What Happiness Looks Like

And with that swing, 3-1 Phillies.

Reality Check

So I had this dream the other night. Like most of my dreams since the surgery, it was incredibly detailed, life-like, and completely unsettling. Unlike the other dreams, however, I don't think I need a PHD in psychology to interpret this one.

Back to my dream. I had entered a race comprised of the bike and run portions of a half-Ironman: 56 miles on the bike followed by a half-marathon. Just as in real life, I was only several months from my aneurysm clipping, and fully aware that I wasn't ready for this level of physical exertion.

So I came up with a plan: I would ride and run very, very slowly, even if it meant finishing dead last, as a way to keep from harming myself.

The bike course was made up of 5 repeats of a 5-mile out-and-back (I know the math doesn't work, but it was a dream, after all!) As the race started, I stuck to my plan, and let everyone fly by as I slowly plodded towards the first turn around. Making matters worse, the "out" section of the course was steep; absurdly steep in that unrealistic yet realistic manner that dreams allow.

As I stood out of the saddle and applied as much pressure to the pedals as I could, I became acutely aware that I had bit off way more than I could chew, and was in very real danger of hurting or even killing myself if I kept up this level of intensity so soon after my surgery.

But I kept pedaling, because in my mind, the most important thing wasn't how I raced, but that I finished. Because it was only at the finish, at least in my dream, that the rest of the racers and spectators would learn that I was only five months removed from aneurysm surgery. I became more exhausted and certain I was doing irreparable harm to myself, yet I kept going and going simply because I wanted to make it to the end for the satisfaction of being recognized as having "overcome" the aneurysm. Once I finished, everyone in attendance would know it was possible to ride 56 miles and run a half-marathon five months after brain surgery.

And this was the only thought repeating in my brain as I pedaled and pedaled and pedaled. When I had finished the first 10 miles of the ride, I found I had gone so slowly that other racers were already out on the run portion. But it didn't matter: I had to keep going no matter how long it took, to prove to everyone -- to prove to myself -- that it could be done.

When I woke, I was covered in sweat and breathing heavily, a position I have found myself in far too often in the middle of the night recently.

Why I am I writing this? Because a few months ago, I wrote the following:

To be able to process hearing a surgeon tell us three weeks ago that everything is fine and I can return to a normal life, after everything we've been through, takes an element of faith. Faith that this was the end of something, rather than the beginning. And in my mind, in order to procure that faith, I need to look forward rather than back. I need to accept this aneurysm for what it was: a medical condition that, while terrifying and potentially life-threatening, has been properly treated. Only then can I stop defining myself by what I've been through, and start living again like I did four months ago: excited for every day to come rather than apprehensive of what may go wrong.

I'd like to believe that at the time, I genuinely believed that this was how I'd approach my recovery. But four months later, nothing could be farther from the truth.

This has been, to say the least, an emotional ass-kicking. There's not a day that goes by in which I'm not paralyzed by fear that this will all happen to me again. As illogical and nonsensical as it is, every little pain in my head makes me want to run and have a test done to prove there's nothing there.

Even worse, I've gotten into a vicious battle with myself. In an effort to prove to myself that life will return to normal, that I can be just as I was prior to May 9th, I've really pushed the recovery. I've run almost every other day since the 8-week mark, I've been swimming since July, and I recently tried to re-introduce weight lifting.

Each workout is met with fear that I'm doing too much, that I should be taking it easy until at least the six month mark, but each day I go out there and do it. Because I feel I have to. I have to prove to myself that I will do these things again, and the simplest way to do that is go out there, do it, and see what happens.

And that is what led me to run a 5K last Saturday. And to lift weights harder on Sunday. And, of course, to the inevitable bad headache on Sunday night, the first real "headache" I've had since the surgery, and one that led me into a week-long emotional tailspin of convincing myself I had done significant damage.

My dream followed on Tuesday night, and I can't help but think my subconscious was doing everything in its power to send me a message. Maybe it's time to back off, and stop feeling like I have something to prove. Perhaps taking that pressure off will make this time easier.

Big Happenings from Coast to Coast

There's a-doings a-transpiring these days.

Let's start in New Jersey, where a hearty congratulations is in order for two of our favorite people. Dean Gray, simply the best guy I know, and his lovely wife Erica (who also doubles as my most consistent and appreciated blog commenter) welcomed to the world their second little girl, Naomi June.

Naomi came in at a robust 8 lbs 10 ounces, and while that's quite impressive, it's not quite big enough to fend off the inevitable rough-housing to come from big sister Nadia over the coming years.

