3 Days, 10 Years, Many Tears

There are three days of the year in which the pain of losing my dad is more intense.

December 12.  August 22.  Fathers Day.

December 12 is my dad's birthday.  I think of him, of the age he would be, and what our lives would be like if he were still in them.  I think of the fantastic grandpa he'd be to my kids and how things would be so different.

August 22 is the day he died, the day we lost him forever until we meet again in Heaven.  I think of all the time that has gone by and how much he has missed, especially the arrivals of his five grandchildren.

Fathers Day is, well, Fathers Day, and I don't have my dad here to celebrate.

I cry on these days.  Texts from siblings, posts on Facebook, they all make me tear up.  But they're good, too.  I know I'm not alone, that others miss him as much as I do, love him as much I do.

10 years.  Today it has been ten years since he died.  I can't believe he's been gone that long, that we've missed his "whisker rubs" and bear hugs for that long.

(I need a scanner.  Pardon the pictures of pictures.)

Me and Dad at my college graduation in 2002.

Dad as I remember him most before ALS.

We visited his grave today.

We remember him always.

A couple 5ks

Although weeks have passed since we actually ran these 5ks, I'm blogging about them anyway, mostly so that I can look back at our times and such.  We (Zeke and I) ran two 5ks within a week at the end of June/beginning of July.

The first was the Race for Sundaes.  It was an out and back course, mostly on a hilly dirt road.  I actually like that it was an out and back since I got to see Zeke during the race.  (I was heading out and he was on his way back.)  He kicked my butt.  This race had timing chips, so our times were posted pretty soon after the race.  A colleague (and Zeke's teacher) was running also (her first 5k) and it was fun to see her there.  Zeke did great but was really bummed that he didn't win an age group prize.  He missed out by a few seconds.  The kids that beat him were several years older, but he was still in a mood because of it.

Zeke's mouth is full.  He enjoyed the free sundaes!

Times:

Zeke- 27:19.5 (4/13 Male 1to 13)

Me- 31:24.1 (8/14 Female 30 to 39)

The next race was on the 4th of July at 7 in the morning.  I'm not a morning person.  But JD had that day off and could keep Quin and our Fresh Air buddy and also actually watch us finish, so we did it.  It was really humid that morning and Zeke ran slower than normal.  I thought I was running slower too, but I ended up meeting my short term goal of finishing in less than 30 minutes.  Yay!  The course was pretty flat and I'm sure that made a difference.  This one was fun as Nancy (colleague from above) and her husband ran again along with other friends and students.

Times:

Zeke- 28.23 (9/28 12 and Under)

Me- 28.34 (39/103 Open Female)

I've only run once since.  Shame on me.  I was in the habit of going for a run every Sunday morning before church, but then we went away, and then I wasn't feeling well, and then I was exhausted, and the excuses kept piling up.  Our next planned 5k is this Saturday.  Ry has a horse show at the same time.  We're undecided at this point.