The Tests of Friendship

I have a dear friend.
She has a great sense of humor.
She has determination, grit, spunk, humor. She is kind. Her kids are friends with mine. That is an amazing feat in of itself, considering they nicknamed one of my children after the Terminator. We garage sale together.
We laugh together.
But she has learned one thing we don't do together anymore is run.
I love the idea of running. I love the fantasy that flashes through my mind's eyes once or twice a year. Running, alone, no kids, the pavement, the exertion...
However, I am not a teenager anymore. I haven't run consistently in a loooong time.
I have no desire to go through the pain I would have to go through to get there.
I will admit a couple of months ago, every night at 1130 I was having this deep desire to go run. One night, hubby was home and I just decided to go run. His jaw hit the floor. It was great. I did a whole mile never stopped. Felt great. Walked. Showered, went to bed. I could barely move the next day. The second day after was worse. My life doesn't stop while I recover from these crazy whims. My kids though proud of me, didn't like the sore grouchy mom they had around.

So this wonderful friend call me up and tells me she is in need of no children time. She needs adult time. OK. I am a mom, I get it, totally up for it! I even suggest Braums, ice cream is good. I knew her answer... NOOOO, she does no carbs, no sweets, no chocolate. I should be more like her.
"Lets go running." I laughed at her. OH, I laughed at her. Did I ever mention she is the cheerleader type. Super happy, cheerful, exuberant, encouraging, believes you can do it no matter how absolutely insane the idea is... YEP! That is my friend.
She knows I am not going to run, so she pulls out her wild card. You can ride a bike along with me while I run. Now, I won't mention how long it takes her to run a mile... just that slow and steady wins the race. She thinks I can keep pace with her on the bike. She just worries, I will fall over cause I am going so slow.
So thinking it will be a short trek through the neighborhood I agree.

So I borrow Fun Mom's bike, much to her dismay when she discovers later. I have yet to mention, when Fun Mom gets in one of her moods, I am a bit of a weenie and take the easiest way out. So this time, to make things a little bit more pleasant when she finds out, I haven't moved the gears or the seat. Well, Fun Mom is a bit SHORT in the leg department. Fun Mom is newly 14 and has the gears set to quite a challenging level.
This dear friend of mine, doesn't tell me until we are halfway, that oh, by the way, we are going to Dillons....
What ? ? ?
But by then, the ride is feeling good. My worst fear is crossing the highway.
All is good until 2 blocks from Dillons. My legs are getting a little tight.
"Know how far we are going?" I am asked.
I am guestimating 3 miles.
"Nope, I will tell you later." and she laughs, not a psychotic crazy laugh, but it might as well have been!

Now all would be good if we were riding through neighborhoods, but NOoOOOoooOOOO we are riding down one of the main streets in our neck of the woods. Not that there are hills in Kansas, but there are occassional inclines along the way. This cheerful, exuberant, fabulously ridiculous friend of mine is cracking jokes. We are making quite a site, me on my bike, she is riding along... and did I say the gears were set for QUITE a workout!

So we would inevitably get to one of those "inclines" when we were laughing so hard, how she could keep running, I had no idea, I looked like I had been sipping the Elderberry juice a bit too much. But I would get stuck, and start laughing all the more. Wouldn't you know, the cheerleader she is, would fall back behind me and start pushing, which would make me laugh all the more. All this is done on this super busy street, which got me to laughing all the more. Not a bit of pride is left in me at this point.

So we are halfway into the return stretch and the hurt is kicking in. I do not want to SIT on a bike anymore! But I don't want to look silly walking a bike home... NoooOOOOooo I don't want to look silly. Because I already look absolutely hysterical laughing and carrying on while trying to ride a bike that my running buddy is pushing from behind.

We finally return to my home. One hour and 24 minutes later. 7.25 miles later.
I could barely stand. I walk and walk and walk and walk. I had to walk more than I did after running. I had to sleep with ice packs all night.

I am laughing. I am crying. I only sit on nice cushy chairs. My knees feel like my sons whacked them with baseball bats.

I think I am done biking... To which the cheerleader says, but if you ride 13 more times, your body will have adjusted and it won't hurt so bad. This pain means you just need to do it more! Have I mentioned she is 7 years younger than me. My daughter turned 14 today. My husband told me I couldn't tell people I was 29 years old, because then he might have to go to jail. My kids have discovered that I am not mid-30s but late 30s now. Friends at church were shocked to hear I was even still in my 30's cause after all my daughter is starting high school next year. Aiy, it is good to have friends, even the young ones who help us to laugh at our aging selves.