Smug Marrieds: Retraining

The North Carolina Marathon was this past Saturday and I celebrated not having to run it by working one of the water stops with my Saturday running group, the Blueliners. 

The race started at 8 am. We had to be at our water stop by 7:30 to set up and the location was about 50 minutes from my house, which is a long way of saying that I had Blair wake me up at 5:30 a.m.  

I'd stayed up later than usual the night before and I was not shaking off sleep easily. I love being in bed in the morning when you're buried under the covers and have made a little nest for yourself out of your body heat and your pillow is so soft...

"5:30. Time to get up," said Blair, coming into the bedroom. (The God of Dawn arises closer to 4 or 4:30 each day.) He sat down next to me and stroked my hair. 

I rolled over and stretched and felt the cold air blast me. It was 29 degrees outside and we hadn't yet strongly cranked up the heat. I dove back under the covers. "Let's just crawl under the covers and stay in bed all day," I said, burrowing deep and yawning. 

"Can't do it," said Blair. "You promised you'd be at the race and--"

I pulled a hand out from under the blanket and covered his mouth, cutting him off. "Let's try this again," I said. "Let's crawl under the covers and stay in bed all day." I released my hand from over his mouth and looked at him. I nodded encouragingly.

"Uh... yeah. Okay. Screw those runners! They don't need--"

I placed my hand back over his mouth, cutting him off again. "So close," I said. "You've almost got it. One more time." I cleared my throat. "Let's just crawl under the covers and stay in bed all day."

"Nothing I'd rather do," said Blair. "Perfect. You read my mind." 

See? Sometimes they just forget their training from bootcamp (i.e., the first five years of marriage) and need a little reinforcement reminder. Of course, I got up and got ready but the point is that it's nice to at least pretend that blowing off the world for one another is sometimes an option. 

And the race? SO much fun. I loved being on the other end and shouting encouragement to runners. We were at mile 4.5 going out for the half and full marathon runners and at mile 9.5 for the half and mile 23 for the full coming back. Since our group was comprised of marathon runners, we knew better than to say things like, "You're almost there." Instead, we handed out water, Gatorade, pretzels, bananas, and Gu. It was a morning filled with great friends, lots of laughing, and Krispy Kreme coffee.

All in all, well worth getting out of bed for. 

Cheers,

Dena