course virtually, and some zwift miles through the foothills of France

There is something protective about movement, or maybe there is something vulnerable in stillness. Either way, flying to another place, running or biking, even if it is stationary, moving always has a net calming effect for me.

There is a magical effect when I walk into an airplane that my problems seem to melt away. The airplane doesn’t solve any problems, and they are always waiting for me back on the ground, but flying has a way of lowering the volume on everything else in life.

Athletics have always held that same powerful effect for me. The wrestling mat or the jui jitsu mat has always been a special place almost spiritual. Like stepping into another dimension, where all your baggage gets checked at the door, I grew up Catholic and seldom felt that way walking into church. There is a special mental space only attainable by forgetting your fixation on first world minutiae, and trying to avoid being choked unconscious.

A similar state of mind occasionally becomes accessible to me after long miles on the road or in the saddle. No one is trying to choke me, but the mental struggle against my weaker thoughts, my faults and failings, match the physical struggle to just keep moving.

I’m excited to read the rest of Thompson’s work, and I’m grateful already for his illumination of an emotion that I can so keenly relate to and at the same time, have struggled to express.

I hope that you the reader can find the same solace and focus in whatever your craft may be, that many of us find in movement.

Thanksgiving day treadmill brick run that came after 2hrs on a spin bike

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.