A year ago I never would have thought I would run a marathon anytime in my lifetime, let alone the next year. Then, seven months ago, I had somehow* decided to run a marathon, and I hoped I could do it but assumed it would be painful and miserable. But it wasn’t. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I had so. much. fun. That’s right, it was fun! Granted, I wasn’t battling a dropped metatarsal like my running buddy (or any one of the variety of injuries other runners were struggling with), but the combo of our relaxed pace, seeing friends and family, getting cheered on by random strangers, seeing a city I love in a completely new way, and running for a cause I wholeheartedly believe made it such an exhilarating experience. (One of the reasons it was so moving to run in Chicago was the fact that we passed so many places I accompany clients on a regular basis.) During my training I learned so much about discipline, time management, priorities, pain, fear, and endurance, but during the marathon itself I learned about trust, gratitude, and (ironically) how to relax and have fun. We missed our (arbitrary) time goal by quite a bit, but it didn’t matter. In the last several weeks of training I’d gotten caught up in feeling like a slow runner compared to my teammates and others my age and really wanted to make a goal of under 5 hours. But what I realized during the race (and as my running partner verbalized afterwards), we didn’t have a time goal when we signed up. We signed up because we believed that the training process could be transformative and because we believed in the causes that we were running for. As a result I can now say that I’m a marathoner, and hopefully because of that process, Taller de Jose can better serve its clients and I am a stronger, better person. Thank you to everyone who was a part of that process.
(In case you haven’t see the pictures yet, here are a few! There are also some from the official photographers if you click here. If you'd like to see me look really silly you can watch this video featuring Melissa and me from the Chicago Tribune... it won't be the first video that shows up, you have to select "2012 Chicago Marathon: The Race Begins")
 |
| Team Taller with our finishers medals! |
 |
| We were pretty excited to see our fans (it was easy to look so happy at mile 1 :)) |
*Ok, so "somehow" is a little misleading... I actually know exactly how it happened. I walked into work on the day the marathon registration sold out (we didn't know it was going to at the time) and my coworker Lisa said she was signing up for the Chicago Marathon (her second)… and so was Kerry… and Maeve… and they were probably going to try to fundraise for Taller de José. So the wheels started turning… four generations of Amate volunteers running the marathon and fundraising for our service site, how cool would that be?? So I ran to my computer, looked up the information and saw that my good friend Melissa was on gchat. I started the conversation:
12:26pm
me: should i run the
chicago marathon in October??
Melissa: hmmm... i was
totally being "tempted" by that too
1:35pm
me: I'm tweaking out over here!!
you should do
it with me!!!
if we pay the
$150 to register, we'll be motivated :)
Melissa: i
think i want to?
aaahhhh!
i was thinking about the time commitment and feeling kinda
guilty. but then i realized maybe it's what i need or at least a helpful
motivator to learn to be more focused and intentional (with my time and my
work)
and excercise
is healthy
me: and I
bet we could find a way to connect prayer and running and make both things more
disciplined :) (Side note from October 2012: We did. Among other things, our “pace
bands” from the marathon had a prayer intention for each mile)
doooooo it
Melissa: ok i'm convinced..... i will!
me: yay!
YAYAYAY!!!
okay, I'm
going to do it right now!
Melissa: ok, i'm going to sign up now too! what the
heck am i getting myself into?!
me: I don't
know!! We're crazy!!
No comments:
Post a Comment