Sneakers and Wine

On Thursday morning, I ran a Thanksgiving road race in my town.  It is one of those races I run each year just for the fun and energy it gives to me when I show up.  I love the tradition of starting Thanksgiving morning with a number of my friends and spending five miles worth of strides being thankful.  In all honesty, on this particular course, with it’s gentle inclines and beautiful coastal scenery, it is more difficult to not be thankful.   For this race, I have my own tradition of picking up race bibs for my friends and delivering them the night before the race.  I have been doing it for years and I really enjoy it.  It’s a little thing I do that really seems to be appreciated and being able to help in just a small way, the friends in my life whom have helped me  so much, even new friends, it’s my way of demonstrating my gratitude for the friendships and blessings of my life. In the past five years, Thanksgiving has proved to be a ...

Yesterday I ran one of my favorite 5K races.  It falls on my birthday weekend every year and I’ve found it’s a great way to begin the process of mentally reviewing the progress and growth of the past year.  It’s my baseline, my starting point since I have run this race every year since my divorce.  And I always discover, in some way, that my life again has shifted forward.    I love the way things like birthdays and end of year holidays often cause us to reflect, glance, not stare,  in our rearview to see where we came from while we continue forward.  And today when I glanced in mine, all those ugly, broken, painful,  moments were gone. At least the ugliness of those moments were gone because I realized that every single moment, every challenging hill to climb brought me to where I am right now, making me who I am and without all of it, I would not be who and how I am today.   For years I felt I had been handed a very unfair...