Most of my "top days" are really happy ones. As much as I complain on a daily basis, and as many things as I'd like to change, in general, I'm pretty content with life. The fact that I had so many top days to choose from while making this list made it very, VERY clear how lucky I am.
But it's not the soft things that help you grow. The hard times are the ones that change you the most, that give you a reason to change.
In 2012, particularly here in Connecticut, we were all tested by the unfathomable tragedy at Sandy Hook. The reminders remain almost as prevalent as they were a year ago, but I find myself now thinking of those angels even more when something positive happens, not only when the news blares another nightmare.
There was nothing I could do last December. There was so little any of us could do. It wasn't my place to put myself in anyone else's shoes or try to install myself in our neighboring community and intrude on their experience.
So I stayed in my own shoes. And I did something I do NOT do.
I ran.
Last March, I ran for a lot of reasons, all of them listed in my blog, "Why I Run."
I never posted an update after the race, and I'm sure some people wondered if I ever finished. I did finish. Not with any sort of impressive time, but I was upright (mostly), and it was 100% worth it.
I'm glad it took me a while. I'm glad I felt the pain in my chest as the cold air cycled in and out. I felt that pain, and I knew I was alive. And damn it, I deserved to feel that pain as a reminder of why I was moving with that herd of people in the first place. I'm glad I walked part of it, going slow enough to notice the birds overhead. I had vowed that I would remember that moment. I'm even glad it snowed. I always feel pretty good about slowing everything down for the snow.
The Sandy Hook Run was my first official run, the first time I crossed a finish line painted with something other than chalk or neighborhood markers like "that big rock over there". That was the change in me. I still don't like running, but that race has made me "a runner." All I needed was a reason to push my own limits, kick my own ass, and also stop to take a breath once in a while.
And I guess that's how we're all moving forward, bearing the weight of whatever it is we have to overcome. You can't get there in one stride, but you have to keep moving. One step at a time.
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