Saturday, March 26, 2011

The race

Wow...what a day!
Here were are, running the race. My friend, Leslie, is right there by my side, helping me keep going, encouraging me and helping me when I needed to slow down, and then got me back going again.

Here's me, Les, and Sophie before the race got started.

I feel like I just have to take a moment to talk about stuff. I'm sitting here, pretty amazed at God's goodness in my life. Despite my crazy week, I was reminded today how much I have to be thankful for. There are so many things in my life that I have been blessed with...family, a home, provisions in several different forms, and so much more. Today, though, the "stuff" I wanted to talk about is friendships. God has blessed me with some incredible friendships over the years. Several of which I still keep in touch with even today. I could go on and on about these women because they're all pretty great. Today, though, I had a new experience with a friend. You see that lady up in the picture with me? Well, she's one of my newest and closest friends. Her name is Leslie and I feel so blessed to have her in my life! We began our friendship as more of a mentor/mentee situation. She has wisdom about eating right, exercise, and walking with the Lord, and other areas that I really wanted to grow in. Then our friendship grew into one of the closest I've had in several years. Last summer, for the first time, I started trying to run. She encouraged me along the way, giving me tips and things to try. We were working towards a race. Today was race day. Now Leslie can run a mile and a 5K with no problem, but today she ran right next to me. She didn't care about getting a certain time or winning, she was there to support me. When I needed to slow down, she gave me tips and encouraged me. When I wasn't sure if I could pick it back up, she got me going. We even sprinted to the finish. As she said, "there are a lot of metaphors to life" when you think about this whole race thing. Today I'm just bursting with gratitude and love for a friend who will stick right next to me and run the race of life with me, giving me advice, praying for me, hanging out, and so much more. I hope we'll have many years of running the race together!

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