When Dean originally texted me the information, he introduced his daughter as "Nadia June" which prompted me to ask when Dean had turned into George Foreman and started naming all of his kids the same thing. Turns out it was a typo, the result of a fried brain from dealing with the numerous responsibilities of an impending dad. Fatherhood isn't easy you know...unlike motherhood.

Here in Aspen this week has basically consisted of watching my beloved Phillies in the postseason, broken up by periods where I nervously wait to watch my beloved Phillies in the postseason. Tough to concentrate on much else, particularly when you consider the Fightins' haven't won a playoff game since I was eighteen.

At the time, I was a freshman riding the bench for the Trenton State Men's Soccer Team, feigning interest in the action on the field as I waited breathlessly for the PA announcer to give the update on the NLCS and World Series.

Last year, I threw up a celebratory post when the Phils clinched the division on the final day of the regular season, but since that was promptly followed by a three-game bludgeoning at the hands of the buzzsaw that was the 2007 Colorado Rockies, I figured I'd wait a bit this year to avoid any potential jinxing. Now that I think about it, maybe I'll just ignore what happened today and move on with this post.

Saturday morning was a big day on the aneurysm front. I decided it was time to test myself a bit, more mentally than physically, and race in a local 5K. When I arrived at the start, I was surpised to learn that instead of a flat road race, this was a cross-country style event with over 350 feet of climbing. Nonetheless, I had a great time getting out there and running again, simultaneously completing the slowest yet most rewarding 5K of my life.

Here's local legend Terry Schaefer in the finishing chute, completing his second straight championship in the 60-65 year old age group of the Aspen Race Series, a three-stage event that covers the entire summer.

Terry was kind enough to return the favor and shoot a pic of a clearly distracted me.

After the race, I wanted to take a minute and send a message back to everyone that made it possible for me to get back to where I am today. I have a full appreciation for how fortunate I am; how easily things could have ended for me last spring, or how many things could have gone wrong with the surgery, leaving the idea of even running a 5K an impossibility.

So to my wife Lauren, my loving family, and all my friends and co-workers that sent me kind words either before the surgery or during the recovery, this is for you. Oh, and let's not forget my wonderful surgeon and the hopsital staff at Thomas Jefferson who performed the clipping, because let's face it...my wife and friends and family were great and all, but they have neither the skill nor the steady hand to pull off a procedure like that.

In case you can't read it, it says THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To Hell You Ride

You wanna' know the single coolest piece of trivia about Telluride, Colorado?

/waits breathlessly for response

Forget it, I'm telling you anyway. Positioned in the middle of a box canyon, there are three ways into Telluride, but only two ways out. Two of the ways in require drives over steep mountain passes, and one of the entries is so foreboding,it can only safely be climbed INTO Telluride, and not out.

Feel free to impress your friends at your next dinner party with that little nugget of info.

Anyhoo, Lauren and I packed up the Outback Saturday morning for what was supposed to be an overnight excursion to Telluride for the Blues and Brews festival and celebration of our good pal Lori's 40th birthday. Did I write 40th? I meant thirtieth. Yeah, that'll do.

Some would say it's a waste of time for me to attend a Blues and Brews festival, since I'm already clinically depressed and currently unable to imbibe alcohol, but what do they know?

On our way out of town, Lauren took a good shot of Mt. Sopris, in all its downvalley glory. Enjoy.

The idea of the festival was to pitch a tent in the campground adjacent to the festival, so you could convene with friends and fellow party goers well into the night after the bands stopped. Here I am setting up the trusty BD tent and enjoying my last few moments of lucidity before suffering a nervous breakdown.

Why did I snap? Look, I've come a long way since this surgery, and I'm capable of doing nearly everything I could prior to May 9th. But one thing I am NOT ready for, it quickly dawned on me, was to surround myself with 3,000 sweaty hippies on the wrong side of a 72-hour bender when I'm stone sober. I'm still at the point in my recovery where sleep is invaluable, and it quickly became apparent that rest would not be readily available in our intended setting.

So Lauren and I decided to bag the campout, but enjoy the festival regardless and head back to Aspen when the night wore down. Here's a view of Telluride on the way into town. It's a beautiful town, as you can see, but it has a way of making one feel a touch claustrophobic.

Here's Lauren grooving to the sounds of G Love and Special Sauce. We've traveled 2,400 miles, only to hear a guy from Philly play in Telluride. Go figure.

A shot of the festival. You couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting some dreadlocked, patchoulie scented thirty-something deeply immersed in a game of hackey sack.

With the night winding down, Lauren and I had the brilliant idea of driving an hour east and grabbing a hotel in Ouray, Colorado. I drive through Ouray all the time on the way to ski at Silverton, and it's generally considered one of the most idyllically-set towns in the US.

