Growing and hurting

"There's no way to grow that don't hurt..."

That's from one of my favorite songs by Iron & Wine. I've found it applies to most areas of my life...relationships, learning, cycling, occasionally cooking, and more recently, yoga.

Yes, I'm trying yoga. I found a nice little studio only three miles from my house, and yesterday I took my first class. It was challenging, yet simultaneously very relaxing. I wondered, why didn't I try this before?

When I woke up this morning, I realized almost my entire body was sore. (Just about the only parts that weren't too sore were my legs—thanks, cycling!) Though the class was only 60 minutes long, it felt like I'd spent at least 2 hours in a gym focusing on my core. I'm looking forward to taking more classes with the hope that eventually, it will stop hurting.

Goals for 2011

A year-length bucket list, if you will. I made a similar list in summer, but I only accomplished 4 of the 12 goals. I never really expected to reach all of them—some of my goals are easily attainable, while others are difficult (and some are just plain fantasies). Anyways, here's my list for this year. Hopefully I'll have a better success rate this time around!

1. Go back to school for Environmental Biology/Zoology. This one's pretty much in the bag, unless for some reason MSU declines my application for readmission. I've been looking at programs for the last year and a half, and it finally became feasible.
2. Keep riding the veggie train. I always feel healthier when I stick to a vegetarian diet. This was one of my summer goals that I met—been going strong for about a month now. (Which isn't so easy when you live on an Angus beef farm.)
3. Keep riding, period. This is critical to weight loss, and to getting faster, which leads me to...
4. Get faster. I want to improve my Ore to Shore time by at least 15 minutes, and actually finish Iceman this year.
5. Travel to more places with better hiking than Michigan. Because I want to climb a freaking mountain, not a hill! While I love biking in Michigan, the local hiking leaves a lot to be desired. Hopefully I'll get a chance to visit family out west again, and take in some sweet hikes in the process.
6. Save money. This will be difficult with goal #1, but it involves a 2012 goal: attending a mountaineering course at NOLS.
7. Volunteer more! I started doing volunteer work in the wildlife department of the Michigan Humane Society this fall, and hopefully I can find time to step it up a bit with another organization.
8. Actually hike the Porkies. This was in my summer list, but I never got around to it. There was always some excuse—weather, races, my job, the list goes on.
9. Tour Michigan's microbreweries by bicycle. Another from my summer list. Pretty self-explanatory, no? Who's with me?
10. Race more. Entering my first race was one of my summer goals, and I ended up doing 3 in 2010. I want to increase that in 2011—aiming for 6.
11. Ride to one of the Great Lakes. Probably Huron, because it's closest.
12. Hike Isle Royale. I planned on going with the wolf and moose study exhibition in 2010, but it coincided with Ore to Shore. Clearly, Ore to Shore won out for me. I won't have the funds to participate in the study this year (see #6), but I'd still like to hike the whole island.

Oh, and one of the things I'm hoping for is more snow. I finally got my snowshoes (I decided on a pair of MSRs) and all the snow melted. What the hell, Michigan? It's not supposed to be 45ºF in January!