Failure is Not An Option

Some will use the word stubborn.  I prefer determined.  This was part the conversation I was having with myself last Saturday in the middle of my 2nd half-marathon.  The conversation was really something that only a person walking 13.1 miles alone would have with herself.  I also had visions of Stephen King's The Long Walk,  but that was probably just my overactive imagination. Anyway, the conversation was occuring in preparation for how many people would think I was a) crazy for doing the race in the first place and b) crazier for trying to finish with a busted knee.  So here's about how this conversation with myself went:

Mile 1: crap, my knee is hurting again. Dang, this is way earlier then the other race. Ow ow, shit.  OK, walk for a bit.

Mile 2: OK, let's go wimp, jog a bit and see how it feels.  Ow ow, crap, nope.  Something is really wrong this time...damn.  Well (insert variety of 4 letter words), this is going to be a long 11 more miles.  Can I really just walk this?  I don't want to freakin walk this.  I'm not a walker.  Try again in a bit.

Mile 4: Hmmm, I wonder if I should just stop at the half way point.  The running is over.  I need to walk.  Frick.  Oh damn, here come all the old people.  OK, keep walking.  Maybe try the speed walk..nope nope, that hurts.  OK, slow walk.  I really don't want to walk this whole race.  Ugh.  Holy crap, is that a hill?

Mile 5: I bet I'm gonna get lapped by the faster runners any minute. Boy that'll be embarrassing. (This happens, I cheer on a friend who took second in the race.)  Well, I am HURT.  Shut up, stupid excuses.  Sigh, I think I'm going to be the last one today.  I'll just do the whole damn thing.  I started the race and I'll finish it, can't make anything worse at this point.

Miles 6-9: I can't believe I'm going to be last.  (insert short conversation with second to last runner-we briefly discuss his open heart surgery 2 years ago and the marathon he's running next month. He passes me).  So now I'm going to be last AND beat by an old man who had open heart surgery AND who is running a marathon.  I'm not even doing a marathon. Heck I can barely make it through this stupid half.  Sigh again, quit whining and keep walking.

Mile 10: ("Lonnie" drives by in the truck to check on me, his race is over, and asks if I'm hurt.)  No, I purposefully do all my half marathons at a slow pathetic limp.  OK, breathe, that's not nice (I reply that I'll be fine and that I think I tore the cartilage.)  So, I always tell my patients that they should just try, no matter how good or bad they do.  I always tell them that it's OK to be last, that just being in the game is enough.  Right, I'll totally OK.  God, I'm a hypocrite.  Get over it.  You're last, not a failure.  Very different things.  Psycho.  Whatever!  Maureen is totally going to lecture me about this.  I wonder what her time was?

Mile 12: OMG, how freakin long is this course?!?!?  A mile left, no problem.  I'm totally eating ice cream tonight.  You know, someone has to be last.  I guess it's OK to be last.  I'll finish.  It's OK.  Being last in this little race is fine.  Everyone gets a medal for doing it, hooray for shiny!  I wasn't going to be first anyway, so I didn't really lose anything. ("Lonnie" drives by again, plans to meet me at the finish).  I love my husband, he's so nice checking on me. 

Mile 13: A small cheering crowd is waiting at the finish. (Small tear runs down my face) Almost done!  Awww, "Lonnie" is going to walk the last bit with me, no, oh wait, he's chasing after one of the kids.  No prob, almost finished!!  Oh, I see an  ice pack!

"Lonnie" took first in his age group for the 10K race!   I'm so proud of him.  The doctor is sending me to a specialist, so I actually have no idea what's wrong with my knee, but I have my suspicions.  I ran some today with similar results, that being pain.  No problem though, I'm doing a 5K this weekend and looking at another half-marathon later next month.  I mean, at this point I know that I can walk one.  I also know that I can deal with being last if that happens again.  And who ever said that running wasn't good for you?! 

Make Someone's Day

There are many ways that a person can offer up a precious moment to another human, something that enlivens them, gives them hope or laughter. Ayla did that today for us by bending over at the waist, looking at us through her legs, wiggling her butt and screaming "look at my butt, look at my butt!!"  I would be truly concerned about her teenage years, if not for the fact that I made someone's day in a similar way today...and no, it wasn't "Lonnie."

