Dear Alaire & Emery,

Last Sunday, October 6th, 2016, goes down in history as one of my treasured days.

Watching your Dad run his first marathon with such determination, focus, poise, and joy was a moment to behold. He worked hard. I mean hard. Missing few runs of the rigorous training schedule; going farther if he felt good. And the last few weeks, with sore hips and hams, he diligently followed doctors orders with daily stretching and foam rolling.

Ten years ago, running was most certainly not on your Dad’s top activity list. I was training for Portland and my sense was that he considered it a fool’s errand. Just last week, he reminded me that he had to train for a 5k! Then on his 30th Birthday, Aunt La laid the Hood to Coat challenge down, and from there, he ran his first half marathon with me and Zach. After that, running became a part of OUR every day life.

I guess what I feel most inspired by, and proud of, is how your Dad opened himself to a new challenge; something at one point that was way outside of his comfort zone. And, when zeroing in on his goal, there was no stopping him.

It poured down rain on Sunday (we made Oregonians out of you both), but Gvail was all smiles along the way. I had the chance to have a few moments alone while I waited for him at the finish. My cup overflowed as I saw him round that last corner–tears of joy, love, so much love. Your Dad is my hero. We are three lucky girls.

Try new things, remove imaginary boundaries, push through pain, set the bar high–you can always do more than you think you can.

Love,
Mom

P.S. It seems your the PDX marathon had an oops and most runners ran 26.8 miles, including your Dad. This makes him an ultra runner!