When we arrived it was dark, so no pictures until the morning. Lauren and I grabbed a quick bite to eat, then returned to our hotel room a bit despondent that we weren't spenidng the night in the tent.

One quick trip to the car remedied that up quick.

I'll confess, while it didn't quite provide the feeling of freedom that only a night out under the stars can provide, it did cut down our chances of being ravaged by a bear in our sleep dramatically.

The next morning we were greeted by bluebird skies and a sleepy town. We grabbed a bagel, shot some pictures encompassing the entire town of Ouray, and were on our way back to Aspen.

Besides, the Mexican Food Sucks North of There Anyway

Big happenings here in the valley since I last posted, but sadly, my laptop was on the fritz so I couldn't upload any pictures. Until now, that is. But you probably already figured that out.

Ahhh, Texas. There's so much more to the Lonestar State than the Dallas Cowboys, oppressive humidity, and frequent executions of the mentally retarded. It's also the home state of our good friends Brianna and Ryan Smith, who decided to take a break from their twice-weekly hurricane evacuations and spend Labor Day weekend in lovely Aspen, Colorado.

Bri holds a special place in my heart, as we ran our first marathon together back in 2001, and she was the first to encourage me that I had some potential as an endurance athlete. Ryan is a fantastic guy, LSU grad, and the current pilot of my old Cervelo P2K triathlon bike.


Early Saturday morning, we headed out to hike to Cathedral Lake, a 2,000 foot climb and 3.5 mile round trip. Here's the happy Texans' at the beginning of the climb, which started at an elevation of 9,800 feet.

The views, while not painted in their fall colors just yet, were still beautiful. A waterfall here, river there, valley bottom here, towering peaks there...

As we started to ascend above tree line, the surrounding valley opened up. I believe this is a view of one of our Elk Mountain 14ers, Castle Peak, which I skied back in June 2006. I could be mistaken, however.

There's one last steep climb before the trail flattens out and offers hikers a choice of heading to either Cathedral Lake or Electric Pass, named for its frequent and violent lightning storms. * Since the forecast was calling for storms after noon and the skies were already growing ominous, we decided Cathedral Lake was the better play.

Here's the happy couple posing before our well-earned destination, Cathedral Lake. Set in the shadow of Cathedral Peak at 11,800 feet, the water is clear as the Caribbean. Soon after this tranquil photo was taken, Ryan causally tossed several sticks of lit TNT into the lake, blew it to all hell, and harvested the now dead, floating fish from the surface one by one. He referred to it as fishing, "Texas Style." Good times.

With the water temp hovering around the mid-fifties, only one in our group was willing to make the leap.
After a rapid descent, we headed up Independence Pass for a quick tour of the Grottos, seen here in the first week after Lauren and I moved to the valley. A quick stop at the Devil's Punchbowl, a popular Aspen cliff-diving area, and we were on our way back downvalley for some well-deserved rest.

Saturday evening we had a delightful dinner at the Riverside Grill, which as I explained to Bri, was founded by James Riverside in 1971, and has nothing to do with its location adjacent to the Fryingpan River. **

Sunday morning, we took the bus up to the Maroon Bells, the most photographed mountains in the United States. The morning was hazy and overcast, so we decided to get a closer look and go for a hike.

Here's my lovely bride and I enjoying a Sunday morning atop Maroon Lake.

After about an hour of hiking and with a steady rain developing, we reached our destination, Crater Lake, which was discovered by old man Crater in 1945.*** No pictures, sadly, as the weather quickly grew worse and we had to hightail it back to Maroon Lake.

Monday morning, Bri and Ryan left us, and the Nitti family looked to catch up on some much-needed rest. I hopped on the couch, and Maci, as she'll do from time to time, climbed up as well. Only this time, she decided to make her bed in a rather, uh...uncomfortable manner.

* may not be accurate

** most definitely not accurate

*** absolutely, without question not accurate

Back in Aspen

It's been a hectic two weeks in the Nitti family, as this post finds us 2,000 miles away from the previous.

On August 8th, Lauren and I loaded up the trusty Subaru Outback (side note: Please buy all of your Subarus at Nitti's Subaru, so my family can eat again. Now with two convenient locations!!) and started the 30-hour trek back to Aspen, Colorado.

The trickiest part of the packing process was convincing Maci to leave her comfy new digs atop her grandparent's front porch. She spent the better part of the summer surveying the world from this vantage point, and she was in no hurry to abandon it.

As you can probably imagine, saying goodbye proved a bit more difficult this summer than in years past. I never thought my parents would be called upon to care for me in this manner again, but they sure haven't lost their touch. They literally nursed me back to health, and I am forever in their debt. Lauren and I discussed it, and we've decided that if they should ever need us to return the favor and care for them in their advancing years, we'll gladly discuss possibly putting the deposit down on a nice full-care facility somewhere.

