Two Down, Thirty-Eight to Go.

If you are a teacher, you would know immediately that I’m referring to the weeks in the school year. Yesterday marked the end of the first two weeks.

It’s a well-known fact that the first two weeks of school are the most important – for teachers and students. During that time, learning goals are established, respect is gained and the classroom dynamics for the next forty weeks of school are set. What happens in the first two weeks will determine what happens in the last two.

This, then, explains my absence from blogging in the past two weeks. Ironically, on each and every day of those two weeks, something in my world of running has happened that I wanted to write about. Time: it has the ultimate power over us.

I spoke with my class last week about setting goals. “Without goals,” I told them, “we don’t have a purpose. It doesn’t matter if your goals are academic, sports, musical, social – but you need to have goals.”

So now I am practising what I preach and have set a new goal: write at least four times a week. (And, in the same way, another goal is to run at least four times a week.) Like running, writing is an escape; it’s therapeutic; it allows me to connect with a circle of friends. I’m now juggling four balls in the air: work, family, running and writing.

But the thing that is going to pull them all together – this year, at least – is my training for the Boston Marathon! Yes, I registered on Monday and received my confirmation on Wednesday. The hotel is booked and I’m already trying to decide what to wear.