Ironically, I heard some advice on a radio show the other day that almost caused me to drive off the road. It’s not bad advice, at least not for some people…”Life isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon” . While I get the point of approaching life like you’re in it for the long haul, the advice falls flat for me in my day-to-day hectic life.
My life is really a series of sprints, followed by sporadic rests…often punctuated by the beginning of the next sprint. I’ve written before about recognizing that things aren’t going to be perfect, despite my desire for them to be that way. I’ve written about trying to do everything set before me, and my slow (in my case v-e-r-y s-l-o-w) realization that it’s just not going to happen. But life in a busy family with active kids, by it’s very nature, is going to be filled with getting from one place to another.
Take last Saturday for example. We have three kids in high school. One is on the Cross Country team. One is on the Volleyball team. The third is on the Football team. It’s Fall sports season, so there was Cross Country practice on one side of town. There was a Football scrimmage at the local stadium. The Volleyball team was also hosting an officials clinic, and the girls were playing in scrimmages so the officials could all learn how to officiate.
So in an effort to combine all those events with our desires to workout, my wife and I devised a plan to do our running/walking around the transportation that everybody needed. We conned out youngest into riding her bike while I walked the three miles from the Cross Country practice to the Football stadium. In the meantime, my wife ran the five miles from home to the Cross Country practice, so she could drive our XC runner home. Quit looking at me funny…she’s the one that wanted to run, and wanted to run the longer distance. Really, she did.
Of course, the XC practice started at 8am, so we got up and quickly dressed and sprinted over there (well, we drove the van but since the operative word here is “sprint” just go with me on this). Then I sprinted to the Football practice (again, we’re talking metaphor. No one would call what I do “sprinting”) while my wife sprinted from home to the XC practice. Then she and our runner sprinted (again, in the van) to the Football scrimmage. Then we collectively sprinted the ½ mile to the Volleyball scrimmage.
That’s just one day, and although we are in things for the long haul, I find myself sprinting from one event to another. I know, I know…we could tell the kids to participate in less. Another option would be to divide and conquer and split up who attends which events. Or we could just skip some events. I’ve done all of those. I’d rather sprint and be there for the kids than miss out on any more than I absolutely have to.
When I was in Middle School and High School, my Dad made a huge effort to fight through Chicago’s suburban traffic to attend my sporting events. He had to drive over an hour in heavy traffic to make most of them, but I remember him being in the stands cheering me on. His booming voice and hearty congratulations were always there for me. Honestly, it’s where I learned to “dialogue” with officials too. Maybe that wasn’t the best lesson, but it is one that I really learned. From his attendance we created a bond that I’ll always have with him. I want to pass that on to my kids. I want them to know that their biggest fan is there when they are having an all-star day and especially when they are having an “agony of defeat” kind of day.
Does that kind of commitment make for crazy days? Sure. In Kansas we travel hours to compete. That means a lot of windshield time. It means a lot of early starts and late nights getting home. But I wouldn’t trade it for the world. To me, those drives are worth every minute. When my kids were swimming we used to joke that our swim-time to driving-time ratio was something like one minute swimming for every hour of driving. But watching my kids was worth every bit of the effort. And trust me, sometimes those drives really were sprints!
So I do take a bit of exception with the “life is a marathon” analogy. To me, it really is a series of sprints that are strung together. But that’s OK with me. I’m willing to make those sprints to be there for my kids.
I’d love to write more, but I’ve got to run. It’s not always a hectic life…ok, it really is…but that’s fine by me.
Get out there and sprint to your next thing…ok?
