Homelessness, Stress, and I want to compete damn it....

Well the past three weeks have been an emotional roller coaster to say the least, I've been thrown through the ringer and on top of it all I just want to sign up for a couple races and get some primal rage out of the system.

Three weeks ago my parents lost their house. A friend of the family offered us a place to crash while he vacations on the coast for the summer so that was an exceptional act of kindness on the part of him and his family. I'm still planning on moving out but to know I've got a semi stable roof over my head while I scrounge together a security deposit is a good thing. I've had some anger and resentment building and it was approaching a head but thankfully I didn't do anything too rash.

Josie got married last weekend and found out she is expecting a baby girl.


After Josie's wedding my car's battery died so I was left car less and homeless in the same week. Without the car ( which was storing my bike) there was no way I was going to get to the pool or go for rides so my training nosed dived as did my endorphins leading to a massive break down on Tuesday night.

I spent some time with the GF but I had a mini melt down mid-week. Seriously this girl should be up for the medal of honor for having to deal with my crap. essentially my breakdown was I felt unworthy of her. The breakdown went along the lines of she comes from a decent fairly stable family. She has worries that would be considered more or less normal. She cute, she's smart, she's emotionally stable what does she want with a freak like me that's homeless, car less and living off the stop and shop 2 for $0.89 Ramen Special, when she could have a strong, stable, financially secure gentleman ( read : Angry Runner.) that could buy her anything her heart desires annd give her the time attention and stability every girl should have. So essentially I just sort of broke down because I felt like she could do better than me. Which led to a whole long tearful conversation which I will not discuss here but essentially that girl is a keeper.

My plans to keep my perfect steak alive at the Patriot Tri came to a violent end as I looked at the bank account this morning and there was no way I was going to swing the $200 entry fee. I still have meek hope for the Griskus Olympic but I've got to see what hits the account overnight. Despite all the crap that has happened to me in the last 3 weeks I still want to race. I'm a triathlete it's what I do. It's in my blood. For too long I've sat round as a whiny bitch I've got nothing left to lose so I should go out and make my competition pay for my pain and pay dearly.
People have always marveled that I can take the beating of half and full ironman's pretty well, essentially it's because the physical doesn't hurt as much as the mental. I mean you run a marathon your legs cramp tough shit. I'd rather run 3 marathons back to back than to try to keep the stoic face and try to keep it together on the outside like I've had for the last couple of months. People speak of mental toughness, I'll be the first to say I'm not mentally tough I just know I've got to get up in the morning and go to work, and try to do something. I sulk, I bitch but I got to keep moving though I feel like I can't. There were days still are days I look at my situation and feel hopeless, but I still get up and still keep doing what I have to do, because nothing is going to change if I sit on my butt crying and watching CSI dvds all week.
So I really want to compete this year...maybe because it's an escape of the torture daily life has become or maybe it's my way of "sticking it to the man" I've got talent and somedays it feels good to know you just laid the smack on the guy with a $10k P-4, a $200/month training plan, personal massuse, thearpist for his cat, and the executive challenge grab bag hanging from his handle bars. It makes the ramen taste a little better and go down a little smoother on Monday afternoon.

R.D.