The Calm Before the HM

Funny about the best-laid plans. And the Road to He**, and all those quaint expressions about plans that went awry. But I'm calm. Mostly.

As Fate would have it, Tuesday's "Penultimate" run before Sunday's HM became the "Final" run before Sunday's HM. Was it the grades being due, the paper to write then present, the callback audition, the extracurricular fundraiser before & after school, or the headcold I've been battling all week that prevented Thursday's final run before the HM?

No, HA! None of that stood between our heroine, Wannabe, and her final 30 minute easy training run yesterday. Nope. It was 6pm last night, finally home from work & school that Son #1 said, "I don't feel so good." Oh no, the dreaded had come true: the second of my two children had fallen prey to the stomach virus, the poor thing. And then I realized that I hadn't eaten much of my lunch and was not terribly hungry for any dinner, either. Got the boy settled in, ran to school to prepare for sub tomorrow since I was sure I was next in line. It passed me by, but I still stayed home today with Son #1 (it was my turn to take care of a sick kid this week) -- post-virus for him, and nursing my own headcold.

And in the quiet of today's sick day, I remembered I had a dream last night...

I was running the HM! A sea of people were around me, we were running, and I had the feeling I was late, that I had missed the start! But I ducked into some sort of windowed tunnel along the route, took an elevator down to a bunch of TV screens, and was told by someone that no, I was in the right place, but the HM is tomorrow, not to worry. I took the elevator back up to the route with the sea of people and joined them running--and the amazing thing was the route was all downhill. I was running/floating with the sea of people effortlessly down the hill.

That is all I can remember. So what does it all mean...?

Here is how I am choosing to interpret it: I did not get in all of the last two weeks' midweek runs. My health is not 100%. But I have run this distance two times in the last five weeks, and lived to tell about it. Life happens, what's done is done. And given where I was this time last year (um, on the couch), and all I could not do back then (like, um, jog more than 60 seconds), the Penguin's addage gives me solace on Race Eve eve : "The miracle is that I had the courage to start." Like I did in my dream, I have to just go with the flow of people to where it leads, and trust in the miles I *have* run. And that is 163 miles this year. That is the distance from NY to Philadelphia and halfway back! Wowzer!

Thank you RBF-folk, for inspiring me to go from nothing, square one, to this weekend. Thank you for 10 months of encouragement and expertise, for pushing me and for patting me on the back, too. No matter how it plays out, see you on the other side. :-)