Gotta pull myself together in this last stretch.

I’m nearly there. I’ve been running for a long time.

It’s like – ha, flashback to high school. Women’s junior varsity track team, lol. Distance running.

Not sportsball – no hand eye coordination required. Only competing against previous versions of me.

I made it to sectionals. Was expected to come in dead last, 16th out of 16.

It’s like the last steps of that last 800 meters, in the spring.

Spirted that first lap – gave it everything I had. Lead the pack of 15 other people who were all much faster than me. Nobody passed me for two hundred meters.

Like Gimli – “we dwarves are wasted on cross country. Very dangerous over short distances.”

Then people kept passing me, as my legs were burning and going numb. I felt sick. Dragged my cold dead corpse around the bend and around the track again and over the finish line.

I didn’t finish last. I just made it to the end, and I made it there more quickly than I’d ever previously managed.

In the future, maybe, I will slow down and find a more sustainable pace. Maybe if I hadn’t pushed so hard in the beginning I wouldn’t be falling apart a little, in this moment.

Maybe if I hadn’t pushed so hard in the beginning I wouldn’t be where I am now.

Michael told me not to compare the might have beens. He’s right.

One last push.

Like giving birth.