Shortly before our departure, in an elaborate ceremony befitting the Beijing games, I awarded Angelo and Mary their well-deserved "Parents of the Year" medals. Sadly, my father had to return his a week later when he failed the mandatory drug test.

Thirty hours of driving and seventeen McDonalds' Chipotle wraps later, we pulled into our home in Aspen completely spent. Upon arriving, we noticed that for the first time since last Thanksgiving, the entire valley wasn't under 30 feet of snow. So there's that.

Here's two exhausted members of the Nitti family, trying to adjust after not getting our requisite 17 hours of sleep per day we'd averaged over the summer.


Our first week back was spent reacclimating, both physically and mentally. I returned to full-time work for the first time since surgery, which wasn't nearly as bad as it sounds. Lauren took care of some workshops, prepped her classroom, and caught up with some old friends. Together we kept up our every-other-day running schedule, and slowly got used to the 8,000 foot altitude difference between Aspen and Long Beach Island.

This past weekend, we let our proverbial hair down a bit and reminded ourselves why we live in a place where gas is five bucks a gallon. Saturday morning, we hiked the Ute Trail, which while gaining only 1,050 feet of elevation, involved roughly 1,050 feet more climbing than we'd done all summer. So needless to say, we suffered a bit. But as usual, the views were expansive and beautiful. Here's a view of Mt. Sopris, still holding some snow, but not nearly as much as it was on this day.

Lauren and Maci at the top of the Ute Trail. It's hard to imagine that I was skiing this route just five months ago. Maci, as you can see, was finally asked to pull her weight. With her dad still recovering, she's going to have the play the role of Sherpa this fall.

Lauren atop Ute Rock. Previous photos of this same location can be found here and here.

Once we'd descended the Ute, we decided it was only fair to allow our porter some recreation time. So we headed over to the fountain on the Mill Street pedestrian mall, and let Maci loose to do her thing.

That evening, we scrapped some camping plans due to ominous weather and opted instead for a block party at my buddy Jeff's house, complete with bad cover band, moon bounce, badminton, and numerous sporadically-manned barbecues. A good time was had by all, though I'm fairly sure more than a few people went home with a food borne illness. Word of advice? Pork loin at a block party is never a good idea.

Midway trough the evening, the skies opening up with a brief storm, but as the weather passed, the colors came out to play.
It's good to be back.

The Dog Days of Summer, Indeed

We sure are fond of our Maci around these parts. With the first Nitti baby still but a twinkle in my eye, Lauren and I have been able to lavish an awful lot of attention on our one-and-a-half year old yellow lab pup.

This summer, with my own athletic activity brought abruptly to a standstill, I've been forced to live vicariously through my dog. Which, I must say, has been rather entertaining.

As proof, behold the Top 5 Maci pictures of the Summer of 2008:

5. My sister Karen and her husband Rob are proud owners of Zoe, a beautiful 7 year old chocolate lab. Zoe, for all her strengths, is a tad overweight; ironic since her parents are both lean exercise junkies. I guess when you've got three little girls in the house dropping food all day long, you tend to pack on some extra pounds.

Anyhoo, Maci and Zoe became good pals this summer, and their play sessions in Barnegat Bay are responsible for shaving a good 5-10 pounds off Zoe.

4. Every day Maci has spent on LBI this summer has essentially followed the same format: wake up, follow me around the house until I take her to the bay, swim until exhaustion, then sleep all day. Here she is after my nieces got a hold of her during some REM sleep.

3. See my vest, see my vest... While not made of real gorilla's chest, Maci has fallen in love with her new Ruff Wear life vest. The vest serves three purposes: it allows Maci to swim alongside Lauren and I when we kayak without us having to worry about her, it allows her to swim with me when I swim in the bay, and it allows us to pick her up onto the dock at 9th street without having to get in the water.



2. I've gotta say, Maci has certainly won over the grandparents this summer. They've got an unspoken mutual agreement: Maci doesn't poop in the house, and in exchange she gets a piece of my mom's bagel every mornning. But the first day Maci doesn't get that bagel, look out...

1. The picture of the summer. For full effect, click on it to enlarge. It took Maci and I most of the summer to work out the toss so that it matched her considerable pace when hitting the bulkhead. The video below gives the full speed look.

Summer's just about over for Lauren and I here in New Jersey. Lauren celebrated her 31st birthday on Saturday, August 2nd, and after spending the next few days tying up some loose ends, we're heading back to Aspen next Saturday morning.

It's been an interesting summer to say the least, and while I'm very grateful to have spent it back in New Jersey with friends and family, it's about time we headed home and got busy living.