My dear and faithful readers,<\/p>\n
I have a request.\u00a0 Tonight I seek your prayers, positive vibes, good wishes, whatever you are willing to send, for my friend, Katherine, and her family.<\/p>\n
Before I tell you the details, I want you to know Katherine.\u00a0 I\u2019ve mentioned Katherine several times before, and she is a loyal reader of this blog.\u00a0 She often makes encouraging comments when I post.<\/p>\n
From the night I met Katherine, at Teri\u2019s house for my first attendance of the Fit and Fab ladies, she has been one of my biggest cheerleaders.\u00a0 I was training for my first 70.3 and I didn\u2019t have a clue what I was doing amongst a group of women who could boast numerous Ironman\u2019s to their credentials.\u00a0 Other than Teri, I think I knew 3 people there.\u00a0 But somehow I was introduced to Katherine, and before long, we were chatting like old friends.\u00a0 And within no time at all, she had me believing that I truly was capable of anything I wanted to do.<\/p>\n
As we talked, I had absolutely no idea what a complete BADASS this girl is.\u00a0 She runs marathons, she does triathlons.\u00a0 Ok, so do I.\u00a0 But unlike me, she is looming at a sub 3 hour marathon.\u00a0 She PR\u2019ed in Boston the day of the bombing, and I\u2019m pretty sure she has kicked that PR\u2019s butt a couple times since.\u00a0 Last year, at Ironman Coeur D\u2019Alene she was hoping to qualify for the world championships in Kona.\u00a0 After dropping her chain TWICE and losing all of her nutrition and hydration on the bike, she still managed to earn a spot in Kona.\u00a0 It\u2019s not uncommon for her to place at major events or even win local triathlons.\u00a0 The girl is, I would wager to say, the best all-around athlete that I know.\u00a0 She\u2019s amazing.<\/p>\n
And yet, you would never know it to talk to her.\u00a0 She listens intently as you talk about your accomplishments and she encourages vigorously as you talk about your goals. She talks about her love of our sport.\u00a0 But she\u2019s so humble, she would never tell you how spectacular she is at it.\u00a0 She would probably be more likely to describe herself as a nerd or a music lover.\u00a0 She is brilliant too.\u00a0 A \u201cboard-certified Psychiatrist\u201d offering a second opinion, as she posted in a comment on one of my recent Facebook statuses to a friend who was jokingly saying she disagreed with her shrink.\u00a0 Always light-hearted.<\/p>\n
Katherine has 2 beautiful little girls, about the same ages as my boys.\u00a0 She brags on them often.\u00a0 She\u2019s a proud mama.\u00a0 She is also quick to build up her husband Jacob, her brother, her family and friends.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think there is a single one of us who doesn\u2019t feel Katherine\u2019s encouragement push us to be better at our passions.<\/p>\n
Almost exactly 2 years ago, just before I went to Vancouver to run the marathon on May 5, I was in the middle of a fitting with a customer at the Chesterfield store.\u00a0 I was sitting on the floor and I saw Katherine come in.\u00a0 We were super busy, but I smiled and she came over to deliver a gift wrapped in tissue paper.\u00a0 Later, when I opened it, I found socks with the words Bad Ass, and an arrow pointing upward.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure I still have the card she hand wrote, though I don\u2019t know exactly where it is at present.\u00a0 But I can tell you what it said, she was encouraging.\u00a0 What she wrote made me believe that I am capable of achieving everything I dream of.\u00a0 And more.\u00a0Katherine knew I was going after Boston that day.\u00a0 It wasn’t my day, we had record heat in Canada.\u00a0 But Katherine has not, and will not, allow me to let go of that dream.\u00a0 She is the reason I know I will get there someday.<\/p>\n
I guarantee I am not the only one with a Katherine story like that.\u00a0 She has a knack for bringing newbies in and making them feel right at home.<\/p>\n
Yesterday Katherine was involved in a severe bicycle crash and was found unconscious by the side of the road.\u00a0 We don\u2019t believe that a car was involved, but rather that her tire blew causing her to crash.\u00a0 She was flown to Barnes hospital after a passing motorist saw her and stopped to help.\u00a0 She is currently in a medically induced coma to allow for a decrease of brain swelling.\u00a0 If what I\u2019ve heard is correct, she also has facial fractures and some internal bleeding.\u00a0 There is a reason I am terrified of road riding by myself, and this is it.\u00a0But Katherine is superwoman.\u00a0 I don’t think she is afraid of anything, pain least of all.<\/p>\n
If there is any one person in the world that I believe is strong enough to fight her way through this, it\u2019s Katherine.\u00a0 We even received an uplifting report this evening that she was responding to stimulus today.<\/p>\n
In addition to my plea for your prayers for Katherine and her family, I have an additional request.\u00a0 When Katherine was found, she was wearing her RoadID with her emergency contact information.\u00a0 The paramedics were able to quickly determine who she was and contact her family.<\/p>\n
My confession:\u00a0 I have been terrible about wearing my RoadID lately.\u00a0 Maybe in part because it still has my old last name on it.\u00a0 But what happened to Katherine was the kick in the booty I needed to order a new one with the gift card I\u2019ve had sitting on my desk since Christmas.<\/p>\n
RoadID\u2019s come in a variety of styles and colors.\u00a0 And may I suggest they make great gifts for your active friends and family members.\u00a0 If your mom is anything like mine, remember that Mother\u2019s Day is right around the corner.\u00a0 Sorry, Mom, I guess that secret is out.<\/p>\n
Whatever your sport of choice, I ask you please, Lovely people, go forth and be safe!<\/p>\n
I will post an update about Katherine\u2019s progress when we have one, but in the meantime, please keep my cheerleader, my teammate and my friend lifted up high in your prayers.<\/p>\n
Much love to you and yours,<\/p>\n
Rambling Runner Girl<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My dear and faithful readers, I have a request.\u00a0 Tonight I seek your prayers, positive vibes, good wishes, whatever you are willing to send, for my friend, Katherine, and her family. Before I tell you the details, I want you to know Katherine.\u00a0 I\u2019ve mentioned Katherine several times before, and she is a loyal reader […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-randomthoughts","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4eO4v-bm","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=704"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":705,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704\/revisions\/705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}