CHOICES......

So this race season did not go as PLANNED...as if you can ever really plan life. I opened up with a decent to fair race in New Orleans and then trained pretty hard all summer for the upcoming fall races in Augusta and Miami. Somewhere about late July /Early August a seed was planted in my head out of nowhere that with school in session I could not be a racer and an effective homeschooler of FOUR.. both in the same body. Now many people juggle many things but what I could not seem to wrap my head around was doing both things WELL. I was not willing to school my children without giving them 100% of myself intellectually and creatively....yet on the other hand I have the inability to approach a 70.3 or most any race with the attitude of I just want to finish or I am just doing this for fun. So as I weighed all of this out in my mind ....I came to the conclusion that I must choose one or the other.....so of course I choose my children. There really was no choice to be made but it sure felt like choosing. I was very "down" for awhile as I really love racing and was so "race Ready" at the time of this decision but the races were still 6 to 12 weeks away and something had to give. The lesson learned is I need to set up my 2012 race season differently...I need to utilize ALOT of my summer...even if it means stacking races a little closer than normal....I need to relish in the time I allow my self to race because my race season is SHORT. Fortunately, I really enjoy the training aspect and can still indulge in that aspect every or most mornings between 5 and 8 AM.......So I am looking forward to 2012 from a racing perspective....but I cherish every day with my children as that season of my life will end all too quickly. At the end of the day the resounding thought in my mind was this...."It is their time" meaning that when I was a child my parents supported, nourished and participated in all my sports and activities as busy and time consuming as it was.....and as I look back that is a gift beyond words....so I want to give nothing less to the four children that I have so that when they look back one day they will feel as if they were given the same gift of limitless time, love and support in their childhoods. Choices.....