Before the big day

As I sit in the Columbus airport I realize that my dream is coming a reality. I look around and see some familiar faces....runners! We all look alike in a way! Wearing our favorite race gear, tennis shoes on and all drinking bottles of water. We smile at each other with delight as we realize all our hard work, sweat and tears are for this very moment..race weekend. 

You will never understand this moment if you never raced... Well maybe that isn't totally the truth.  I am sure this moment happens for brides on their wedding day or for an event that you put your heart and soul in....I would have to think that is feels close to the same way runners feel. 

The jitters are kicking in and you look back on all those months in panic....did You do everything right? Did You put in the correct time and work in all the training/planning?  One will only  know if the plan worked when they cross that finish line, leave the wedding and have that award they hoped would come from the event. 

This moment is really why I love racing so much. It all comes together like the final chapter in a story  book. Still unsure about the ending but so close that you feel you might know the final line in the chapter....that she finished with a smile and lived happily ever after with sore muscles but a heart full of complete joy. 

I been told by several friends that I should really slow down and let my body rest.  That if I keep this pace up I will either get injured or that I will burn myself out. A friend told me that he feels that I will fall out of love for this passion that has literally become who I am. Maybe he is right, maybe they are all right?

Maybe I do need to slow down and work on other areas of my life I keep pushing aside. I just don't know how to hang up the one thing in my life I feel I have complete control over.  The past two years I been living for these race weekend moments....it's the one thing that brings me complete joy and happiness in my life. 

So this weekend is not just going to be the best moment of my life but it will be a time for me to discover what am I really running from in my life. Why do I always need to look for the next race, when I haven't even reached the finish line in this race? I hope to figured this out and can come to peace with whatever I am running from or even if I am running from something at all?

As I sit on the plane and wait to land. I eye the other runners wondering if they too are running from something in their lives or are they like me endurance junkies who need moments like this to feel complete? 

What I do know is that the runners surrounding me all want the same ending in their book. They all want to have a picture of a happy healthy finisher, they all want those medals and they all want their own happily ever after ending. 

I am positive that this will not be the end of my series of race books.  I have  so much more I want to do, so much more I want to discover and mostly I just want more moments like this....when I feel that I can do anything and that every mission I set out to do is possible!  These moments make me believe that I have complete control of who I want to be....and that simply is to be amazing!