lucky duck

Wednesday night after my yoga class I got into a discussion with two other women about distance running. One regularly runs half marathons and the other is training for her first real distance race, a full marathon. I asked the new marathoner how she was feeling about her training, preparations, etc. She talked about how she really loved running but thought that this would probably be her only marathon because of the time it takes to train. The other woman agreed and they continued to talk about how their work schedules and trying to spend time with their kids outside of work made training difficult and feel like an indulgence they couldn't always justify. And I felt like a schmuck. Lately I have been doing 90-120 min workouts six days a week plus a long run that takes at least that long. I secretly thought it was just a sign that my commitment was greater than that of others that I was able to this. In many cases that simply isn't true. See I have the most flexible of schedules. I am home. Sometimes I sew for other people but I have complete control over how often and how much and if I don't do it at all for a while, nothing bad happens. I can take my kids to the gym at 2 in the afternoon if I sleep in one morning. My husband completely works around my schedule. If I want to go at 5 in the morning, great, he'll run later. If I sleep in , he gets up and goes. It's always my choice. When my long runs get really long I often hire babysitters so that I don't have to do them on the weekend when I 'd rather be doing fun things with my little family. I don't even think about it. I take it completely for granted. Now I am thinking about it and I think I need to thank my husband. His schedule is much more rigid and unforgiving than mine but he has chosen to give me precedence in this because it's important to me and up until now I have given him little or no credit. Thank you, sweetheart, it really means the world to me.This is better and more important to me right now than any other gift you could give me and I truly appreciate the sacrifices that you make to give me these opportunities. I feel truly loved. The end.