Yesterday Ben and I ran a 5k race at Gallaudet University. Ben's friend Mark helped to organized the race. We wanted to support Mark, plus the race was conveniently located a half a mile away from our house.
My new shoes / my favorite running shoes ever. I really like what Under Armour is doing in the running shoe and basketball shoe space. Nike hears footsteps running up behind them.
This was my first race ever (minus the junior high cross country days). I don't agree entirely with the idea of PAYING MONEY to run since it seems like people should pay me to run. Anyway, I was just happy to be surrounded by a few hundred people for my Saturday morning jog.
This guy, on the other hand, was in it to win it. Ben hasn't gone running in the past six months, yet he was determined to be competitive. He went for three practice runs earlier in the week and then went all out on Saturday. He finished 15th out of 257, while running a 7:04 mile pace. Speaking of going all out, his breakfast came out just past the finish line. No pain, no gain, right?It was interesting to get a tiny snapshot into another world during the event. We live next to the hub for deaf culture in America and Mark, Ben's friend/gym buddy, has been a great connector. It kills Ben to not be able to communicate with other people, hence his love of languages, so he has been learning sign language. He has also read a couple of books on the history of deaf culture in America. Thanks to Ben, I've had a lot of second hand exposure to deaf culture, and yesterday I enjoyed meeting his new friends as much I enjoyed running the race (which turned out to be fun and worth every penny).
2 comments:
Bendrea--I'm impressed. Ben, I'm impressed with your awesome time. Way to give it your all! Andrea, I'm impressed that you did a 5k since running isn't on your top 10 things to do for fun:).
Race? Yuck, even to get a better handle on deaf culture. I actually took sign language for a few semesters in high school and college. I made friends with a guy who had lost his hearing in his teens on account of getting wasted and jumping off a building -- we had phone conversations via a TTY/operator which was very interesting. I also went to some closed-captioned movies and Sacrament meeting at a deaf ward to get further into deaf culture. The thing I wasn't expecting was how very, very LOUD those events are...never heard a movie theater or chapel that loud. It was really cool, such a visual experience to watch people interact. They are so physically expressive. My cousin is an ASL interpreter in DC, so if any of your new friends need assistance: http://audreybastian.com/
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