Snow, ice and 21 tiny little degrees

I was encouraged in my running this week by seeing my cousin Valerie who lives in New York. She is the person who was instrumental in putting me on this course of running ten years ago. Valerie is my hero. A decade ago, she called to tell me that she had lost one hundred pounds through running and as she puts it, '”hard-core Weight Watchers.” And after all this time, she still gets up to run before anyone of us would consider morning, when most of us are turning over for one last snooze before the alarm goes off, and when we all are buried alive by a thousand reasons not to get up. She runs in the cold and dark before she heads off for her job as a second-grade teacher, a job which would put most of us in the loony farm after one day. She has taught for 30 years. And last June, she shaved her head to support a little boy in her class who has leukemia. She is THAT kind of person.

Well, this week, she signed up for her first half-marathon, yes, the same week that New York was blanketed by another 20 inches of snow. Way to go. Not many excuses stand up to that kind of tenacity.

And it was enough to get me out there today….even in snow, ice and 21 tiny little degrees.