That Extra Push

Few things are sad as a dying dream.

It's a fading star.

A slowly detuning violin.

A comedian who gets a soft smile, but never a laugh.

It's the reality that reality is reality.

I signed up for the Prairie State Half-Marathon 10 weeks ago. I was spitting into my own face. "Future disciplined" me was hocking a giant loogie at "I don't have to work hard for anything, and you can't make me" me. I trained pretty well for 8 weeks. I should have been active 6 days a week according to my schedule, but I'd usually get 3 or 4, just enough to keep me on track, and still more than I'd ever done.

10 days ago, as I was still making an effort to get off work for the day of the race, I found the task near impossible, and still have found it such. My manager's wedding is the same day, so many of the staff is already gone, and there isn't any love left to go around.

As you can imagine, this took the wind out of my sails rather quickly. I am a goal-oriented person, so not working toward this date ruined the experience for me. I dropped into physical exercise depression. I ran once last week, and not at all this past week. Someone wedged a proverbial block under the tires of my motivation, and I parked.

The thing is, I know who it was. It was "I don't have to work hard for anything, and you can't make me" me. It was the same me I spit at and left in my 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8-mile dust. When I slowed down, that me caught up and kicked my foot, sending me into a groundward spiral I am reluctant to rise from.

"Well, the point is to learn discipline, and I learned a lot."

"I've actually taken on a lot of responsibility since, so I think the purpose was achieved."

"I don't actually have to go the whole way, the point was the journey, and I've learned some good lessons, even if I don't run 13.1 miles."

Excuse.

Excuse.

Excuse.

It's amazing what I will tell myself so I don't feel like a loser. I'm still a winner; I just won in my own special creative way! I have instated my own No Child Left Behind Act. The problem is the child moves ahead, but the man never emerges. The act is rightly named.

But stars can shine brighter.

Violins can be retuned.

Comedians can be redeemed.

Last night I told my 2-weeks estranged running partner I couldn't run the race. I wasn't happy to say it, but I had resigned myself to the situation. She listened. Good friends always listen.

The other thing good friends do is remind you. They walk you back to the starting line, because they were there, too. They show you why you signed up for a thing in the first place, and they lovingly and firmly say, "You're not quitting." And when it's a good friend, you listen, because they tell you the things that "Future Disciplined" you said months ago. And those words still ring true, and that desire is still there. And sitting on the trail at the 8-mile marker thinking, "Boy, I sure have learned a great lesson!" isn't nearly good enough.

No, it's not good enough. And it's not who I am, nor is it who I want to be.

She told me even if I don't run 13.1 on October 9, I still have to do it. And she even said she'd run it with me. That's a good friend. The kind that are hard to find, for sure. Jesus said, "If someone asks you to go one mile with them, go with them 13.1," or something like that.

So, the wind is slowly billowing my sails. It's not like I'm super excited yet. Newton's first law of motion is as true in exercise and life as it is in physics. "An object at rest stays at rest until..."

But, just as true, once it gets going, it's hard to slow down.