30 in 30 No. 13 - 1/2 Marathon

In 30 days I will be turning 30. I’m actually really excited about turning 30 and I’ve decided to enter into this transition intentionally. For the next 30 days I will be writing a blog a day about an event, person, experience that has had a significant impact on the woman that I am today and who I am becoming

I had this crazy idea in early of 2006 that I wanted to run a half-marathon. I mentioned it to Danielle and she immediately said that she wanted to do it with me. On the last day to register for the race, I called Danielle to see if she was serious and apparently she was. So, we signed up. Ok, I’ll be honest… I HATED paying money to run! It was like paying to get my left hand cut off! And really, the reason that I signed up was because I didn’t believe that I could do it, but I wanted to challenge myself.

The race was at the end of June and for anyone who works at a college, you know that the 2^nd busiest time of the year (the first being right now) is the end of spring term. Not a very convenient time for training. Long story short, I ran 4 miles a couple of times a week and then about a week before I ran about 7 miles. I had NEVER in my life run more than 7 miles and I was about to run 13.2!

As Danielle and I drove out to Sunriver, I was so preoccupied with the doom that lied ahead of me. I was sure I was going to die. When we arrived, we stayed with my dear Sarah’s precious mother. She took excellent care of us. Fed us a PERFECT breakfast and sent us on our dreaded way.

Danielle and I had never run together. But when we decided to run it together, I decided not to bring my ipod. We ran the 1^st 3 miles or so together and I thought that I was going to die. We quickly discovered that Danielle’s pace is much faster than mine. So about 3 miles in I told her to go ahead. Funny story: do you remember Nacho Libre? If so, you may remember the scene where Jack Black says “when you are a man you wear streatchy pants… is for fun.” Well, Danielle was wearing some stretchy pants and we had been talking about them in Jack Black’s accent for days. After Danielle ran ahead (since I didn’t have any music to occupy my mind, the words replaying over and over in my head were “don’t lose sight of the streatchy pants.” And then when she was out of my sight, “I lost sight of the streatchy pants.” It was very annoying.

When I finished the race, I crossed the finish line and saw Danielle. I remember crying and saying “I didn’t think I could do it!” There were so many times that I just wanted to quit. I played out every possible scenario in my mind, getting lost, faking and injury... etc. But, I kept going. I CHOSE to keep going even though it sucked!! I don’t challenge myself enough, but that day (and then a year later when we did it again) I challenged myself to accomplish something that I didn’t think I was able to do. It makes me wonder what else I don’t think I can do.