I don't know how it got to be May. There are boxes of Christmas decorations on the garage floor outside my office waiting for me to put them away. We're almost halfway to Christmas. Do I just leave them out? They're not bothering anyone.
I was listening to a podcast (Huberman Lab) the other day. He was talking about the auditory process, and how white noise helps people focus. As those Christmas decorations attest, I don't have that problem. When a project has me in its grip I can shut out everything else. This goes double when a book project combines with coaching to overwhelm my subconscious. It's a good problem to have if you're me, because my thoughts are never far from problem solving. People in my life suffer, however, because I let a lot of other balls drop. I can be distant, unreachable.
So it's nice when events collide to snap me awake. I found out we had a new pope as I was finishing a workout in O'Neill the other day. Mike the Homeless Guy keeps sentinel at the south entrance. When he's off his meds his rants can be alarming. But that morning, he just called out that we had "an American pope." Which is how I found out this landmark news. It was such an offbeat moment in history — I mean, who ever thought we would have an American pope? — that it completely rocked my thought process. Finding out he went to Villanova and is a Chicago White Sox fan (and regrettably, a Bears fan) made the pope feel like a regular guy. First time I can remember that being a thing. Then it turns out he's of Louisiana creole roots, with grandparents descended from slaves. Utterly mind-blowing.
And then the news that our president is being given a $400 million dollar aircraft. As a personal gift. From a foreign nation which harbored the 9/11 mastermind. Which claims it has no intention of using this gift to curry favor. And that he'd "be stupid not to accept it." I'll just leave that there. Not a profile in courage.
Then it was 100 degrees here in the OC this weekend. For the first time I can ever remember, a track meet was actually halted for several hours to allow for conditions to improve. I just ended up going home and streaming the rest. One of my runners benefited from the delay, posting a 17-second improvement in the two-mile.
So those three very divergent occurrences yanked me out of the creative cycle just in time for Mother's Day. The boys brought dinner. We all sat around and hung out, keeping the conversation very away from popes and presidents and track meets. Just a family sitting down and ignoring their phones for an afternoon. It was pretty amazing. A lot of love in the room.
Anyway, it's May, with all that implies. Time to put away the Christmas decorations.