You know how sometimes you do something just to prove to yourself that you can?
Like, if you can make it through this one challenge, then everything else in your life seems easier. All of life’s struggles and challenges don’t seem quite so insurmountable. You take on these ridiculous things so that nobody can ever tell you that you can’t do something. You can do anything.
Ok. So today was not that.
What happened today was Rogue and Fall Risk and I gave Tiny Brazilian TWENTY SIX opportunities to agree to defer. Twenty six times we tried to get her to say, “Yeah, let’s not do this bullshit today. Let’s just defer and do this next year.”
Because at least one of us is gonna have to do this bullshit next year anyway.
Because my son had substitute parenting responsibilities. And couldn’t make it. So he had to defer. And someone is gonna have to run that shit with him next year.
Me. I’m someone.
Rogue, upon hearing me explain this, said: See. I wanna say this is it for me. But I know it’s not. It’s not over for me.
Because she knows there’s no way in hell I’m not gonna make her go with me.
But TB refused to defer. And obviously we weren’t gonna let her go through this Beast alone.
So there we were. Standing in the cold. And rain. Waiting to get into this dumbass venue. To run this stupid race.
Today was, quite simply, bullshit.
And, I mean, we knew it would be, didn’t we?
Because Rogue and I together? In North Carolina?
We woke up to this.
Which is apparently quite lovely when you’re the one person staying at the house and napping as you wait for Sunday’s perfect Sprint weather.
But when you’re the dumbasses heading out to run a beast, it’s pure bullshit.
As we approached the registration tent, Rogue tried one more time.
We’ve got about ten seconds left to defer…
No?
Fine.
Registration dude asked me to sign for my daughter. Tiny Brazilian.
Ummm, what???
Dude. I’m 45. She’s fucking 40. No. Not my child.
Got to the starting line with four minutes to spare.
And then the real bullshit began.
Mud.
So much mud.
Maybe not Charlotte Shit Show mud. But still. So much mud.
And so much climbing. Which. Cool. We like mountains. We’re good at the climbing.
But you have to go back down the other side.
And remember the mud?
You can’t just run down the side of a mud-covered mountain.
You’ll die.
So what happens here is you have to kind of crab walk down. Except your hands and feet are still probably gonna get away from you at some point.
And you have absolute zero control over the trajectory your body’s taking as you just take off down the mud slide. And you maybe end up spinning around. Sliding backwards. Looking back at Rogue and TB. With a look that can only be described as acceptance.
Thankfully the people I went careening into grabbed me. As I was bouncing off and about to continue on down the mountain. Just pinballing off of people. And trees. And rocks.
Which is probably why I spent most of the race with my right ass cheek hanging out. Of my ripped pants.
And that tear just got wider with every obstacle we went through.
And just because Eldest Child didn’t go, doesn’t mean that I wasn’t dropped from on top of an obstacle straight onto my back.
Because every fucking race.
“Oh man, you ok??”
Yeah. Not my first time.
And as I was bear crawling up the next hill, I almost screamed at the folks around me, “I swear to fuck I’m gonna throat punch the first person that tells J-Vicious he was right to make me practice this bullshit so much.” Because I was killing it getting up that hill.
But I realized that none of the people around me probably know J-Vicious. And probably don’t need me screaming obscenities at them.
At one point, Tiny Brazilian was just chugging along and some dude was like, “You make it look so easy.”
Don’t let her fool you, man. She’s been whining the whole fucking time just like the rest of us.
Because the fucking rain.
And the temperature was dropping.
And we couldn’t feel our hands. Or use them.
So by the time we got to the cargo net climb at the end, the terror was real.
Because as I was climbing up behind Rogue and TB. Just trying to maintain a grasp on the net. With my useless hands. To avoid falling 50 feet. Or however high up we were. Because I was pretty sure I’d actually break my back on a fall like that. The last climbers made it to the top. The climbers who were keeping the net taught enough to provide some stability. Which caused all of the slack to return to the netting. Sending me slamming into the center of it.
And the same experience coming down the other side.
Fucking terrifying.
Which is why. When we walked up to the fire jump. I just stepped the fuck over it.
Because I was. Over it.
So were Rogue and TB.
Just give me my medal. And my shirt. And my stupid meat-flavored potato chips. And get me to the car.
And while we were all naked outside of the car. Because just so much mud. I at least bothered to put on pants before getting in.
And driving us back to the condo.
Where Fall Risk had coffee. And food. And heat. For us.
Because she knows. We’ve gotta go back out in that bullshit tomorrow. For her.
And our damn Trifectas.
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