Subourbon Mom

Most of them time, my brain and my body work together pretty seamlessly – but sometimes I wonder if that same body hasn’t become the worst third-party vendor ever. Especially in my 40’s.

I recently started horseback riding again – and by that, I mean flopping around on top of my daughter’s wonderful horse as I try to make muscle memory turn into actual muscle doing.

After hours and hours of watching her ride in lessons and horse shows, I have a pretty good mental idea of the mechanics of how it is done. And, I remember how to physically do some of it from when I used to ride as a kid – but now I have to outsource the job to my much older and out of shape body.  As a third-party vendor, my current body’s still the cheapest (and only) option, but the relationship has begun to take a turn for the worse.

So, I Googled how to improve vendor performance:

First, Measure Performance – I do this every day, and sometimes I surprise myself with how well I (and my outsourced body) are doing; other days, I’m horrified. Take sleeping, for example. I used to be able to read for an hour and sleep through the night.  Now I’m lucky if I can stay awake for two paragraphs and snore half the night. On the other hand, I can do sit-ups, push-ups and burpees, and like getting up at the crack of dawn because.

Measuring performance leads to:  Listen to Your Vendor – “How often do you really have a two-way conversation with your vendors about their issues and the support they need to do a better job for you?  Ok, so I just expect my body, er, vendor, to do what it was hired to do…but when my expectations are too high, or my body hasn’t had time to prepare (i.e. horseback riding), it does still try to find ways to meet my needs. The result – I rode for 20 minutes without falling off, but I couldn’t walk the next day.  Perhaps my outsourced body would tell me that it needs more time in the gym, less bourbon and maybe a vitamin on occasion.

Establish a Service Level Agreement – There was never an agreement, although it appears that as I age, my body is beginning to make the rules around what is happening, instead of me.

Vendor: You’re going riding again? Fine, I’ll do it, but you don’t get to walk anywhere for two days.

Me: I think we need to revisit our agreement. I’m supposed to be in charge.

Vendor:  I just made you pee a little.

Me:  That’s not funny.

Vendor: That’s just the beginning. Go ahead – eat that crabmeat again – I dare you.

Establish Routines and Be Predictable – “It is much easier for vendors to better supply you when your ordering is predictable and consistent. Um, yeah, because life works like that. If I could be predictable, I would, but the best things in life usually aren’t in your routine…and if there’s a vendor cost for that, so be it. The 20-minute ride was worth it.