Skip to main content

My Pet Peeves

 


Saturday, as I stood at track meet next to another 'Shot Put Mom'. Awaiting her son to throw. Keeping our volume low. I remarked, "You know what my main three pet peeves are?" She angled her head towards me. I nodded. "Um..." She responded, "You forgot your pet peeves?"

We giggled. And then I replied, "Good God I have so many. It's not three." We cynically scoffed in synchronization. Whereas tailgating raced through my mind. People who don't use their blinkers.

I slowly arrived at, "People who roll through stop signs. People not picking up after their dogs. And you don't cross a track while an event is being run. But what's got me now, are the loud talkers when a guy's going to throw. Like seriously, you have no respect? Definitely cigarette smoking." I then mind my volume, "Oh, I have so many."  

A guy is getting to throw... a minute later... my mind relaxes in between videoing throws, timing kids on the track, watching forms as hurdlers leap over obstacles. My pet peeves weave their way into the right side of my mind... They lay dormant, as I imagine them resting, waiting for an attack just oblique of my right temple. No one sees them. My pet peeves laying in wait that is. But I hear them knocking. Ready to yell, 'No more filtering!' One ebbs and flows... into the unfiltered vicinity. 

I calm it down and let it ride in my mind. 'It's the damn illegal cell phone use while driving. Or just too much of it while driving. I really don't care if it's hands free. It's just inappropriate. No one is that important.' Then my brain relaxes as I soak up the sun timing kids. 

A couple of them finish, leaning over the fence near me and puke a foot away from where I stand. I giggle. Looking at a kid from an opposing team. He looks at me. The dark skinned young man of Indonesian descent, nods politely. He holds his hands as if in prayer. Looking me straight in the eye. He bows a little, then remarks. "I'm good." I respond smiling. "Thank you so much, young man." I digress. 

Tuesday I receive a long-distance call from long time friend, Non-Stop Nina. During our at least hour long conversation. For we hadn't spoken in probably a year. We email, snail mail, mostly for now. It's been almost thirty years every week.   

We begin to talk about miracles. Then I blurt out. "Ah haha! That is my biggest pet peeve. Nina, it's 'People who don't acknowledge miracles'..." -Jody-Lynn Reicher 


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Completion of Humanness

Completion of Humanness As we arrive to the completion of the first year without Norman, I had decided long before he'd passed that I would continue to do things certain things he liked yet could no longer do. I decided I would not take a day off of fitness.  I would run at least for 500 days in a row. I began that in early 2020.  I'd not be concerned with the distance I'd run. It was the very thing I convinced Norman and the thing that mattered to him, from the very first discussion we had August 11th, 1981, was fitness. I loved that he was a College Boy. He loved that I was a Marine. We tickled each other's soul with such admirations. Later fitness continued as an old discussion from 1994 ...getting outside and to run no matter what. I would say to him, "Run 200 meters, then 400 meters. If it doesn't feel good, stop. Turn around and walk back home and know you did your best. That is all you can ask of yourself." I said this,  knowing he would get dow

In My World

As I finish putting away the week's groceries, I contemplate other's lives. Aside from my two daughters,  I consider what may be other's lives.  How they have conducted their lives over the past two years.  This is a thought not unusual for me to have. Yet, it occurs more often than not. Especially  now, as the population is probably feeling ever more irked. Regarding perhaps. their illusion of any lack of their freedom. But isn't that what life is about? The illusion of who we are. What we are about. Where we stand on the planet. Who we love. And who loves us. Our significance. Couldn't we imagine if this were all just an illusion? Sounds like a "Twighlight Zone" episode, perhaps. My aim here, are the thoughts of reckoning. I'll explain why I'm claiming such a thing. For about twenty-eight years of a career in dealing with injured athletes,  pain patients, chronically ill and the terminally ill. I found that there were many people who lied to

It's About the Soul And...

  ...perhaps the soles of our shoes. My father-in-law used to say the feet are what soldiers depend on, as we do food. He said that to me in 1985 as I stood in his home office.  My husband, Norman was a shoe guy. And it was all about the soles on the shoes.  For me, the way I have stayed on my feet was soul deep. Sometimes praying every step of the way, to not fall over out of exhaustion. The approximately 170,000 miles of running, many of which Norman had witnessed or known of. He wondered how I stayed standing working on my feet all day. Only to come home, and go for a second run at midnight at times.  Often Norman would give me a lecture on good shoe care. It was about the soles of the shoes. He'd point out stitching on a shoe that was done wrong. Therefore commenting, "...giving a shoe less time of wear on this earth."  He'd remark quite often. "You have to buy good quality shoes." I have to say, there was absolutely something comedic about his shoe obse