Our Marathon Weekend

I should let you know right off the bat here that I am not speaking metaphorically when I say it was a marathon weekend.  Yes it was busy, and we were tired, and sweaty.  We ate bananas and drank lots of fluid.  But T also ran a marathon.  A real one.  It was his life altering first marathon.  I am sure this will not be his last.  I am resigned to being a marathon widow proudly cheering from the sidelines with my muffin top.

Speaking of my muffin top, yesterday in church my 11 yr old son was side punching me (not hard) just above my waistline where my pantyhose end and, you know, the muffin begins.  I asked him if he was trying to flatten that part of me down by punching.  Because I had tried that before and it won't stay.  He smiled and said "Mom, you've had five babies.  You still look pretty good for all your body has done for you."  What pearls of wisdom from Little Boy.  I know I spend too much time worrying over this matter.  I should just relax and be glad for the body I have.  Not relax so much that I let my body get more out of shape mind you.  But not try to be the same size I was at 20 either.  Work out to feel good and be healthy.  Remind myself about the babies and the reason I look like this.  The babies, and the ice-cream.  I would totally eat it all over again.  The ice cream, not the babies.

On to our marathon day now.  It was the Baltimore marathon and there were something like 23,000 people running that day.  Either in relays or half marathons or full marathons.  We got there later than I wanted to due to a series of unfortunate events.  I clearly stated at breakfast that I wanted us to be out the door at 9:30.  Giving us 30 minutes to get dressed.  In 30 minutes 6 independent people should manage to put on a shirt and pants right?  At 10 minutes until we needed to be out the door I yelled to the masses "Leaving in ten!"  Go figure that my oldest was still up in the playroom on the computer messing with his ipod, still in his PJs.  Don't think I didn't have a few words with him.  Especially because when he had asked before if we could search for an application online I had told him "no, not this morning."  We managed to get out the door close to my goal and then I looked at my gas tank.  It was almost on empty!  I was going to have to stop for gas.  Big Girl was the one who announced in the car that I had passed the gas station.  More time lost turning around.  I was filling up the tank and in my haste to get going I pulled out the hose upon hearing the click without looking at the screen to see if it had really stopped.  It must have been my neighbor's click because I was now spilling gasoline out all over the ground, on the side of the van, my shoes and pants.  I was so mad at myself for doing this!  I reeked of gas.  I had to go back home and change.  There was no way I was going to stand in the crowds smelling like that.  Of course, looking back, maybe it would have cleared us some room to get to the front.

I was so stressed out during the whole 45 minute drive from there.  I kept telling the kids not to speak to me.  I get that way when I am stressed- irritable.  We somehow managed to get a great parking spot due to intense praying and we were at the sidelines waiting for him to cross about 30 minutes before his goal time.  But the spot we were in was actually after the finish line and I wasn't pleased with how far away we were.  So even though it was no small feat I managed to move all of us (with a stroller) to a better spot and we played the waiting game.  We waited for the people in front of us to see their person go by and we used our pushy skills we picked up in the crowed city streets of Seoul to mush our way to the front.  I had Baby Girl on my shoulders and she was frankly being a pill.  She required so much of my attention that I handed the camera over to Big Boy and gave him a quick camera lesson on our new Nikkon D90.  I still worried about this move and told him to take lots of practice shots.  In retrospect I should have given the camera to Middle Boy who is my most observant kid.  He should be a detective one day because he can spot a hair out of place when he enters a room.  And indeed just as predicted, Big Boy got plenty photos of this guy....

Shirtless Cowboy whooping it up for the crowd

And this is the kind of photo we got of T a few seconds after Middle Boy mentioned that his Dad just ran by.  Nice~  

He is way up there in all black just between the white tank girl and the maroon shirted older guy.

I am just so proud of him that words cannot tell.  And as he limped his way back to the car I couldn't help but think that there will definitely be a next time.