It seems that New Year's Day (and New Year's Eve) is always an "event", the celebration of many things ...

... another year that mankind has survived ...

... another year that the planet has gotten just a little bit hotter ....

... another year that will lead me to write the date incorrectly for at least a few weeks ...

... and another year that the Toronto Maple Leafs go into their run for the Stanley Cup ... but I digress ....

Resolutions are made on this arbitrary day ... the day in which the calendar changes.

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It's that time of year again. Fall will soon be here (hard as that is to imagine when it's 100 degrees outside) and training programs for the AT&T Marathon and Half Marathon in Austin will be starting. There will be hordes of runners on Town Lake on the weekends. From the perspective of "health", it's great to see people out exercising. Unfortunately, this time of year also brings with it a plethora of running injuries.

Since that's the case, this is the first of a three part series on running injuries.

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I just came back from a trip to Canada - to see my family. Some friends of mine think that "going to Canada" entails "going on vacation". I would suggest that "going to Canada" entails "spending a lot of time with family" ... and that's not always a vacation!

After a number of days of great conversation and catching up with family and friends - I am exhausted.

Five days can go by very fast. Since I only get home about once a year (go ahead, interject the "bad son" thoughts here before you read further), it seems like you take those 5 days to get caught up on all the goings-on from the recent and not -so-recent past. Add in a reminiscence or two and lo and behold, you're ready to head back to Austin.

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It seems like everyone is talking about "it" - performance enhancement - these days. Whether it's Barry Bonds breaking the 755 home run record - or the multiple positive doping tests in this year's Tour de France - or even going back to Ben Johnson's 100m performance in the 1988 Summer Olympics - the topic of "performance enhancement" swirls about our culture.

When sport performance equates to dollars and cents, then there are always the questions of "how to do it - and if it's not legal, how to do it without getting caught". It is pervasive in our culture - and it's not just the athletes and coaches in whom this exists.

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I've become a "Seinfeld" fan since it's been in syndication. I didn't really enjoy it when it was first on TV, but now I fully appreciate it. Have you ever seen the "Seinfeld" episode in which George Costanza is trying to keep his "worlds" - his love life and his life as "one of the guys" with Jerry and Kramer and Elaine - separate? He's concerned that his "worlds will collide", thereby ruining a good thing.

I bring this up because a similar thing has happened to me recently - an episode in which two very divergent parts of my world collided in a very surreal fashion.

It all comes down to one particular address that brought it all out - 1109-B South Congress. For those of you who know me well, that's my new office address - within the walls of the South Congress Athletic Club. This brings me to my tale for today ...

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I recently found myself on the "client" side of the health care equation. I was on vacation - Canada to be exact - visiting my family and looking forward to some rest and relaxation. It would be a nice change of pace from the summer in Austin, that's for sure. Within hours of my arrival, I was stepping out onto my father's front porch ... placed my foot in an awkward position ... and suddenly, I felt an ouch. I sat down - and within moments, found myself trying to problem-solve my way out of it. That's the physical therapist in me - collecting data, assessing my active and passive ranges of motion, trying to make sense of my apparent clumsiness doing something I've done routinely for 40-odd years!

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It's time for a recollection or two. Today's topic: higher education.

Back in the day (i.e. when I was in high school in Canada), going to university wasn't a given. In high school, you were "tracked" into a university program or a college program. What, you say? Aren't they the same? No, actually, in Canada they aren't the same. University programs are oriented towards the attainment of a degree ... in the intellectual pursuit of "higher learning and education". Professional programs - doctors, lawyers, physiotherapists, dentists - those are all university programs. But so is the Bachelors in Arts focusing on Canadian history (a bit of a misnomer since we all know that Canada doesn't have much history - at least much that we are prepared to acknowledge!). The university setting is all about attaining a higher level of knowledge in something - and, frankly, it's not for everyone. It's for the best students, those with the highest grades, those who have the greatest potential to expand and add to the knowledge base, the research base, the development and enhancement of what we as a species know.

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