My favorite piece of advice to give a bride before her wedding day is this: The experience is surreal, so every once in a while just stop whatever you\u2019re doing and take a mental snapshot of the moment. There are few times in your life that you get to be surrounded by everyone you love, so do what you can to freeze those moments and tuck them inside your heart pocket.<\/p>\n
I really should be sleeping right now since I have to be up in about 6 hours for my race tomorrow. But everyone knows it\u2019s impossible to sleep the night before a big event.\u00a0 Tomorrow is my 2nd<\/sup> ever 70.3.<\/p>\n This morning was chaos. After rounding up two of my three from various friends\u2019 houses, we did a quick swing by Dunkin\u2019 Donuts so I could bribe my kids into pretending they were enjoying themselves and then we made our way over to Swim Bike Run to meet up with several members of my crew.<\/p>\n From there, we had a 6 vehicle caravan out to Alton, IL, about an hour away where we are competing in the inaugural race of Border Wars: East vs West, tomorrow morning.<\/p>\n It\u2019s been a gorgeous Indian summer here for the past week. Until 2 days ago.\u00a0 Storms blew in and the temps have plummeted.\u00a0 This morning the wind was fierce!\u00a0 We were bundled in hoodies as we made our way into the building where packet pick up was being held.<\/p>\n This being the first year of the event, it\u2019s been more than a little chaotic, so we\u2019ve all flown way past freak out mode and right on into hyper-spaztic freak out mode. There were only 2 gals working the packets, so we waited in line for 20-30 minutes until we all had our packets and our race swag.\u00a0 But I could see people I knew no matter which direction I turned.\u00a0 It was like a party.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure anyone who didn\u2019t know me was probably wondering who in the world brought all these kids to the event.\u00a0 Fortunately, Jen had brought her 4 year old, too, which made me feel a little less obvious.<\/p>\n After we had our gear, we headed into the room that had been designated for the athlete meeting. It was set up with about 20 chairs.\u00a0 We took up all of them.\u00a0 The meeting didn\u2019t start until 11, so we had some time to kill.\u00a0 I was in and out of the packet pick up line\u2026out to the car to get the ipad to entertain my kiddos, taking Silas to the bathroom, saying hi to everyone along the way.<\/p>\n By the time the meeting finally started, the room was packed as full of people as we could make it. Some standing, some on the floor, most of the chairs occupied at least 2 people.\u00a0 I was flanked with Jen\u2019s and had another one in front of me.\u00a0 Allison was on the floor directly behind me.\u00a0 Everywhere I looked I saw a familiar face. Silas was on my lap, Ally was leaning against a trashcan and Ethan was the most efficient one in the room, sitting under a table.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure the Fire Marshall would have approved of the situation.\u00a0 The meeting was a whirlwind of information.\u00a0 My kids were troopers. \u00a0They played silently, thanks to technology.\u00a0 At one point Silas whispered in an excited voice, \u201cMom, I have a loose tooth!\u201d\u00a0 His first. \u00a0I was surrounded by people that make me smile.<\/p>\n As we left the meeting room, we all talked details. Ken called me \u201cMiss Popularity\u201d since he seemed to think that if anyone had a question they\u2019d say, \u201cLet\u2019s ask Lindsey, she\u2019ll know the answer.\u201d\u00a0 Now, let\u2019s be clear, I don\u2019t actually know anything, but being fortunate enough to work where I do, I know EVERYONE, so I know where to go to find the answer.<\/p>\n Then we headed down the road to T1 (Transition Area 1 for the rookies) to drop off our bikes. The wind was howling!\u00a0 We set our bikes on our assigned spots on the transition racks according to our ages, hoping they might still be upright when we get back in the morning.<\/p>\n We fought our way back to the cars discussing what to wear, how to stay warm on that transition from the swim to the bike and the fact that when we get into the water tomorrow morning, it\u2019s going to feel about 30 degrees warmer than the air. This is like nothing else I have ever experienced.\u00a0 It\u2019s going to be an adventure.<\/p>\n When we were finished at the race sight, some had to bolt to get back for other commitments. Those of us who had a free afternoon decided to head to Alton for some lunch.\u00a0 We\u2019re saving Fast Eddie\u2019s for tomorrow after the race.\u00a0 So today, I just picked somewhere that seemed reasonable and attempted to lead everyone there.\u00a0 You would think by now my friends would know better than to let me make any decisions that require navigation, but I lead, they followed.\u00a0 We arrived at my decided location to find it was closed.\u00a0 So, we stood in the street surrounding Vega\u2019s car until we agreed on our next destination.<\/p>\n We found our restaurant, sat at our table and finally the whole crew was assembled. We ate and laughed and talked about the race.\u00a0 And as I looked around, I realized I was doing one of those mental snapshot moments.\u00a0 I had my kids there and some of my best friends in the world.\u00a0 And I thought, This.\u00a0 This is what makes me keep doing these crazy things.\u00a0 Things like getting up at 4 am to go swimming when its 40 degrees out and then jump on a bike and follow it up with a run.\u00a0 Because I get to have my adventures with some of the most amazing, wonderful people I know.\u00a0 I love these people.\u00a0 Partly because they are just as crazy as me.<\/p>\n My kids have been dropped at their dad\u2019s, my gear is packed, my alarm is set. All that\u2019s left to do now is sleep.\u00a0 I received a text earlier from Ally with a picture of a smiling Silas showing a gap in the bottom front of his smile.\u00a0 The tooth is gone.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t able to be there when he lost it, and I don\u2019t get to be the Tooth Fairy tonight.\u00a0 But that mental snapshot of him on my lap, in that room full of athletes prepping for a crazy experience, when he whispered to me, I will keep that tucked in my heart pocket.<\/p>\n Tomorrow, I\u2019ll drag my crabby butt out of bed while it\u2019s still dark. And I\u2019ll make my coffee and drive over to meet Kris and Jen so we can caravan out to Alton.\u00a0 And I will dread getting into the water, and even more so, I will dread getting OUT of the water.\u00a0 And I will ultimately get to the run, my favorite part, and I will be tired, but I will keep going.\u00a0 And then, before I know it, it will all be over.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know what snapshots tomorrow will hold, but I\u2019ll be looking for them and ready with my \u201ccamera\u201d.<\/p>\n To my crew, I love you guys. Crazy as it is, I can\u2019t wait to do this with you tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" My favorite piece of advice to give a bride before her wedding day is this: The experience is surreal, so every once in a while just stop whatever you\u2019re doing and take a mental snapshot of the moment. 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