A new Long.

There was much apprehension in approaching my Saturday morning. Perhaps through divine intervention, I had zero luck scrounging up anyone to commit to running all or any of my sixteen mile training run with me. I couldn’t exactly blame them—the furthest I’ve ever run is a half marathon, so the idea of running sixteen miles seemed impossible. As far as my experience was concerned, it was impossible! So there were some negative thoughts running through my head the night before. 

I think my children had an inkling of what was to come, because they decided going to bed early was not on their list of things to do Friday night. Instead, they (both the six month old and the two year old) stayed up until 11 despite our best efforts. The husband also was struggling with some work related issues, so we were up late processing. By the time sleep was even an option, the 5 a.m. alarm seemed comical with its absurdity. Instead, with very little convincing from the husband, it was decided my “alarm” would be when the six month old woke up for the day. 

That alarm wasn’t too terribly late—6:20—but then after pumping, grabbing something to eat, and then heading out to Olathe Lake, it was 7:30 and already 75 degrees. My initial plan had me running until about 8, when it was supposed to have warmed up to a maximum of 74 degrees. I could tell this was going to be a hot one. 

The husband was kind enough to ride the course with the kids in the bike trailer going in the opposite direction, which meant we met each other 2-3 times per lap. That was enough to get me water without me having to wear a belt, which was eight shades of delightful as I had given into temptation and consumed a Fiber One bar at 10:30 the night before (darn you, Oats and Chocolate! Gets me EVERY TIME).

The course was hilly. The training plan said to go 60-90 seconds over goal pace, which put me at 9:30-10:00 per mile. With all the hills, and having not done that distance before, I was feeling concerned about maintaining that pace. When I hit 12 miles, though, and felt awesome, I had the following conversation in my head:

Self: Hey, remember when you first bought running shoes from a running store, and the guy said not to go out and run 20 miles the next day in them?

Me: Yeah. I laughed because I NEVER thought I would run 20 miles at once. Ever.

Self: Well, you’re feeling pretty good. Really good. Maybe today is the day. Just do an extra lap on this four mile loop. No big deal.

Me: Yeah! No big deal! How great would that be?

It was runner’s euphoria. In my previous half marathons, it was at this point where I had to convince my legs to keep moving. For some odd reason, though, my lungs felt great, my calves felt even better, and my quads were just a touch sore. 

The conversation I had just two miles later on a steep uphill was drastically different. 

Me: This is STUPID. Who on earth would ever CHOOSE to run UP A HILL?

Self: Why is it even legal for them to make roads on hills? That’s the real injustice. Someone should be impeached.

Me: I. HATE. HILLS.

Self: “Sadism” is probably in the job description.

It was all I could do to make it the last two miles. And even with the stupid, stupid hills, I managed an average 9:59 pace. Just barely within the training requirement, but by golly, I’ll take “just barely.”

Bottlenecking traffic for this abdominal car wreck

I live in Kansas. For those of you who are unaware, it's frakkin hot in Kansas right now. So hot that running outside is enough to make you cry, and that's when you get up at 6 a.m. Going running later results in the desire to cry, but self preservation prevents you from actually doing so as any additional loss of liquids will quickly result in your demise.

That was the feeling today on my 6 mile training run (2-3-1). The only thing that got me out the door was knowing that tomorrow is a rest day, and switching days to do this training run before my 16 mile run on Saturday seemed like a poor idea. It also seemed like a less than stellar idea to not go much earlier in the day, but my six month old decided midnight was as good of a time as any to go to bed, which was an awesome 4 hours later than he is usually asleep.

It's silly to even consider snoozing. I turned that alarm off when we hit 11:30 and I was still nursing and bouncing on that ridiculous pilates ball.

So at 9 a.m., I was out the door with the double jogger. Both kids were rocking the only-diaper look, because their mother's inability to wake up early is no reason to make them swelter unnecessarily. Fortunately my children were blessed with freakishly good looks, so many people are able to look past the white-trashiness of only wearing a diaper and see only the adorable they use to manipulate strangers into giving them things. I, on the other hand, had a sleeveless tank and shorts, thinking the lack of four inches of material on either arm would be enough.

In case you were wondering, that's a little bit of foreshadowing.

Two miles into the run, I had to turn it up a bit to get the three miles of goal pace +30-60 seconds. I'm hoping to run an 8:30 pace for my first marathon this fall, and pushing the double jogger at 9-9:30 pace usually isn't a huge deal. I had been feeling pretty good the first two miles, and actually had to tell myself to slow down a bit because I would look at the Garmin and see I was doing a sub 9 minute for a warm up. As usual, when I get cocky and prideful, something happens:

God laughs.

Just as I started my three mile stretch, the temperature seemed to climb ten degrees. The sun beat down like a psychotic oversized bird pecking at breakfast, and my perceived effort resulted in a pace that would have been shameful for even a warmup.

The mental game started. To go home? To do only four today? The kids were both napping, though, so that would have been a waste of a rare opportunity-- and entire run without a child screaming. I eyed my water bottles. The insulated one still had plenty of ice, and the other was already in the gross-warm range. I could use some of the cold water to douse my head and hope for the best, but that would be a waste of perfectly good hydration.

There was really only one option if I wanted to continue running this morning.

Off went the running top.

For this formerly eating disordered individual who has always identified the abdominal region as a problem area, this was a monstrous deal. Add to that the racing stripes my second child added with his 9 lb 2 oz at birth self and the Scottish heritage that results in any skin not regularly exposed to sunlight appearing fluorescent, this event can almost be deemed black-and-white-tabloid-in-the-grocery-store-checkout worthy.

It would be fantastic to say that once the top went off, I finished my three mile stretch almost effortlessly, glancing down at my Garmin to see I'd rocked a 7:15 pace the entire time. Truth is, though, the top went off, and I still had to talk myself into exerting myself to get to the 9:00 mark.

But I lived to blog about it. And to me, that's a pretty big deal.

Stupid heat.

There she goes.

Lately, it seems there have been a lot of "parties" amongst my group of friends. Individuals send out cute invitations to gatherings focused on various products designed to make your life awesome. Through some confusion amongst said group of friends, I received a phone call.

"Hey, Katie. I heard you were selling <insert product here>, and I totally want you to come over and do a party at my house! When can you do it?"

I laughed. The product she was asking about was something I'd never heard of before and knew nothing about. As tactfully as I could, I explained that there had been some misunderstanding, to which she responded with:

"Oh. Well, you'd be really good at it. I heard <So and So> was going to start selling it, but when I heard your name, I thought, I want her!"

Flattery will get you everywhere.

After the phone was hung up, however, I started to think. We're certainly not wealthy. The husband is working at a women's shelter making very little, and I'm staying home with two kids. The plans are to have even more kids as they come, and the husband will be starting graduate school. Perhaps I should consider getting on board with one of these life awesomers to make some extra money.

Truth is, though-- I don't have the passion for anything but* being healthy.

So instead, I'm starting this blog.

Hopefully my life awesomer can inspire your life awesomer.

*This excludes my freakishly adorable kids and my too hot to handle husband... because blogging about them would be boring to everyone else. This is me being optimistic that this blog will be different/not boring.