First Swim Jitters

Part of the reason I have not been swimming is because the downtown pool is freakin freezing. I mean to tell you it is freezing. So I have been fretting and worrying about getting my butt into that freezing pool.

Then I got to thinking about my years of swimming with the masters in Flagstaff. Getting up at five a.m. every morning, scraping the ice off the car windows, in my pj's no less, and dragging to the pool 15 miles away. I pretty much slept through the workout, which was a good thing, but man was I tired all day.

Now I will head down around eightish, on the bus, swim my own workout, and be home in time to home school the girlies. Not sure what I will do once massage classes start, but maybe do the afternoons. The only hard part once again, is the unheated pool.

The good news is that by Friday the pool will be warming up. Yup they fill it on Sunday and by the end of the week it starts warming up, but it is dirty also. I think I prefer dirty and a little warmer. As you can see by the picture though it is beautiful and I am sure thankful to be so close to it.

You know the saddest part is that I will probably be the exact same speed I was eight years ago. When I swam everyday I was the same speed as when I only swam once a week. In other words after six weeks of swimming with the masters I was no faster. It was easier, but no faster. Of course unfortunately the same can be said about running club. I went for about four years and never got any faster. My only goal at running club was to keep up with my friend, the one that was 62 years old!

LYMPH DRAINAGE

I have found the perfect answer to the "swine flu". Get a lymph massage! As we have been studying the lymph massage for the past couple of weeks I keep thinking that it would be great for everyone to get one, if they are worried about their immune systems.

In conjunction with the massage portion we also studied salt glows, dry luffa scrubs, and yoga moves to stimulate the lymph system. We all had fun and learned a lot about this amazing system and how it works.

Good thing we can work on each other! Hannah had a cold and was demo one day.She got to draining really good, slept for awhile and then felt much better. Amazing this stuff really works!

LET THE CLASSES BEGIN!

Time to go to work, yeah! We will be beginning classes again Monday. Since the weather is perfect we are excited to get started going again. It is fun to teach and clear out the ole' brain cobwebs that tend to gather with inactivity. Oh wait I do blog so I guess the brain is not sleeping too much.

I don't know about you but some days I feel like the only thinking I do is when I write a blog. Even then not too much :) Tomorrow is long run day and we are looking forward to getting the 14 miler out of the way. Kind of like labor, every pain only lasts once. With the long runs you only do each distance once.

I had to cut my exterra hat into a visor because it does not fit over my dreads anymore. They are getting out of hand for sure.

FLEXIBLE TEACHING

We just finished our second week of massage classes. I am so pleased with our students, they look awesome and I think we have the makings of more awesome massage therapists! The best part is we have worked with a couple of the students to personalize the program for them. That is what we specialize in, personalized programs.

The first student that studied with us did so in Arizona before we even left. He was headed to Myopractic school and need some massage training before he could go on to specialize. The next student we had was on her way to Naturapathic training and we put together her required massage classes for her to certify her with her school in New Zealand. She is still in the process of taking classes from us every year to keep up.

Our next student needed a program that we could put together for her and work around her work schedule at the beach, two hours from us. That was about the same time the governing board decided that we could provide half of the hours online. So we were able to do her book work online and she would come for three days at a time for her massage hands on work.

We thought this class would be a normal class. No way. It turns out one of the student has had advanced studies in Anatomy and Physiology so we have allowed him to turn up on Monday and get his assignments and come back on Friday for his test. Of course he still has to come in the afternoon for his massage classes and to work his time in the clinic.

I guess that is the beauty of being flexible and willing to work with the students, which we do pride ourselves on :)

STUDENTS

We got our new student settled in and hopefully he is loving Costa Rica. I spent the morning taking him around San Rafael to see the town and learn his way around. Since we really don't spend that much time in town it was kind of good to get out and rediscover some places I had not been for awhile.

He got really lucky and is staying with our homestay coordinator. She is an awesome cook, and just fun person. I did warn him that he would probably gain weight living with her. He got in last night and she had all his laundry done by this morning and made him a great breakfast.

Our classes begin Monday and he and our other student are very excited. It took Hannah a few days to decide she really wanted to attend massage school, but I think once she thought about the money she could make it convinced her to go for it. She told our other student today that she plans on financing her professional singing career startup fees with massage. That is thinkin.

My co director will miss the first day of class, but I'm sure he is enjoying his time in the U.S. We miss him and look forward to seeing him in a few days. So far he has managed to hire out about half of his teaching time, so I have a feeling he is planning on replacing himself as teacher.

It is all good, and the weather is beautiful so we are ready to go into summer here. Now if the wind would just die down I would be ecstatic.