Proud to be a P.A.

My hubby has nightmare stories of when he was sports editor at the local newspaper and he'd have to field all the calls from the P.A.'s -- Parents of Athletes -- who all insisted their son or daughter deserved more ink.

Yes, we're all proud of our kids, aren't we? It's not just fun to be a P.A. because you get to see your child perform good, bad and ugly under pressure, you also get to meet other P.A.'s and get involved in the sports program of the season.

Since Rapids is hosting this baseball tournament this weekend and since hubby is one of the coaches, he's spent countless hours at the park the past several days. All I know is the alarm went off at 5:20 this morning and it is supposed to be the weekend!

So he left the house. I got Carter up at 6:15 a.m. so he could get a ride to the ball park at 6:45, then went back to bed in hopes of getting my 8 hours in since I had a race to run today. Well I didn't sleep well and rolled out of bed at 7:15. The plan was to eat breakfast and get ready to ride with my neighbors at 8:15. That's when I noticed the scorebook on the counter.

Uh-oh.

I called Jim and said I'd bring it in and get it there for the 8 a.m. game but I'd be cutting it close because I had to slam my pre-race food and get ready. I was in such a hurry, I didn't get time to switch to my lucky race underwear. I'm blaming that for my later disappointment.

I did get the scorebook to the game with about 3 minutes to spare -- actually ran from the car so that was a good warmup. Hadn't planned to see any of Carter's game so was glad I got to see the first inning at least. When I left, we trailed 3-0. What I missed was a great come-from-behind victory, 4-3, which means we're playing 2 games tomorrow for sure! Whoo-hoo!

Not that I would put any races ahead of my child, but I did sign up for this awhile ago and did not know at the time when Carter would play that day. Plus this was a first-time event for Renaissance Learning -- a local business that lost 2 employees to cancer last year. I really wanted to run this race because not only am I a P.A. -- Parent of Athlete -- I am also P.A. -- Physically Able.
The neat thing about the Renaissance Race Against Cancer was that we could dedicate our race to someone right on our t-shirts. Very cool. I dedicated mine to the memory of 2 friends -- Rory Deschaine (great husband to my good friend Cindy and wonderful father to their 2 kids) and Karen Ancona (my favorite editor on the whole planet). Both of them were so full of life and still missed so much!

My neighbors Cindy and Niki (and her daughter Mya) raced the 5K today, too. It was decent weather. No rain finally. I personally started off pretty fast for me -- but it ended up being too fast and I ran out of steam the last mile. I kept thinking, just keep going, you are here on this earth and Rory and Karen are gone. Just show them you can do this for them.

My finishing time was not that great, but that's not what matters today. What matters is they had 1,050 runners and walkers take part today, raising well over $10,000 for the Riverview Cancer Center here. That is so awesome!!

After the race, I went home, showered and headed to the ball park. Did my first shift of concessions from 12:30-3 p.m. Came home did laundry, blogged and now I gotta head back for the second shift of the day from 5:30-8 p.m.

I seriously don't mind. I am a proud parent of an athlete and am physically able to do this.

Thanks for blessing me, Lord!