So there I was, starting out a 15K race having to pee.  Not like I hadn't gone to the bathroom twice already that morning, but in the corrals with 16000 other runners, I have to pee again.  I start running, hoping that, like normal, the running will take away the need to pee.  Mile 2 comes around and I still need to go. It's all I can think about and Carly Rae Jepsen's tunes can't block out the big golden elephant in my mind. The wait at the port-o-johns was awful (and I didn't wait to kill my run time), so I pressed on.  We were running in downtown Atlanta, where there is an unfortunate lack of trees and parks, or stores open on Sunday.  Finally, at Mile 5 I see my chance.  We were running under a huge overpass supported by gigantic columns that ran down a hill and these were behind some big bushes.  Perfect!!!  I run off the road and behind a column, hidden from view of my fellow runners, I drop traugh where golden bliss awaits.  That's when I here the guy laughing.  In my haste to go unnoticed from the race, I failed to realized that the other side of the columns was a large railyard with a bunch of train workers and their equipment.  One dude was standing on top of a truck looking at me and laughing his ass off!  Like, holding his belly, bent over and laughing.  I jokingly yelled to him, "Don't put this on you tube" and finished my task.  Dude was still laughing and calling his friends over!  As I ran back on the course, the other runners realized what this guy had been laughing at and I received that comment, "Looks like you made that guy's day."  Well, glad I could help.

And now I have really no excuse when "Lonnie" points to Ayla, who is still presenting her butt to us, and then back at me and says, "Gee, I wonder where she gets it from?"  However, at least I can say I made someone's day golden.

This was Mile 7, all better now

Lets shop for tornadoes

We survived the holidays. Not like there was any thing to prepare to survive, I mean, we don't have any crazy relatives and we didn't go anywhere near an airport. So technically, we didn't really have any thing to stress over.  Minus the projectile vomiting... and the evacuation from camp on Christmas day...oh, and the fact that I'm trying to finish learning Gaelic by tomorrow.  OK, so it wasn't a stress free 2 weeks.  On top of that, any time spent in a vehicle with our children eventually devolves into Lonnie or I yelling, "STOP touching (insert name)" and/or "for the love of god, be quiet!"

It started with Orion performing the spray puke maneuver in the middle of a drive through a beautifully lit park. Not some little park, but one that had thousands (really) of cars driving through bumper-to-bumper to view the spectacle. We were luckily right by the park facilities when trouble spewed, ha ha. No papertowls in the bathroom, the truck was out of napkins, so we had to finish the long evening with a half naked child sitting in a puke-soaked car seat. That fruitcake is looking pretty good right now, isn't it? 3 days later on our midnight return to Alabama, Kai got out for a potty break and yakked all over, but at least in a toilet. We now carry prescription strength anti-nausea drugs in the truck. And a bucket.

One cute story... we were in an old Department store in Columbia, SC, when Ayla spotted a tall, heavyset, white-bearded man in overalls. He looked just like Santa on his day off, so when Ayla screamed out at the top of her lungs "Santa", forcing everyone in the store to turn and look, the man had the poise to play along. It was totally cute and my new favorite holiday moment. Speaking of stores, the kids have a new favorite game called "go shopping with mommy."  Its pretty bad when we merely drive by a store they know and Ayla starts screaming "SHOPPING!"


Ayla with her mini Starbucks cocoa

Anyway, we were back less than 24 hours, having a lazy holiday involving me being more excited about the Disney parade then the kids, when the Force Support commander knocked on our door to let us know about the tornados. There was blue sky. It had rained hard all morning and was apparently going to get worse that night.  We had the stellar option of going to the on-base warehouse evacuation site.  Yes, 3 little kids sleeping in an open bay on cots.  Nothing could POSSIBLY go wrong.  So we packed our things and crashed at one of my flight-mate's homes (thanks Marchands!). We even did shelter time because a storm did come and tornados were spotted. 4 kids, 4 adults, and 2 large dogs in the laundry room shelter for almost an hour! Thank heavens for smart phones and reflective belts, both are excellent sources of entertainment!


Tod and Baird shelter-in-place smartphone style

Having survived the tornadoes, we spent pre-New Years in Chattanooga with no puking!  Only battlefields, history, a bit of snow and quality time with my friend Evie.  Kai spent the time practicing his new catchphrase, "god damn it", which reminds me that I shouldn't swear so often, or at least not as loud.  It was so much fun that I didn't get nearly as much Gaelic learned as I planned and now I'm trying to fit in 2 weeks of material in 4 days.  I will fail and be totally OK with it.  Well, a little OK. I'm spending every spare moment working on Gaelic and all I can remember with certainty is "thank you".  I can't spell or pronounce anything else.  Why didn't I choose another language, like Arabic...oh, I know, because it doesn't use letters!  Ugh.  If I could only learn all the Gaelic swear words I be succeeding in two areas and the kids would all be bilingual!


On to the new year and the second semester of school.  New adventures in the trailer await. We might even try that nude RV park...Nollaig Shona ya'll!