Home sweet home.

For more than 6 years now, I have been living at a rental space. Roaming around for better options, be it living space/view/community amenities/affordable rental, there was always a reason to move around. It never occurred to us(well to "me") to buy a house here in US. Back in India, with dads help we did buy an apartment but it was always just another investment for me. Never really able to connect to it at all.

Whenever my parents used to go to that house, they used to call me up and congratulate and/or tell me about it. To say it out loud, I was indifferent to it...They could never get why I was being so indifferent and I could never get why they were so senti about it. All of this changed when we bought out first house...yes our home.

Even when buying this "property" here , when we were shopping around, checking out houses at different communities: it was always a financial decision for me. Whether it makes practical sense to buy or not: that was the prime thought process. Couple it with the excitement and curiosity with which vandita was looking at it...and we were up for a bag of mixed reactions. Every time we checked out an apmnt, I looked at the financial side much more closely than the sentimental association with that place. If you must have noticed it above, I was shopping for a "property" and vandita was looking to buy a house/home. There is a big difference to it. I always thought whether we live in a rental place or as owner..it does not matter...and guess what I was just plain wrong.

Buying house/ moving into it...setting it up has been a journey in itself. Placing things around knowing that this is the final setup, has been a pleasure. Walking into the house knowing this is OUR HOSUE/ OUR HOME has been a pleasure. Just being there in the living room..marveling at the river front view has been a pleasure. We have had similar view from our previous rental places as well, however this is different. I can surely feel it now. Very few times in life one is not able to express in words what he/she is feeling. Today when I sit in the living room and relax, thats the feeling I get and that feeling is here to stay.

To all my "practical" friends out there, listen to your partners. They may see things differently and we got to respect it...njoy it from their eyes for some time till you see for yourself.  Thank god I was not adamant and listened all the way to Vanditas' calling for this house.If it was not for her, we wouldn't have bought this home and I would forever have missed this opportunity to cherish.

Cheers.

Open water swim !!

Its been quiet some time since we have been training for the triathlon. Its been fun..exciting..tiring and most important of all super amazing. Pls don't mind the superlative feel in my words but that's precisely how its been. Every other day we keep working on it Practice session, catchups..fall injuries, gearing back up and getting back on track !

Today however was very unique. We had our first open water swim.
So we all have been training for our triathlon for about 2 months now. Swim somehow always was the the most difficult part of the race..not to say it "was"..it still is. After all for someone who does not swim at all to swimming 1.5 km in a river..is an insane task.Thanks to the continuous prep and training from our Head coach Scott Willet, we all are getting comfortable. Till this point it has always been about swimming in the pool and today I can say proudly that Its a piece of cake when it comes to swim in the pool . Today our coach took us out our first OPEN water swim..at Coney island NYC.

So what is open water swim.
Open water swim is where you cant really measure the depth of the water and cant ever stand up ..no boundaries and full of current. Yes we swam in the ocean. As scary as it sounds..it sure was. We all have been waiting for this moment for the entire training time. We were supposed to reach at the meeting point at Coney Island today at 7 am. The usual prep was done the previous night with packing and loading up on carbs. Just to make it more interesting, god was playing games with us..there was a hurricane warning.It was pouring yday night and I wasnt entirely sure we should be doing our first open water swim in rain !

Got up at 4 30 am today morning..I think i was anxious about this whole thing. I am scared of water..have learnt it the hard way(yes one time in ocean..on a boat ride, the boat went upside down..with all us fellow passengers well under the boat and thank god for the life jackets..) Anyways, I am glad that I was anxious..I kept focusing on the task at hand with much seriousness.
Couple of us carpooled and reached Coney. Got in the gear...and all excited. For a moment thought about going in the "intermeddiate" group but thankfully came back to senses and continued in the BASIC group. We got few instructions and behold we were stepping into water..it was roaring at the shore !

As we put our first step, we realized what was the impact of the heavy rains from previous day...the water was ICY cold ! damn it..just to add to the fun, we could feel our feet but our coach kept going in and we kept following. At a point when we were hip dip in water, he asked us to take a dive and feel the water...yeah right.feel the icy cold water.. Couple of us had already started panicking and sure it was worth panicking. However coaches word is the final word, we did dive in..Pitch Green..murky...no visibility ..ICY cold and nothing else..the first "dubki" in water was insane, surreal ... We couldn't believe him when he said, now we will do laps from a to point b.

Few minutes later we started on our first lap ! 50-100 m away from the shore line..thr we were: a brave team of about 50-100 people trying their hand t open water swim. Coach gave the word and we went in batches. and there began the fun. It was a scramble...so many people panicking..trying to swim in one direction in files, everyone had their own speed and sense of direction and as a result we kept bumping into each other. If it was not for the damn murky water...or the waves crashing on you ...then it was the limbs of people...someone from the front kicking you in the face or someone on the side hitting you with fist ! one word CRAZY. the first lap was a disaster..We got  closer to the shore line by the end of lap ( 50-100 m) and tried to get up..another thing stuck us.
Our head was spinning ! Most of us had a hard time standing up for 30 secs or so..we were walking drunk ! the cold water had done something nasty to our senses..After leaping out for a while and standing straight, we were able to get back to senses and feeling much better about the whole exercise ! Coach saw the confidence on couple of faces and off we were on the second lap.

Second lap was much smoother and we started getting used to this process..then came 3rd and then few more....were getting better. We are going from "wanna-be triathletes" to the real triathletes... After all on the race day, its going to be 3k + swimmers in the same river ..going one after another in 15 sec interval..Its going to be a chaos..July 14th is going to be a memorable day. Go Triathlon..


The biggest fear in this race was the swim part..After todays horrific start yet owing to the  meaningful culmination...we are all looking forward to this whole experience. Yes , looks like we can do it !