Seize every opportunity along the way, for how sad it would be if the road you chose became the road not taken. ~Robert Braul

Got an email from the race organizers welcoming me to TransAlsp, it was a great morning waking up to that news. The story of how i got invited is interesting, Bernd Meyer whom I never met has been asking me to be his partner at the race, I declined but he kept emailing me with reasons why i should consider his offer. Better judgment told me not to go, I am not the best at teams, specially the ones required to stay close through the course, mountaineering is different because you are usually walking roped together, behind each other, so even though i am surrounded by people, it still gives me some space. But races like TransRockies and TransAlps, you run together all the way, my problem? there is not escape. i love the solitude of climbing and running long distance,I enjoy going for a run with my best friend Nadia talking and laughing once in a while but is a completely different matter to be out a race for 3 to 5 hrs a day, a week at a time talking. I know where to push her buttons so after a few hours together, i told her something that i knew would get her upset and then she speed off only to wait for me at the checkpoint to cross it together, she never knew why i did it. I cancel on Bernd several times, he likes to talk too so i was very hesitant about it, but something kept telling me that i should consider going, here is an opportunity of a lifetime and i should be taking advantage of it, his sponsors are paying, second, i get more fan mail from Germany that any where else, actually, i only get request for sign pictures from Germany, the first time i showed my sister Muneca the email, I was asking her if she saw a sign of this been a joke, why will anybody want a sign picture of me? Muneca looked at it and said that it looked legit so i send the picture away, then other requests started to arrived. Then i got word that i had made the cover of Trail Magazing that was all i needed to decide that I should go to TransAlps,so i started focusing on running again i am also working hard at been more of a team player.

I am well aware of my short comings, just as i am well aware of the consequences. Every act has a consequence, your life is a direct reflection of your priorities. I strongly believe in taking full ownership of my life, it strengthens the commitment to the choices i have made and it helps me decide, some choices are hard to make, we all have choices, when we struggle is when we are making the ones we are forced to make, they are not the ones we want to make.
They are some people that know me well and can tell you that i might be the most unsympathetic person in the world, Nadia gave me for my birthday a "whining" sand clock, not for me but for her, it saved our relationship, she got one minute of release and for me a time when i could just say, OK, time is up. I work harder on two things, either changing the situation or accepting it, there is no middle ground, the word has never made any progress but just having countless of hours of just talking about a problem, now you know why politics is difficult, you have a lot of smart people terrific at identifying a problem but not great at action.

The problem is not the wasted time, the problem I see if the choices you make while you feel you have no choice. "I might as well just give up and eat myself to death, I am never going to loose weight"
Sometimes acceptance is just patience, contrary to what some people believe, i don't enjoy been single, i dislike the choices i have to make in order for me to be in a relationship, it took me a while to figure out that, yes it was me, it was not until i met Charlie that i realized that. Somebody that believed was right for me didn't workout at all, after we broke up i did almost what an alcoholic does and made amends, contacted some of my past relationships to apologized," sorry remember when I told you that it was really you? sorry, i guess it turned out, it was really me."

I am well aware that as long as i am committed to the choices that i make, the amount of time i spend training, raising my kids alone, and the involvement with my charities, i have to suck it up and not complain if i spend Saturday nights folding laundry while my kids are out with friends.
Of course this is not an easy thing to do, with every choice there is consequence, i disliked making the call to the charities telling them that i was aborting all future climbs because my fiance needed me and and spending the money in helping him instead, as much as i disliked calling Charlie and telling him that i couldn't do it anymore, they where both equally devastating and it brought criticisms no matter what direction I took, so as usual i had to relay on my judgment to make the decision and made myself ready to face the consequence. Sometimes the choice is made for me, like my involvement with the charities, i get cc'd on every conversation Karl school aid with the visual aids specialist for the school district, like the one below.

"

Can you get speech to text software for Karl's computer? His typing skills are very poor and we believe his eyesight may have deteriorated since school started- he couldn't use it at school so much but he would be able to use it at home for essay writing. It is necessary to 'train' the software to your own voice so he should have some help getting this accomplished?"

After that email i knew i needed to call Charlie. But i take full ownership of it, i stand by the outcome fully understanding that while, i don't have to be involved on the charities, after all who is going to say is my fault if Karl goes blind but i will have to face it everyday asking myself, did I do everything I could?.
I am working on several things that might bring the quest back, I needed to go back to working so it's taking a bit longer than I would like to but this opens many opportunities to maybe do more and better I hope. So everyday I am still living my life with purpose, when the time comes I want to be ready.
Seize every opportunity along the way, for how sad it would be if the road you chose became the road not taken. ~Robert Braul