In the beginning.....

It won't be fair....but in trying times I'm going to blame Bob (the boyfriend). Not that anyone can make anyone else run a marathon. In fact, it's always been on my "list of things to do in life" along with "swim with dolphins" and "build a house". And Bob and I had talked about it before in just that way. But then Bob turned to me one day and said, "would you really? run a marathon? San Diego has the Rock 'n' Roll marathon in June." I have no memory of what I said to him at that moment but the inner dialogue had begun.

Would I run a marathon? Could I really get it together enough physically and mentally to do that? How would I begin to think about running a marathon? I've never done anything that physical in my life and can be a bit fair-weather about the whole exercising thing, to be honest. I knew that I would need to scaffold such a goal or it would never seem manageable. I made the predictable pro-con list. Pros - I had plenty of time to get ready - I was in probably the worst shape of my life and pretty motivated to do something about it - it would be an incredible to thing to accomplish (and with Bob if he did it too) - I only had to run one once. Cons - it's running a crazy 26.2 miles (duh!) - I've never been great at staying with fitness goals - it would become my life for awhile when training got intense.

And the more I thought about it, the less crazy it seemed. So I started thinking about the scaffolding.
1) I became familiar with the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training program. They train and coach you into being ready to run a marathon - pay your entry and travel expenses. In exchange, you fundraise four times the money they spend on you ($.25 goes to helping me, $.75 goes to research, support and services to people with Leukemia and Lymphoma). On the selfish side, I knew that the structure of a program like that would be what could move me from a 3-mile jogger into a long-distance race participant. On the less selfish side, I loved the idea of combining my own personal life goal with a bigger cause - making two things happen and having a way to give back. The fundraising is intimidating, I will admit.
2) Secondly, I started talking about it as a goal to "put it out there". People have been incredibly supportive. I also wanted to see who else might be interested thinking "the more the merrier". My friend Pete is interested and started running again and working out.
3) I would still have the short-term fitness goals to keep me going.
4) Since the training for Team in Training wouldn't begin until the new year, I had all Fall to simply become a runner/jogger again and make exercise part of the routine.