I’m sure everyone has heard of the seven deadly sins.  Well, this week there were five for me: Envy, Fear, Jealousy, Gluttony and Pride.  I’d be being a bit dramatic to say they were deadly, though some felt that way at times.  If you are at all impressed by the numbers in the photo above, so am I.  No, I’m not tooting my own horn, those aren’t my numbers.  To get the full story, we have to go back a bit.  Not too far, just a few weeks ago.

Darin asked if I heard about the Vista View 360 Ultra Marathon.  My response was something like “yeah, I got that email, why?”    He told me he was thinking about signing up for it.  I probably looked at him like he had three heads because I wear my reactions right on my face.  He chuckled and I told him I didn’t pay much attention to the details.  He filled me in.  You can either do a relay with three other people, or just run as many laps you can as a single runner within the six hours allotted.  Wow.  Six hours, ok.  I was a bit taken back, but he is so supportive of me and never blinks twice when I blurt out that I am doing race, how could I not support him?  Ok, go for it.  Sign up!  I say.  I reminded him a couple times and he went on my training runs with me but still was undecided.  Then one day, he just signed up.

Guess we will start with Envy.  I was totally envious of his willingness to jump in and sign up.  I immediately wanted to sign up too.  I am the runner in the family after all, right?  No, this was his thing.  I don’t want to sign up and then make it about me, I have enough races.  He was so excited.  We talked about how he would fuel, what he would bring and wear and about how many miles he might do.  His longest training run was ten miles at this time.  Ten.  He talked about how cool it would be to hit a half marathon.  Then, after a few training runs and seeing his time, he talked about how cool it would be if he got close to a full marathon distance.  Or even maybe a 50k!  I envy how he can think positive “what if’s.”  All my what if scenarios usually involve my death by drowning or bike crash.

Saturday we decided to go for a bike ride.  Darin asked where I wanted to ride to and I suggested the greenway.  Greenway = safer than the streets and no major turns (sad, I know).  He tells me that the greenway on the other side of Oakland had just  been repaved and now goes through to Welleby park.    While I was referring to the safe greenway that required no major intersections, he was being adventurous, as usual.  I agreed and we headed off.  Adventure is good.  As per usual for me, fear sets in while I ride.  I’m not sure exactly what my fear is.  Eating it in the street is probably the top one.  See, I don’t have the best balance and I have not been out riding much.  Most of my work has been on the trainer building fitness more than function.  At least I tell myself that.  I thought I was safe when we got into Welleby but I was wrong.  The path was full of little tight turns, hills and narrow spots to make a chicken like me cringe.  My new cleats were not helping the matter and I had a few close calls with not being able to clip in or out in time.  The whole time he kept encouraging me.  I explained to him that I didn’t think he could relate to how hard it is to do something while the whole time you are afraid.  He doesn’t know what that’s like, he has no fear when it comes to that kind of thing.

Our next stop is jealousy.  I’m totally jealous of him!  He is good at everything, without trying mind you.  I train six days a week.  He trains six days total before running a near marathon!  I am exaggerating a little in the fact that he may have trained more than six days, but not by much.  He has the balance of a trapeze artist on the bike, and just jumps into any challenge without flinching.  He literally has no fear.  I was totally jealous that of the two of us, he would run more than a half marathon first and  I was totally jealous that he was participating in this race and I wasn’t.  I’m jealous that he can think and speak positively of himself without looking like a smug jerk and I am jealous that he’s made of magic.

Needless to say, he did an amazing job.  I’ll get to pride in a moment but first, let’s fast forward to gluttony.  After a big race, I always treat myself to a little naughty food.  For me, I crave eggs, bacon, hash browns and a big ol’ stack of pancakes.  Then again, my races usually end sometime in the morning.  After we were home and showered, I asked what he wanted for lunch.  He chose Ale House, for a zinger mountain melt.  Rightfully so, he just ran a near freaking marathon.  In case you don’t know what a zinger mountain melt is, picture a big plate covered in french fries.  Now cover those fries in cheese and bacon crumbles.  Now cover that in like five chicken tenders covered in hot sauce.  Put a side of blue cheese dressing on the plate and you have a zinger mountain melt.  It’s what dreams and diabetes are made of.  Yeah, I had one too.   Nice to meet you, gluttony.

While I may envy him and be jealous of him, I am so proud of him.  Today, he ran for six hours, he covered more than twenty five miles.  I would not have been nearly as successful.  That course was hard, probably the hardest I have seen in local races.  I am usually thankful for Florida’s flat terrain, but not at Vista View.  This was a trail run through mulch and gravel and chunked up grass.  This was no flat, out and back.  This was the same scenery lap after one and a quarter mile lap.  This was a hell of a run.  He was in pain and he was tired, but he never really complained.  He was exhausted and I am sure wanted to quit on more than one occasion but he didn’t.   He could have easily been grumpy, like I have been sometimes, but he wasn’t.  He smiled at us, and thanked us for being there for him lap after lap.  He was and is amazing and I could not be more proud of him.

Some of these “sins” of mine, I plan to avoid in the future.  That mountain melt is not something I ever hope to eat again.  There will be envy, there will be jealousy and unfortunately there will be fear.  I will work to accept the fear, maybe one day conquer it.  I am grateful for the opportunity to pay him back for the support he so readily gives me and the pride I felt when he crossed that finish line is something I welcome again and again.