Keep crossing that finish line

Just like countless others, I'm struggling to make sense of it all.  The usual questions....who would do such a thing?  Why would they do such a thing?  How could they do such a thing?  And of course, we are offered the usual lack of answers.  I don't say that flippantly   I mean honestly, how could something like this, something so unreasonable, be reasonably explained?

And now we add the question, why a marathon?  Why something so pure and harmless that does nothing but promote life, happiness and celebrates the human spirit?  And why choose the time when it was mostly the weekend athletes crossing as their friends and families cheered them in?  These everyday people; our brothers, our neighbors, our extended running family that we have never met?

We train.  We run.  We test ourselves in these grand events and we each do it for our own reasons.  Running is so many things to me.  It keeps me fit.  It keeps me sane.  It introduced me to a new way of life, new friends.  It keeps me alive in so many ways.  Some run for the pure joy it brings.  Some run to celebrate life.  Some run to remember loved ones.  Some run to even save lives.  And now?

Well, now we will all run to honor the lives lost and lives forever altered in Boston.  Don't stop running.  We're endurance athletes....we know how to be strong, to be resilient, we know how to be in it for the long haul.  They need us to keep going.  They need us to keep crossing that finish line.

I want to cross that finish line.  I want to cross for those who can't.  I want to cross for those whose spirit may be shaken.  And I especially want to cross for whomever decided it was a good idea to place explosives in trash cans.  Yes.  I want to run for YOU.  Because I want to show YOU that we WILL keep going.  The best way to get me to do something? Go ahead and tell me I can't.

Join me.  Refuse to let that finish line symbolize loss.  Let it symbolize life.

Don't let them tell us we can't.