run.

“Archy, archy, archy,” I’m awoken by Pooperson’s cranky old lady barks. I tap my FitBit to see what time it is. The glowing screen displays that its 3:34 am. Yep, it’s Pooperson’s bewitching hour. Even on Saturday, she’s consistent. Pooperson is either angry at the birds roosting in the holly tree outside our window, there’s a bug somewhere in her proximity, or she can see the deer grazing in our side yard. Regardless, I get up before Quiggles starts his low, trying-oh-so-hard-to-be-manly chest growl.
 
I walk down my hickory staircase. Two fuzzy blurs pass me before I reach the landing. I open the back door and whoosh, they’re gone. I’m sure Pooperson will do a perimeter check with Quiggles right on her heels. I drag myself back upstairs, successfully navigating around the bench at the foot of the bed following the narrow carpet between my side and the fireplace.
 
I plop down in bed, grabbing my down comforter to snuggle against my chest. I can hear Jason’s rhythmic breathing somewhere over to my right. “How does he do that? How does he always sleep through Pooperson’s tantrums?” I think.  
 
Just one more hour before my alarm goes off. “I’m committed to this. I’ve verbalized this. People will know if I don’t do this. Therefore, I will do this!” my mantras begin. Today, I’m going to run. Yep, today will be my first half marathon since the catastrophe known as the Savannah Rock and Roll Marathon of 2015. Let’s just say the city of Savannah was ill equipped to handle 40,000 runners and a November heat wave.  But before I even have time to relive that race or all the months of long distance training that led to that disappointment, my alarm began echoing on my bathroom vanity.
 
Next thing I know, I’m back out of bed, turning off my cell phone alarm. Outside, I can still hear Aussie and Quigley (yes, these are their birth names but their nicknames are many) outside giving whatever poor creature hell with Aussie’s consistent “archy, archy” followed by Quiggles’s low chest tuffs. 
 
Back downstairs I trudge for my much needed injection of caffeine. I let the kids back in. Quigley pauses to let me wipe the mud off of his paws. Aussie’s a little more dramatic with her entrance, trying so hard to tell me how she just saved our home from some natural intruders, probably a fuzzy family of fluffy bunnies.
 
I wait for my first cup of coffee to percolate while the internal battle of wits begins. “Natalie, you will do this!” the encouraging corner of my mind starts off, trying to beat the rest of my mind to the punch line. “But what if you can’t?” Negative Nancy interjects. (Don’t you just hate her, your internal Negative Nancy?) “What if you don’t finish?” “What if you can’t finish?” Even worse, “What if you slow down and are forced to (gasp) walk it?” Oh the horror! (Now you can see where Pooperson gets her flair for the dramatics.)

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