Pacers

This will come as a shock to none of you.

But I have never run a marathon.

I also don’t have any plans to do so.

However, more than any other time in my life, I feel myself landing in bed every night and thinking:

I need a pacer.

Pacers in marathons are "experienced runner(s) that run at a set speed in a race. They help the other racers finish at their desired time.“ They are the runners with a flag and numbers on their backs who are not in the race to win or compete for their own time. They are there to help the other runners, allowing runners to gauge and set their own pace to match theirs.

Well, as I stare down an empty nest, a new stage of life, adult kids, and increasing new pressures and new challenges, needing to figure out who the heck I am and what I have to offer the planet…I need a pacer.

I find myself needing and wanting more time with my parents. Wanting to ask more questions of my last-surviving Grandfather. I am sending that text to a friend, “coffee?” I am saying yes to connections that I might not have before. I am on the lookout for others in the same stage of the race and those that have long passed me. I need pacers because I can feel myself floundering.

I am equally pulled right now to either:

Disappear, to get quieter, more hidden, let my mind, heart and muscles rest and potentially atrophy. I’m tired. It’s been a ride. I’m not sure this race needs me anymore. I’ll sneak off the course here.

Or. Start beating the pavement with fury and aggression. I will pant and dig deep and do whatever it takes as I try to hustle for my worth, redefine myself, looking for grand gestures, and unparalleled speed. I’ll finish fast and maybe win some awards and some money, and certainly impress the spectators with my performance on the back 10.

On my own, I would be tempted to go in either ill-fated direction.

I clearly need pacers.

There are those whose rhythm and wisdom force me to pick up the weary legs and keep at it. They know what it takes to finish. They sometimes block the alley when I try to sneak off the course quietly, and their steps pace me back into the pack.

They are there to call me back when I get caught up in proving myself and take off unbridled down the street. They know I won’t be able to finish that way, much less finish strong. Their steady rhythm is an echo behind me until my steps match theirs.

I’ve never actually run a real marathon.

But I think I understand enough to know that we all need pacers sometimes.

That we all need to be pacers sometimes.

I’ll circle back around to the young mothers and moms to teens and we will tell all the stories and cry all the tears and share all the laughs, and we will pace each other.

And I’ve got my eyes, ears, mind, and heart focused on my own pacers around me right now. Grateful they circled back and didn’t stop running either.

Cheers to a running analogy.

Direct to you from my living room couch.