The First Goal

I am not generally an ambitious person, but I am very goal oriented. That is, without a goal I have endless ability to procrastinate, make excuses, and otherwise drift along without accomplishing much of anything.

To combat that tendency, I knew I needed to find myself a tangible goal to keep me honest in my training. Not the vague "someday" goal of not only training for but also finding the money to add another trip for a Disney race before my annual pass expires in March of next year, but something that is right in front of me, looming on my calendar as a constant reminder to keep me focused.

Today, my daughter found that goal for me.

The 10th annual running of the Save the Manatee 5K.

Mommy brag time: My daughter is a brilliant, driven girl, active in so many things and with a clear goal for her future that she's had in her mind since she was very young. She wants to major in biology with an emphasis on marine biology and conservation. She absolutely fell in love with the manatees in The Living Seas pavilion at Epcot on one of our first Disney trips. Even before that she knew she wanted to work with animals when she grew up, but that was the start of a great fascination with the plight of marine mammals as their habitats see ever increasing human traffic. On our last trip to Florida, we even braved an unseasonably frigid 40° morning to kayak along a spring-fed river and see manatees in their natural habitat.

So when she came across the Save the Manatee 5K in doing research for a school presentation I knew we were going to have to register. I mean, what are the odds that we'd find a manatee conservation fundraiser that is held in Michigan, 1100 miles from the nearest manatee? And that it would be a 5K, scheduled for just about 2 months from now... more than enough time to train but still near enough to keep the pressure on. It is  the perfect first race for us.

On Saturday, May 18 I'll be running my first 5K. It isn't timed but I'm shooting for a 15 minute mile pace, since that's what I need to achieve for a Disney race. The course is through a very pretty and entirely flat park, so it really is ideal for a first event, and I am very much looking forward to it.