It is just a hobby
I’m standing up at the kitchen counter writing this blog entry. I went to the Y after work to log in my 30 minute run with strideouts. Check. I drove home to heat up leftovers for our dinner and then sat down to eat and talk to my husband. Check. After about an hour, I got up and started making a pasta salad for my lunches this week. Check. (I’m not good at being prepared ahead of time so I’m usually grabbing a salad from either HT or Earthfare. It’s a big deal that I now have lunch ready for the week). I’ve cleaned up the kitchen and the background noise besides the tapping of the keys on the laptop is the whirling, chortling of water in the dishwasher.
Time. We don’t have a lot of it these days. Kathryn has less of it than me and she’s a master juggler of all the things going on in her life. She is truly amazing. We were talking on the spin bikes on Saturday and one thing she said has come back to my thoughts tonight: This is just a hobby.
Kathryn and I are not competing against anyone else but ourselves. We’re not in it to win our age group (though it would be cool) and we’re not doing it for glory. We’re doing this triathlon thing because we love it and we love how we feel when we’re training (for the most part) and when we’re competing. I hope I’m not putting too many words in my friend’s mouth, but I think she’ll agree.
Braun and I were talking about serving tonight. Not serving dinner, but serving others. Sometimes it’s so hard to fit just one more thing in, but we know we are called to serve people. So, what do we do and when do we do it? What we end up sacrificing at times is actual time with our husbands, kids, our friends and our community. Where do we make the sacrifice? What is truly important when it all comes down?
So I’m reminded tonight that triathlon is a hobby – an awesome one — but it’s not my job; no one is paying me to do this. I’m choosing it and I have to remember that there are going to be times when I need choose time with my husband over fitting in that run. Or, skipping that class because I’ve committed to this group of people once a week. A lot of times I can fit it all in, but not all the time. So I’m taking this time to remember and to get perspective. I lose it sometimes!
