"Father Time is Undefeated"

Have you ever felt as though radio announcers were speaking to you? Lately that has been the case with me. A couple of weeks ago I was driving to a race early on a Saturday morning when a sports talk show host was talking about Payton Manning, the quarterback for the Denver Broncos. Manning's game performance has seemingly declined rapidly. His comment really made an impact on me just because of the way I was feeling driving to the race and actually have been feeling for a while. He said, "Old age gets a hold of you and won't let go". While it was a simple comment it struck me as profound simply because I have been feeling that old age has in fact got a hold of me and darn sure isn't letting go.

I mentioned in a prior post that I had banged my knee on a trailer hitch the end of September and that it was still sore and even affecting my gait from time to time but I am able to run through it. Well it's another month later and the knee doesn't seem to be getting worse but it also doesn't seem to be getting better. It's ironic in a sense that it would be a knee bothering me because for years doctors have been surprised that I ran as much as I do and have for so many years with no negative knee issues. So the combination of the sore knee, the coldest November here since 2000 and probably some Seasonal Affect Disorder issues has me wondering how much longer I want to be running and racing. The answer remains at least for now that I want to keep doing it as long as I am able. 

Yesterday I was out early doing errands that I wanted to get done while a) it warmed up some and b) I talked myself into getting out to run and I heard Jim Rome on his show talking about Kobe Bryant's retirement after this season. His comment, "Father Time is undefeated". 

With all that being said, I've got six races scheduled for December so hopefully they will be the motivation to get through another month. For the record I had a decent month of racing in November despite "feeling" old. I even won a chicken for finishing 2nd in the 60+ age group at the Turkey Trot in Turlock. It was good!

With all that being said I am very grateful to still be running and the friends and family that I share running experiences with. In particular my daughter Stacie and son in law Tom and a group of four friends in Colorado, Robert Spell, Gerald Romero, Joe Brazil and Walter Miller. I always try to run at least one race with Tom and one with Stacie when I visit wherever they are living and have had a lot of fun experiences as a result. Additionally Joe comes out once a year or so and we turn his trip into a running adventure with a lot of side activities mixed in. Finally I try to get to Colorado at least once a year for what the five of us call a Reunion Run and those have been fun. Maybe that's part of the reason I've been more frustrated than I should be with the knee I don't want it to get so bad that I have to stop running. Oh well, time will tell and if it does happen then it will just have to be on to a new adventure. In the meantime, I'll just keep running and racing.