Skip to main content

Go, Girl!

Yesterday was the Go Girl half marathon.  I was privileged and honored to spend 13.1 miles with some extremely special girls.

The weather was perfect, and as the ladies started gathering around the starting line there was a great spirit of excitement.  My friend Andi and I saw matching shirts, cheerful signs, and tutus (hey, this was an all-girls race!).  There was even a spontaneous Zumba warm-up before the race, courtesy of Mark Livesay and the Ultramax team.  Once the race started we kept telling ourselves we were just on a nice long walk.  Emphasis on the long part.

About three miles in we caught up with two young mothers pushing strollers.  They were part of a mothers' group based out of Fort Leonard Wood; military wives teamed up for races and called themselves "warriors with strollers".  One woman, named Sunny, was embarking on her first half marathon.  She would run in short bursts, telling herself she could make it to the next stop sign or the end of the block.  Her son was the perfect racing partner, talking and flirting from his seat.  Andi asked her if she had any plans for Mother's Day, and Sunny replied that her husband was deployed and wouldn't be there.  Her effort, both on and off the race course, was a real inspiration.

At the last tenth of a mile we saw another young woman attempting her first half marathon. It was clear that she was hurting; she was moving slowly and stopping often.  Members of the Ultramax team were encouraging and guiding her along, but the enormity of the race was weighing heavily on her and she quietly kept her head down as she trudged along.  As she rounded the last turn, however, several of her family and friends emerged and began to cheer.  That was all it took to push her across the finish line into her family's arms.  There were tears and smiles all around as she accepted congratulations all around that she richly deserved.

The most special lady we met along the way was Beth.  About five miles in we noticed her moving right along all on her own.  The three of us struck up a conversation that carried us miles down the road.  At first Beth worried she was slowing us down, although we assured her we were worried about the same thing!  We fell into a comfortable pace, and Beth started to tell us about her family.  She mentioned her husband of 44 years, who had passed about a month ago.  She admitted with a smile that he would have teased her for doing a half marathon -- "a walk through the woods?  Great! A 13 mile walk on a road?   Why on earth would you do that?"  She told us about the time they had won a boat despite knowing nothing about them.  Her husband had managed to recruit two friends who had sailed before, and that boat ended up being one of their favorite places to go.

The miles ticked by, and soon we only had three miles to go.  We passed a group of buildings near the college campus.  Beth suddenly began to cry, to Andi's and my surprise.  Beth pointed at a building and quietly said, "That's the building where my husband and I met."  Beth was letting us in on this extremely private and emotional moment, and we felt for her.  That was also a turning point in the race.  We were no longer casual acquaintances; we were friends.

We received a welcome distraction soon afterwards -- the robot that our middle school students had built was outside and ready to cheer us on!  I was so touched that my friends and students would take the time to come outside and cheer us along.  It was the push we needed to finish those last few miles.

Another welcome surprise was Beth's daughter Becky, who had already finished the race and had backtracked to come find us.  Becky is also a teacher and, as it turns out, we had several friends and students in common.  Another bond was forged as we powered through those last steps.  As we crossed the finish line and the announcer was calling our names, we each had our own little moment of triumph. The look in Andi's eyes was worth every minute of effort.  We accepted our medals and flowers and grabbed each other in a huge hug. There was a flurry of pictures and hugs and promises to get together soon.  Despite the pain and thoughts of "will this ever end?", it was the perfect ending to the perfect race.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Power of Yet

Last week I attended a meeting where the presenter discussed the power of "yet"-- how someone can re-frame his/her thinking so as to have a growth mindset.  For instance, instead of saying "I can't run a marathon," I should tell myself, "I can't run a marathon...yet."  To be fair, I feel there's a fine line between self-confidence and false confidence; no matter how strongly I believe in myself, I'm not sure any amount of positive thinking will turn me into an Olympic gold medalist.  However, my thoughts on the theory were tested just a few short hours later... I discovered that someone was making disparaging jokes at my expense about my weight.  It's no secret that I have a love-hate relationship with my body; anyone who follows me on social media has seen my #runburstinrun journey. And it is indeed a journey -- I feel like I barely remember where I began, and there is no ending in sight.  The source of the jokes claimed no harm was ...

Redman Race Report

This is it -- the official rundown of my triathlon experience!  I know many of you (well, at least my parents) have been anxiously awaiting this post, so here it goes. My Nationals experience actually started a day before I left for OKC when I arrived home to discover my beloved bike had been stolen (chain and all).  This was probably one of the least articulate moments of my life; most of the phone call to my father consisted of four-letter words.  My next flurry of phone calls went out to my lovely friends and coworkers, who made sure that I would have a bike to take to OKC.  I also put out the SOS to the rest of the racers in Oklahoma and was assured that a bike would be waiting for me there. Saturday was a really inspiring day.  I got to watch several races, including an Ironman distance race.  I saw people overcome pain and fatigue to accomplish something truly amazing.  As the sun set over Lake Hefner I had a moment of fear and panic and exci...

Random Musings

1.  Last Friday night I was driving home from my parents' house when I saw two gentlemen on the corner.  One was wearing a jumpsuit and the other was dressed as (I swear) Captain Hook.  They appeared to be brushing up on their creeper skills.  Well played, boys.  Well played. 2.  I've been watching a lot of "Storage Wars" lately.  Who puts glass eyeballs in a storage locker?  Why are plastic chairs worthy of storage?  If someone can afford to purchase and store randomly valuable items, why can't they afford to pay the storage fees?  And why do so many people store money in storage lockers?  Haven't they ever heard of a bank? 3.  My father used the work "Grok" in Words with Friends.  He claims it means "to understand."  Later when I was telling him about my bad day he told me he totally grokked (groked?).  Thanks for the support, Dad. 4. - 6.  I'm sure I've mused about some more stuff here, I'm just to...