Happy birthday to my Mom! She is celebrating in Walt Disney World with my sister, and I will be joining them tomorrow. Like me, she is celebrating her birthday by running a runDisney race. See, the crazy runs in the family.
But I won’t tell you how old she is. I’m not that crazy.
My mom did her first race at Princess 2011. She and my sister power-walked it together. I’m not sure how they did it – while I run faster than Mom power-walks, I certainly couldn’t walk it at the pace she keeps. And her legs are no longer than mine! But she’s well within the time-limits set by the race rules, and I think she loves the bling.
Later in 2011, when my sister decided she wanted to run races and not walk them, Mom coerced Dad into joining her, and they walked the 2011 Disneyland Half. Dad’s quite a bit taller, so while she power-walks, he strolls. (I want them to both wear pedometers for a race sometime, just to see how many more steps she has to take to cover the same distance.)
Clearly, she got hooked, and in 2012, she walked Princess, as well as two (I think) local half marathons. This year, she did the Disney Half with Dad, will be doing Princess this weekend, and she and Dad are also registered for the Dumbo Double Dare (10k and half) out at Disneyland later this year. And I think they’ll do the same two local races again.
Though she would likely disagree, Mom’s always been fairly fit, attending various exercise classes (unlike me, she’s a class fitness person – I’m much more of a solo fitness person). Though she’s clearly got a few years on me (what, she’s my mom, this is not news), I’m pretty sure she could plank three times as long as I could and probably do more pushups than I could even consider trying.
(I may have just issued a challenge that I am destined to lose. Except I don’t think she reads my blog.)
But I’m proud of her for seeing something that she wanted (a cool race medal) and going for it. And she still brings her medals back to her fitness classes and shows them off and may have inspired her daily walking partner to do races as well. I hope she continues to inspire others and show them that they can do it. It just takes time and dedication.
In sum, my Mom is awesome and I hope she gets a Mickey Ice Cream Bar to celebrate her birthday today.