I am literally living under a cloud right now. It rained last night and the marine layer still presses down on Orange County. It looks like it will burn off soon enough. The sun will shine and I will head on over to the local to sip a couple IPA's and read a book. I won't really talk to anyone but I like being around the noise. We had our track banquet yesterday and I got several gift cards to Board & Brew as a coach's gift. No time like the present to put them to work.
There is an efficiency to the annual banquet. By tradition, each coach has a small gift bag with their name on it. This is placed on a side table. Athletes can drop in a card or a note for us to take home. I spent the evening on the back porch opening those words of thanks, reading each card two or three times. I lived under a different sort of cloud the last four years, that of a spouse diagnosed with cancer and the disease's daily insults. My constant through all this was my daily trips to coach my athletes. It gave me purpose and joy. Sometimes Calene came with me to the Saturday long run, chatting with the athletes as if nothing was wrong. Every night when I came home from practice she would ask about the runners by name, wondering how the workout went. Now and again I would wonder if I should stop coaching and Calene actually got angry that I even entertained that thought.
You wonder a lot about the future when your life partner isn't around anymore. It's disorienting. I have a book that just came out. I don't know what the next book will be. I feel very fallible, my weaknesses suddenly glaring in the silence of solitude. Navigating the years to come feels scary. I'm trying to dream but the dreams still revolve around Callie. I keep waiting for her to come back. There's a pile of laundered and folded clothes of hers on the big chair in the bedroom. They've been sitting there for eight weeks. I can't bear to put them away, imagining her voice saying she'll take care of it in the morning.
So last night I opened all those notes from my runners and felt a surge of joy. They know me well, all my moods and demands. They said the nicest, most affirming things. I was lifted up in an amazing way. I basked in their kindness and chuckled at their insider memories of our time together. I leaned into the love. This is my twenty-first year coaching. I love to win and I revel in seeing my runners do something they never thought they could do.
But winning is secondary to the daily connection. That back and forth. Encouraging during a hard workout. High fives and dad jokes. That encouragement obviously goes two ways, as those wonderful thank you notes showed. Calene knew I needed these runners. I think she was adamant I keep coaching because she knew I would be going this alone, and the daily act of driving to the school and clicking the stopwatch would help me find my way out from under the cloud and into the sunshine.
So thank you to all my runners. I cherish your kindness and swagger and insecurities. The best is yet to come.