Coming Up Brigi

Last week wasn’t great. It’s not worth rehashing, but all you need to know is that last week ended on a low note and this week started off like Mariah Carrey in “All I Want for Christmas” (90’s Mariah, not 2017 Mariah…sorry Mimi). 

Our town had a 5k Sunday morning, a fundraiser for the high school girl’s lacrosse team, and Brent and I said to ourselves, you know what’d be a good idea? To stuff ourselves w/ Qdoba and beers and then run a race the next day; yeah, that’d be brilliant. Brent wanted to do a sub 30 minute run, which isn’t all that hard to do, but I figured the burritos and beers would have something to say about that (read: not happening). When we got to the high school, it was all families; little kids running around and their exhausted and slightly out-of-shape parents looking on wearily. I thought to myself: wait, is this a race we might be able to place in? So then I got all in my head and was actually nervous for a run that wasn’t even big enough to shut down the roads and had us running alongside traffic with a police officer every mile to give the impression of safety. 

I think my nerves gave me that final push at the end when I saw the finish line and that girl in the busy leggings who was in my sights the whole run and who I really wanted to beat. I started my final sprint as soon as I saw the orange cone, and I flew by busy leggings. And then I saw the actual finish line, which was well beyond the stray cone some maintenance personnel had left out that I mistook for the finish. It was a pretty long stretch there at the end, but I did it. I beat busy leggings! My new personal record, that I had just set for myself that day, shattered. That’s how you start a week. The good news just kept rolling in; when we were checking our results online, I saw that I had placed third in my age bracket. 

Full disclosure: my bracket was females 30-45, so I really lucked out there, but I don’t make the brackets, I just dominate them (third place is considered dominating, right?)

Full disclosure: I was more than a little excited about this turn of events. I’ve never placed in a race, ever. We were in the car, practically in our neighborhood when I saw this and I turned to Brent and was like, wait, should we go back? Is there going to be a medal ceremony? And he just looked at me like, aren’t the twelve Almond-Joys you swiped from the meager post-race swag table enough? (in my defense, I’ve never seen Almond-Joys after a race and they’re one of my favorites so I’m not proud of how I cleared that tiny table out, but it is what it is).

On our post-run high, Brent and I decided to head to the city. We wanted to hit up a brewery but needed to eat first, so we were those people, cruising along Seaport Boulevard at 15mph, hoping against all hope that we might be able to find a parking spot. Just as we were about to give up and pay for a garage, Brent pointed out a spot that wasn’t even a parallel park job; it was at the end of a row of cars and I just had to pull it in. It was across the street from the restaurant we wanted to go to and less than a ten minute walk to the brewery. You probably don’t believe me, b/c none of this sounds at all believable, but it’s true. It happened to us, it can happen to you; don’t give up on your dreams. 

Later that night, back at home, Brent was checking our NCAA brackets and noted how I was in first place. I had a pretty solid lead, but needed UNC to win Monday night so I could clinch first place. Spoiler alert: UNC won March Madness and I won McCarthy Madness. It’s a pretty big deal, I’ll definitely be mentioned in the family newsletter and they’ll probably need a quote about what I plan to do w/ my winnings. 

Come to think of it, Brent and I didn’t send our dollar entry fees in, so my prize might come up a little short. That’s probably for the best, since I plan to spend it all on Reese’s eggs. It’s not really spring until my couch is littered w/ those telltale yellow wrappers and I have a perpetual stomachache.