SaraLittlejohn.com: a great marathon with a side of drama...

being on time is VERY important to me. being timely for me communicates love. like, "i love you enough, you are so important to me, that i thought about you long before the clock struck the time i was suppose to be here!" for me being on time is being 10 minutes early. it's just how i work. when you add four kids to the mix it's like this clock challenge that i LOVE competing against. i calculate and recalculate things just to make sure we will be on time. anyway, i had studied maps, calculated mark's pace, and added in about an hour cushion time, and was prepared to meet mark at the finish line on saturday with EASE :)

we left the house at 8:50 am, it takes an hour and 15 minutes to get to our destination, add 25 minutes for unloading and walking to the finish line and our ETA was 10:30.. that was about an hour before mark thought he would cross. i thought we would cheer on the other racers, walk around the festivities and enjoy the race atmosphere.... ah, that was plan. i've learned a few things a long the way like... plans don't always work out. but i like to think that i am a flexible person with four children who takes things and rolls with them. ah, that's the plan anyway.

saturday morning we leave on time, things are going smashingly.. traffic is great and we are about 1 mile from our destination. we come to a hault b/c of road construction. no problem.. remember, i had built in 1 hour for incidentals? when we finally got past the 15 minute delay i could see our turn. then i realized the road was shut down and police officers were directing traffic. ok, small problem. the police officer tried to shout a million directions at me with no luck. i turned down a residential road and parallel parked (i've had to master parallel parking in the city!). decided that we were on the marathon route and we would get out and go check things out and try and figure out our next plan. so we unloaded everyone and everything. we started walking. i thought maybe we would zig-zag our way to the finish line. it was about the time we started walking that katie complained she needed to use the restroom. i told her to hold it. ok, we parked ourselves and i called mark. "where are you?" he said, "mile 16!".. i said, " i have no idea where we are, but we are just going to figure out where we are and wait here for you. i have no idea how to get to the finish line." i hung up and asked the closest police man how far we were to the finish line... he said, "eight miles!" perfect, mark was at mile 16 we were at mile 18.. he should be here in about 15-20 minutes... all the while katie is complaining about going to the bathroom.. all the while i am noticing my surroundings more and more. large groups of police officers are circling around a church and patrolling this particular road, as well as police officers patrolling the race. as i am watching the metro and bus stop i am seeing many groups of very large african american men unloading from the buses and metro. at first i thought, "wow, all these people here to cheer on runners!" but the more that showed up the more i realized something else was going on. i strolled up a hill and realized i was standing in a very long line.. i was the only VERY white person with my VERY white four children. then i began to listen to conversation... it didn't take long to put the pieces together and realized i was standing in the middle of a dual gang member funeral procession. there was potential for opposing gangs to show up at the funeral and start something.... YIKES! at the same time i was hearing people cheer the runners on by saying, "your almost there... stay strong, the finish line is SO close!" what?what? i thought i was 8 miles out. i found the next police officer and asked him how far we were to the finish line.. he said 2 miles. oh, no ! we were going to be here for at least another hour, hour and a half. this was NOT going work. katie still had to go potty, and now i was convinced there was no where really safe for us to stop. while i knew i was not particularly unsafe b/c there was police every 10 steps, i was also not comfortable being there. especially, hauling my 4 white kids around. i kept asking people the quickest way to get to the finish line. everyone had a different way. katie is now sobbing b/c her bladder hurts so bad :( so we went back to the car.. saw a couple of drug deals along the way, saw a couple of homeless beggars along the way, some big man kept pointing at me and speaking jibberish along the way. i threw everyone in the car got out of dodge. i told katie we would find a gas station. we pulled out onto the main road and were in the middle of road locked, traffic jam. stopped in all directions for MILES. i started sobbing, it was now after 11 and i knew mark would be crossing any minute. i had no idea how to get to him based on the five police men's directions... i felt so helpless. after a good sob, i tried to get some composure and help katie. i told her to empty the wipe box and straddle the box and pee in it. she did so happily. we dumped the box and lucy went. my girls are SUCH amazing troopers. we spent the next 40 minutes turning down one way streets, dead ends, and closed roads. by now i had given up all hope on seeing mark finish. but i knew we had to get to the stadium to pick him. i could see the stadium but had to cross a river to get there. finally, i found another police man who gave me logical directions.. and finally two left turns later we were at the stadium. i had no idea where the finish line was in comparison to where we parked. it was 11:54am. i told the kids to get out and get in the stroller. by now everyone is half naked. i threw blankets on them and started running in the direction of the stadium. there was a huge hill i had to climb. i had no idea what was on the other side of the hill, but it looked like the shortest way to the stadium. i could see runners, but i had no idea where they were going. we sprinted up the hill, rolled over the top and low and behold, there we stood at the finish line. i didn't celebrate yet. i was pretty sure mark was waiting for us some where at the finish line festivities. i called him. he was ONE mile out.. "really, you aren't here yet?" "nope, i am close," he said. then i celebrated. i could NOT believe we had made it. after two hours of wrong turns, gang funerals, drug deals, dead ends, closed roads, sobbing mama, WE MADE IT. and just a few minutes later we saw our sweet runner.. we jumped up and down, screamed for our daddy at the top of our lungs, gave him high-fives as he passed; and celebration, pride, and relief welled up in ALL of our hearts! it was NOT the day i had strategical planned out. all my plans went to hell in a hand basket. and really it was ok. mark said that he was glad he didn't see us any sooner. he needed the motivation to keep running. :) and i needed to be reminded how amazing my children are, how God guides all of our steps, wrong turns, dead ends, and well as right turns and final destinations. He saw this very white woman, in her very white honda minivan, with her very white children, totally lost in the big city... He knew how i needed to see how uncomfortable i was not having control, to remind me that HE is in control. We finally met up with mark, and could not have been more relieved or more proud to see him. it was such an adventure. one i would do all over again b/c at the finish line was the love of my life, and he makes EVERYTHING worth it :)!!

enjoy the pics,

even ed earl showed up. check out the bib.