Free to Breathe
I ran the Free to Breathe 5k fun run on Saturday morning. This was a different sort of run for me, for several reasons. Stephanie and I were on the event committee, and helped to organize some of the race day activities. I say "we", but really, she gets credit for everything from the "we" unit. She got people to donate money and various items for the race and for a silent auction. She donated her time throughout the past several months and this morning. She worked pretty hard to help make the event a success. Thank you so much to anyone who helped donate a bit of money or a bit of their time!
We got involved initially because Stephanie's cousin and her husband were the local event chairs. We both also had more personal connections to the cause - the Free to Breathe organization's goal is to raise awareness of and funding for lung cancer research. My connection is my Dad. I ran yesterday in memory of him.
I thought a lot about what that meant to me in the weeks and months leading up to the race. What does it mean to run in his memory? He definitely wouldn't have wanted me out there getting all teary-eyed and sentimental. Do I go run as fast as I can, and try to PR? Do I go for a casual run and enjoy the scenery? Which one would my Dad have wanted me to do? Neither choice seemed to spring out as the "right" one. He'd have been proud of me in either case, as long as I was having a good time. He was cool like that.
So I thought some more about it, and finally I found the answer. Our family was really important to my Dad. We spent a lot of time doing things together, especially in the summertime out at the lake. Dad would take us fishing, or tow us around the lake behind the boat for hours on end, until the boat was almost out of gas. Then we'd just go get some more gas and do it again (I can only remember one time we had to row it in). He really loved doing stuff with us. It wasn't some kind of obligation - he simply loved his kids and enjoyed spending time with us. I never really "knew" that when I was a kid. It was just always there - one of those things you take for granted. But between hindsight, all the stories I've heard about him in the years since he passed away, and how I see my own kids, it is obvious to me now. And so I thought a good way to remember my Dad would be to bring my kids along for the run in the jogging stroller - at least, if they wanted to.
On Thursday night, I asked them each to see what they thought. The response was typical kidcitement - from Penelope, I got "Yay! Will you push us fast?!?". From Ben, it was "Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!" and some jumping up and down. So it was settled then. I pumped up the tires and packed the stroller on Friday night.
Saturday morning, the first order of business was to get everyone fed, dressed in warm clothes and into the car. I had the easy job. Stephanie was already at the race helping set things up by the time the kids (and I) woke up. After we got ready we drove out to Lakeway to pick up a buttload of donated doughnuts (one "buttload" = 120 doughnuts), and headed up to Old Settler's Park in Round Rock. It was a fairly long drive for my two kids at 7AM, but they didn't seem to mind. We kept occupied mostly by singing Sesame Street tunes, even though the music was turned off. We talked a bit about me running with them in the stroller too - they were still excited.
We got there about 40 minutes before the run, delivered the doughnuts and found Stephanie. At that point, Penelope decided that a stroller run was not high on her prioirity list - she wanted to hang out with (hang onto?) Mommy. Ben was still game though. We ran around a bit as a small "warmup", and he was loving it. Then it was time for the Kid's dash. Ben got second place! (out of two). The winner was his newly-rediscovered friend, Max. When it was time for the "adult" race (as he started calling it after he heard there was a kid's race) Ben was torn. He kind of wanted to go in the stroller, but *really* wanted to go play on the playground with Max. I looked around. There weren't any other people with strollers lining up, and the paths didn't look particularly wide at the park. I told him to go have fun with Max, and he sped off towards the playground.
And so I did the run sans stroller and kids. I didn't really have a backup plan, so I just ran. The course was kind of neat - some paved pathways, a couple bridges, some dirt, some grass. It reminded me a lot of the cross country courses in high school. Several portions of it were obviously not built for running strollers, which made me feel a little better about not pushing one. I thought about my Dad - about hiking and camping, and the other outdoor stuff we used to do. Before I knew it, the run was over.
But I wasn't quite done running. There was a single water table about halfway through the course. When I had gone past, all the water was still packed up (oops!). So I took a shortcut and ran out to the table, and unpacked some water for people. Most of the runners were past already, but there were a lot of walkers that came by and grabbed a bottle. Good deed for the day complete, I ran back over to the finish area, grabbed some coffee and a doughnut, and looked for my family.
Ben was still playing on the playground and Stephanie was talking with a friend, Penelope in the stroller. She wanted to be in the stroller, and Ben wanted to play, so I hung out a while and listened to the band. Then I saw Ben wandering around near the start line, looking a little down. I went over to him and asked what he was doing. He asked me when we were going to go run in the adult race. I told him the race was over, but we could go run a little while if he still wanted to. And yeah, he *really* wanted to.
So... I got the stroller, complete with Penelope attachment and a helium balloon, installed Ben in the other seat, and set off with the intention of running around a 1 mile loop. Every so often one of the kids would yell at me to go "super fast", and I'd run as fast as I could for a little bit. When we got to the place we'd need to turn to go back, I really didn't want to. I took a quick survey, and they were both having as much fun as I was. So we kept going, all the way around the whole course again, and we had the whole thing to ourselves. They were excited to see all the cool, unexpected stuff - bridges, a couple big dirt hills to run up and down, a disc golf course, some carnival rides, the seats we sat in for a Round Rock Express game earlier this summer. There was even someone flying a toy helicopter as we passed a field. It was going sideways, upside down, doing flips and all sorts of other fun stuff. Ben wanted to know if the people inside it were bumping their heads when it went upside down. I told him it was just a remote-controlled toy, so his next question was if there were little action figures inside, and if so, were they bumping their heads when it went upside down?
I love my kids! And I will always remember where that love came from.