Jem Publishing

The other day, I had the honour (or not, depending on your view) of meeting a well-known, high-powered politician here in Tassie. (So a nobody then? Glad we sorted that out.) Actually, I met a bunch of them. All the sitting members of a particular party. The big wigs. The movers and shakers. The connected. The suits.

I felt right at home in my cargo shorts and singlet top.

These were powerful men and women … and they knew it. And I was little old me … and I knew it.

Now, without opening the whole political can of worms, I will say this group of politicians represented a party I tend to lean away from. I find it a challenge to agree with their doctrine … and a couple of specific policies I am vehemently against. But, hey, in essence (especially at a State level) I am a swinging voter … so I’ll hear what everyone has to say!

So here I am, sitting at a laptop in a small room with a colleague working on a project. The bunch of suits wander in – they don’t all fit, the room is too small. One or two are just poking their heads in the door. If they weren’t so serious, stuffy and stuck up I would have laughed out loud. It looked comical.

They knew my colleague and shook his hand. I was introduced to everyone as “Em”. That’s it, just “Em”.

Riiiiiight.

So, I don’t matter? Strangely, that’s fine by me because I don’t really want to matter to these people. Not on a personal level.

I imagine the lack of elaboration on my name or my role was a protective thing because my surname (not me) is rather strongly associated with the other major political party in Tasmania and that would have just been awkward, right?

I shake the hand of the party’s Big Guy and do you know what I get? Barely the ends of his fingers! Like a tiny little bit of hand, not a proper handshake at all.

What’s with that??

I figured I must have had Other Party written all across my face and he didn’t want to get any on him.

Seriously?! Why do some men do that? Blokes will give other blokes nice firm handshakes. Proper ones, that actually say:

“I am pleased to meet you and to show you how much I respect you as a person I will now share with you the full force of the germs on my hand.”

With women though it seems to be:

“I’m a big powerful bloke. If I shake your hand in the regular way I may crush your dainty bones with my amazing masculine strength. So here, have a floppy fingertip shake.”

Yuk.

In all honesty, my suspicions were confirmed and I was suitably unimpressed.

My training for the Burnie 10 was going really well … a couple of weeks ago.

Sure, I wasn’t going to set the world on fire, but I was aiming for around the 55mins mark … a time that is just a tad slower than my best time Burnie 10 … when I was in high school. And significantly fitter.

Then I got the flu.

Bloody kids, when you want them to share their toys they turn into possessionist Nazis … when you want them to keep their snot to themselves they decide to share.

Unfortunately I went down like a sack of spuds and spent amost a week in bed. I managed to hit recovery in time for the weekend’s RYL2 in Anglesea and was able to go … but it was a bad idea (health-wise) and I went downhill again.

However, it’s amazing what a week of antibiotics will do, and this morning I took my place on the start line (along with 5000 of my closest friends) to run the 10km out-and-back course.

I went in with absolutely no expectations and no pressure (from myself or others). And I also went in with my friend’s 9-year-old daughter. We had decided to run together. It was the best thing I could have done, in my un-trained condition, because I allowed all my focus to be on G, instead of on me. I wasn’t running a race, I wasn’t aiming for a time, I didn’t even take my sports watch. It was just G and I trying to get around the course as best we could. No pressure.

It was the first time G had run 10km and she did a fabulous job. The whole time, we just talked about how proud we were going to be to get over the finish line – how proud I was of her, and how proud she should be of herself (because that’s what matters most). She talked about how she was going to tell her PE teacher at school and what she’d say.

And we counted down the kilometres.

We walked when she needed to, we stopped at the toilets when she needed to, we drank at every drinks station and I poured water on her head when she got hot.

And we counted down the kilometres.

But mostly we were quiet … we were just doing our thing, lost in our thoughts. Me, with my rhythmic stride, and G plodding along beside me – her little legs doing twice as much work as my long legs, and with no rhythm whatsoever!! We’d talk occassionally and set mini goals, or we’d urge each other along as we saw each distance marker.

And we counted down the kilometres.

Just before the nine-kilometre mark we decided there would be no more walking until we crossed the line. Just do our thing, don’t think about how tired we were, how hungry we were, how much our feet and legs hurt. Our legs were heavy by this stage …  I have to say I’d about had enough.

(Note to self: I need to work on muscular endurance … the lungs held up fine, the legs couldn’t keep up.)

As we turned into Mount St and headed up the final hill to the finish line, we felt a surge of pride and happiness from completing this thing together. I’m so glad we ran together – for me it was so much more uplifting that if it had just been me and my iPod.

Thanks G … no more kilometres to count!!

I’ll sleep well tonight.

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