Animals fascinate me.  I wonder how my dog Buddy can be so simple to chase a ball I throw 500 times and still want it once more and yet still understand when I am sad and snuggle up next to me.  They have their own thoughts and feelings I suppose, they just can't say what they are.

Giraffes have always been one of my favorite animals at the zoo.  The shape of their bodies is just....different.  And I guess being a tall girl, I liked the animals that looked tall and magestic.  Ever wonder what they do in their spare time?  Diving, apparently.

I love sporting events.  I grew up going to football and basketball games, played volleyball and tennis, ran track and in general, just enjoyed being physical.  The event that preceded all these games is the national anthem.  Maybe you can make it through hearing (or singing) it without crying but I can't.  Although we can complain about our country, nothing like what happened in Boston can make you feel more like a Patriot than belting out the national anthem.

And this girl, she belted it out.  She's Marlana VanHoose, a blind girl born with cytomegalovirus.  And can she SING!!!

I'm a runner.  To me, there is nothing more amazing than getting out on the road, just me and my shoes and running.  I feel such peace and it takes me to a place that I can't seem to find anywhere else.  If you're a runner, you know what I'm talking about and if you're not, well, you're missing out, in my opinion :).

I ran the Paris marathon on April 10th, 2011.  I had run long distance for a solid year, doing half marathons, and began marathon training six months before the event.  I ran and ran and ran and ran.  I had all kinds of anxiety about running a marathon, wondering if I could do it and what if I couldn't?

The night before the race, they told us they were going to shut downt the course at 5:30 and we had the choice of finishing with no medal or getting on the Metro to get our medal by essentially cheating.  I was going to run the race even if it meant there wasn't even a finish line to cross.  I'm kind of determined that way.

Race day was warm and having trained in cooler weather, battling the heat was tough.  I made sure to do my water and salt and just enjoyed the beautiful weather and the sights of Paris.  All of my worry and anxiety were for nothing because I really didn't struggle.  There was no "wall" and although I got pretty tired at mile 24ish, I knew I would finish.

The finish of a marathon is fairly amazing.  You hit 26 miles and see the finish line and it's just this feeling of, "Wow, I did this.  My body did this.  I am kind of amazed at myself."  I cried when I crossed the finish.  I kind of get weepy even thinking about it now.

1% of the population completes a marathon.  That's a small number and I am one of them.  You may think, big deal.  For me, it was.  I had struggled most of of my life with my body.  I'm too tall, not thin enough, not proportioned right, not pretty enough.  All of these stupid thoughts really.  And ultimately what I found, after I ran a marathon is that I couldn't dislike a body that would run 26.2 miles when I asked it to.  I just couldn't anymore - and I don't.

This video is about how women see themselves and how incredibly OFF we are in our minds, how we see ourselves.  It's kind of sad.

Even sadder is what happened in Boston.  The Boston Marathon is the pinnacle of marathon running.  You have to qualify to run it, meaning you have to be fast.  You have to train.  You have to plan.  Often, you have to travel.  I cannot fathom working that hard to run Boston and having what happened yesterday, happen.  All that work, all that exhaustion, just gone, marred by what happened.

The average marathoner would have finished past four hours, meaning that their families would have been at the finish waiting for them.  My heart breaks for those impacted by this event.  As a runner, you worry about drivers on the road not paying attention or getting injured or finishing too slow.  To add worrying about a bomb going off, it's just unfathomable. I find myself greatly saddened that this thing that I love, that has sustained me, is now marred in my mind.

My thoughts and prayers to all impacted by this event.