One sure fire way to make me cry is to show me someone doing something that is hard for them and succeeding. Automatically, I will well up and have to contain myself from spilling over. I think I would call the emotion triumph, but that doesn't seem to do it justice. (I guess any emotion that is deeply personal is hard to label).
So, no wonder that I was on the brink of tears most the day this past Sunday. I ran in a marathon...well...sort of. A team marathon!, and I ran the shortest leg - the 5K. Gooooooo me! But no matter the details, it felt triumphant for me. I have had pretty tough couple of months physically and emotionally, so my goal of a mere 5K felt like a mile marker of a new beginning and was just about right for pushing myself without being a lunatic.
Mind you, there were lunatics there: as in everyone that ran the full marathon and they made me cry too. But I felt the undefinable feeling when my husband finished his 10K in a time he wanted to, (he swears he had run more than a mile before I knew him, but I don't think so), and my friend who ran with us literally at the last minute because one of our teammates had to drop out and ran her little booty off, and the father that I saw carrying his teenage daughter on his back so that they could finish the 1/2 marathon together. Triumph can be huge and it can be small; it can be public and it can be private; loud and quiet; and somewhere in between it all.
Next year, I hope I can run the long leg of the relay, like I planned to this year. Or the half-marathon...(but not the full - that is for lunatics and we have already established that I am not THAT type of lunatic). Even so, or regardless, I pray to be thankful for whatever triumph I have the privilege to experience. Race or no race.
No comments:
Post a Comment