This Post Isn't About Running

I mean, this post isn't about *my* running. It's about Ella. Ella running. Ella's on the run!

She's really been enjoying her school's running club, which meets weekly (not monthly as I originally thought). They get two feet charm for every mile they run, and Ella brought her necklace and charms home last night. Very cute. I gather this was the idea of some kid's parent, and I really wish I could volunteer for running club sometimes. It sounds like everything I love about running: The kids who aren't in running club are cheering on the kids who are in running club (who run around the field five times for a mile). The kids who are in running club seem to already be enjoying the camaraderie that runners enter races for. What's not to love?

Ella is very proud of her feet charms, and I was proud (and a bit surprised!) that she could run a mile at one go. I teased that I would like a necklace and charms but that I would need something like 400 charms (I honestly have no idea what my mileage is at for the year. Daily Mile has me at 259, but that only has the runs I've logged since I got my new Garmin plus I haven't uploaded data in a while). It's a fine line: I certainly don't want to one-up her. But I also want her to understand (as much as a six-year-old can) a few things about me and running. Like why I've dedicated so much time to training for the marathon. And what a huge distance it is.  And how commitment to something—anything—takes time and effort but the results are worth it in the end. I want her to understand that everything she loves about running club is everything I love about running and that I am as proud of the miles I've logged as she is about the mile(s) she will log.

I think we are getting somewhere. On Sunday afternoon a few hours after I'd gotten home from my run, Ella said, "Oh--I forgot to ask: How was your run?"

She made me my own version of feet charms to tape to my bib on Sunday. Honestly, I'll take that over a necklace with plastic feet on it any day!!

In other news, I somehow completely almost forgot to remember what yesterday's date was but then, of course, remembered at the last minute and couldn't sleep for trying not to think about it. Then the husband discovered he had a tick on him, and it was all over from there. Hopefully tonight's sleep will be better. Cross your fingers for me that I can avoid getting Sadie's cold!!!