The most common question I get when I tell people I'm going to run a marathon...WHY? Well good question.... Let me first start off by saying that running didn't come naturally to me, it wasn't something that I feel in love with right away, in fact anything over a mile completely sounded like peer torture to me. Growing up I was always involved in sports, I loved being a part of a team, I thrived on competition. It's the rush, the feeling you get when you step on that court in a packed gym with the band playing and the crowd cheering. The same feeling an athlete gets when they score a goal, or hit a home run or cross the finish line first. The reason we play sports. The rush. It doesn't just come to you, you must earn it. You put in the time, the sweat, the tears. It's having a goal and reaching that goal through hard work. And after high school that all just kind of ended. Yes, I played a few pick up games here and there and joined a couple teams in college, but for some reason it wasn't the same for me. Then I started running. And it wasn't until after college that I feel in love with running.
I clearly remember the moment when I decided to run my first marathon. I was talking with a friend, who is a veteran marathon runner, about all the marathons he'd run that year. I made the comment, I could NEVER do that. He looked me straight in the eye. "Yes. You. Can". And that was it. At that very moment I decided to train for my first marathon. Five months later, he was right. I could do it.
Running for me is my time. Just me. Being a stay at home mom, while trying to run a business, be a good wife and coach basketball gets to be overwhelming at times. But the two hours in the morning when it's just me, I get to reload. Shake off the cobwebs from the day before and find my balance again. I find my inter peace on my run. And I'm ready for the day.
And now as I approach my second marathon this Saturday in Seattle I am bombarded by the question, why? Well because I can. Because for me I get that rush. That overwhelming feeling that I accomplished something that I worked so very hard to get. Not only physically, but mentally as well. It's amazing what the body can do, when you fully put your mind to it. I found that my hardest runs where days when I couldn't get my mind where it needed to be. Everything would be working beautifully from the neck down, but I couldn't occupy my mind. With five days left to go, the miles limited this week, I will be concentrating on keeping my mind full of positive thought. I'm ready to go. I've put in the miles, a lot of miles. Got up two to three, sometimes four hours before everyone else to fit in a three hour run. There has been some pretty painful bumps and bruises along the way, but come Saturday mid day I know that I will feel that rush again. And it will all be worth it. And that's why I run. I love it.
And of course the beauty that surrounds Montana... A gallery of the past three months morning miles :)
