Nike Half Marathon

Sunday, 10-17-10, was the Nike Women's Half Marathon in San Francisco. I flew up there, met friends and we ran the race. It covered some beautiful scenery from Union Square, along the Embarcadero, through the Presidio to the ocean and finished at Golden Gate Park. It had some challenging hills from mile seven to mile nine. At that point, I questioned why I had willingly decided to do this torture! It started raining at mile ten and drizzled steadily until the end of the race. Ahhh, the end of the race where a fireman in a tuxedo handed us that little blue box with our Tiffany necklace in it. NOW, I remembered why I wanted to do this race! There were 20,000 people, mostly women, who ran it. As we enjoyed the city the next day, we proudly wore our necklaces and strangers congratulated us on finishing the race. We belonged to a sisterhood of other runners who had been there with us. Oh, some were much faster and some were much slower, but that really was not the point. We set a goal, we trained for it and we accomplished it. It is a heady, empowering feeling.
Running may not be your thing, but I urge you to find something that is. It may force you to get outside your comfort level and grow in ways you never thought possible and that may just be even better than a Tiffany blue box!!