Friends

Do you know what is quite fabulous? Friends. Girlfriends to be exact. In the last few weeks I have been lucky enough to spend time with girlfriends from many points in my life: some high school friends, college friends, work friends, “mom” friends, and triathlon friends (AKA retired greyhounds). Let me just say that I am blessed to have so many amazing ladies in my life.

This past weekend, specifically, I stepped back into my college, pre-mom days, for a bachelorette party. And this party was the real deal, complete with a fancy suite at the Motor City Casino, pre-Tigers game drinks at Cheli’s (with a table hand-picked by Chris Chelios himself!), Tigers Den seats for the Tigers vs. Red Sox game, dancing at a club after the game, and then back to the hotel at 2:00am. Whoa. I’m tired all over again just listing it out! It was such a fun time. Admittedly, however, I was left feeling exhausted on Sunday and realizing that that type of event should probably be a once a year occurrence for me at this point in my life. (You know, the “what was I thinking!?” self talk that occurs right before a 3 hours nap!)

By Sunday night I was experiencing the need to get back in the swing of things and recharge my energy for the upcoming week of being a stay at home mom. (Make a plan and stick to it!) So I sent a group text out (with fingers crossed) to my triathlon friends to see if anyone was up for a “crack of dawn” run the next day (I really wasn’t sure that I could get myself out of bed on my own). Sure enough, I had a taker!  Setting the alarm for 5:12am didn’t bother me one bit knowing that I was getting up to hang out with a great friend. And 8 hours later we were running through the woods, sharing stories of weekend fun, summer plans, work stresses, and race plans. I can’t think of anything I would have rather been doing at 6:00am this morning.

My friends are my motivation. They get me moving when I would rather stay in bed. They sign up for races with me to force me to stick to a training plan. They even remind me that I am still young and fun!  And they always lift me up when I’m feeling down. These are the type of friends that we all need.