20

Monday morning I met my brother Seth and good friend Brett for our 20 mile long run. This was to be our longest run to date. We were a little nervous, not about the distance so much, but because we were all nursing bum body parts. Seth has barely been able to train for this race due to a bad ankle, Brett has been nursing a bum knee and I have felt like I have a nail in my heal. Regardless, we all showed up at 6:30 am on the North side to conquer 20, and...

...we did it! It was not pretty, but we finished. It was a good run. Seth and Brett ended the run with their bum parts feeling pretty normal, well, as normal as you can feel after running 20 miles. I hurt my bum foot by jumping over a median while dodging oncoming traffic at the first 2 mile marker, and that started some discomfort that kind of intensified as we continued to run. I was doing OK with the bum foot and I was able to ignore the pain since I was running with my bros and having good conversations and stuff. The nerves in my foot started yelling at my brain around 14 miles, that was no fun but then the nerves shut up for a while and I was happy until about 16 miles when those same nerves in my foot started cursing at my brain. Needless to say, they sent all kinds of nasty signals the last 4 miles causing my body to slow way down. But hey, I finished. My bros waited up for me despite my pitiful pace. It was a good day.

I also discovered that I have the bladder of a tiny child, which will be interesting come race day.

I am praying that my foot will be OK come race day. Its going to be difficult enough to complete this race as a 250 pound non runner so I would rather not have to limp the 26.2 miles. We will see. I am will cross that finish line one way or another. I think some times when we step out in faith and obedience we think OK God I am ding this "good thing, aren't you proud of me" and we expect the floodgates of blessing to be opened upon us, but instead we find ourselves trudging through the valley of the shadow saying "what the heck". That's when the good stuff happens, when your chest deep in the pains and sorrows of this broken world and all you can do is extend your hand up and cry out for help. That's when God moves in us and through us. That is when He can be glorified.

If my foots gets better, its because God is good and He has answered my cry, and if it does not it simply means He got a better idea. We will see.