ING Marathon: Mile 20 Girl

I woke up bright and early Sunday to cheer on a few friends and running buddies who were running in the ING Marathon and 1/2 Marathon. To my delight, mile 20 of the marathon was set up right in front of my apartment! I was excited the way I imagine I would be excited if a parade was going by my house. I just love running! After cheering at mile 8 for my friends running the 1/2 (go Jessy, Duffy, Amy, and Laurie!), I headed back to my mile marker at home and cheered on the runners who were crossing the 20 mile mark. Yes I sat on the steps and cheered for absolute strangers; Yes it was cold; Yes I probably looked like a dork (and fun to tease; thanks guys)! At first I did kinda feel silly cheering for people I didn't know, but then runners started to smile and cheer and say, "Thank you for being here!" The longer I sat there, the more I realized how important it was for me to be sitting there, cheering with a combination of phrases like, "looking strong," "looking good," "almost there," "on the home stretch now," "dig deep," "hang in there," "Yay Mile 20!" "Good Job!" "You got this," and "Woohoo!" Ok, so maybe Emerson and the guys enjoyed cheering on my single-handed job of cheering on runners, maybe I did look silly hanging out by myself, but I don't care. I know how much that cheering means to a runner, even if they have no idea who I am, and for that reason and a love of the sport, I cheered, and cheered, and cheered, and cheered, foolish looking or not. And, afterwards, about 2 hours or so afterwards, I went inside and drank another nice, hot, toasty, cup of coffee and realized all that clapping and cheering had broken the skin on my hands. I had no idea at the time my skin was starting to crack. But now, its incredibly painful and nearly impossible to wash my hands. However, I am fairly certain that the pain in my hands is minimal to the pain those runners I cheered on are feelings now. Strangely, the cracks are motivating. They remind me of the struggle of those other runners and inspire me to push through fatigue and keep running when what I really want to do is not run another step. Somehow if they could find the mental and physical discipline to run pass my 20 mile marker, then I can find the discipline to run pass a 6, 7 or 8 mile marker! So now I add a giant "Thank you" to all the "Woohoo's." Thank you for running and inspiring me to run. You all are my real-life heros!