All It Takes Is All You've Got

“Run hard when it’s hard to run.” 

 “There is no glory in practice, but without practice there is no glory.”

It’s a weekday afternoon – sunshine, rain, snow, 90 degrees, 30 degrees – and 20 high schoolers are gathered in shelter house 4 at Community Park. Chatter jumps from homework to football scores to who wore what last weekend to who just broke up with who…and then…for a split second…complete silence (ok, not really…but maybe one day) while someone reads off the motivational quote for the week. Now, it’s time for practice!

I have had so much fun coaching the Providence Cross Country Team this season. I’ve been meaning to blog about this all summer, but I’ve been a huge slacker when it comes to blogging. In fact, the season is half over and I haven’t blogged about the team once!

Let me give you the Sports Center Top 10 PXC moments (so far) of 2011...except unlike SC, mine are in no particular order.

Running in the pouring rain/tornado at the Clarksville Track during the Summer Running Series

 

Coach K Squared planning our Homecoming Campaign for Summer 2012...we WILL win next year!

Running the course at Community Park over and over and over again...oh wait, this one actually belongs in another category...

Team T-shirts: Nothing Runs Like A Pioneer!

Ladies taking FIRST PLACE at the Charlestown Invitational!

Two sentences that turn into two mile conversations. "Were you getting a tattoo? Were you being trained by Jackie Chan? Were you wearing shorts? What color? Most importantly...did you have gas?"

Spending two hours in enclosed spaces - the Kim & Kari stand up comedy act - coming soon to a CC Meet near you

 

Captain Murphy hocking a loogie into the Freshman's coke...silly Freshman, we told you runners can't have soft drinks. Boys will be boys!

Team Facebook conversations that go on for hours after a great race

 

Ladies taking FIRST PLACE at the Christian Academy Invitational

That's right, TWO FIRST PLACE FINISHES! I'm so proud of this team and all of their accomplishments so far this season. Even more important than the team however, is Kari. In fact, I would like to dedicate this post to Kari because she is so awesome. In fact, I'm going to replace all of the photos in this post with pictures of Kari...except that seems like a lot of work...so I won't :) Seriously though...love this team!

My Brother - My Hero

I’m about 7 weeks late on this post, but better late than never! I guess it’s still pretty relevant considering Sunday was the 10 Year Anniversary of September 11^th. I spent the morning eyes glued to the History Channel watching all of the 9/11 footage in awe. I don’t remember what I had for breakfast this morning, but I remember where I was and what I was doing when the plane hit the North Tower 10 years ago. Remembering all the lives lost and all of the heroic people who were there that day, I was also thinking about all of the people around the world affected by the day’s events and everything that has happened over the last 10 years. I got especially choked up when I logged into Facebook and saw this:

I’m so proud of my little brother! It’s hard to believe that it’s only been 9 months since he told us he was enlisting in the Air Force. So much has happened in that time. He went off to boot camp in May as a goofy 19 year old boy and graduated in July as a man - a United States Airman.  We got to go down to San Antonio to participate in all of his graduation ceremonies and activities.

From the Airman’s Run…

To the Coin Ceremony…

To the Graduation Parade…

It was an eye-opening experience - touring base, watching the interaction between the different ranks, listening to stories of some of the activities they did. On thing’s for sure – I wouldn’t survive…they have, like, no closet space :) From his manners to his mannerisms, Kevin is definitely different…but in a good way…in a way that he’s still that goofy 19 year old boy when the time is right. It was great visiting him. We got to squeeze some fun in in-between everything that was happening on base – we even got to go to Sea World!

When we left him, he was getting ready to start Tech School - 13 weeks of training for the Security Forces program. I talked to him Friday and he is loving every minute. They’re practicing tactical drills out in the field – “it’s cool, they’re actually shooting as us and we have to shoot back!” Well…cool’s not the word I would use, but whatever floats your boat, buddy. It’s scary to think that in just 3 months, he’ll be stationed at his first base (Panama City Beach…YEA! I think I’ll visit!!) joining the fight to protect and defend our country. Scary for me, I mean. He’s ready and can’t wait! Thank goodness for cell phones, e-mail, Facebook, and Skype. I can’t imagine how people did it even 20 years ago. Luckily, Kevin gets to come home for a visit in November. Can’t wait to see my little brother, my hero.