Birthdays

I have heard that the points of highest stress for NASCAR drivers is not while they are moving at ridiculously fast speeds but, instead, while they are sitting in the pit. I believe it!

Today is Pit Day for me and all of my AV200 friends. While in the pit, we start wondering what possessed us to commit to riding 200 miles on a bicycle. We start wondering if we did enough on the fundraising front. We think about the people we are riding to help and feel like there's no way to do enough. We kick ourselves for eating those coconut cakes, cinnamon roles and Girl Scout cookies (but only for a second!) We wonder if we'll make it.

Today is also my birthday. My friends and colleagues know that I LOVE birthdays, celebrate them for at least a month and don't mind telling you it is my birthday. Unlike my Grandmama, who used to make up an age and even confused her doctors, I see each birthday as another milestone in life. My other Granny was a wedding cake caterer and made magical birthday cakes representing my theme for the year. She never questioned my choices from Cinderella to Cowboys and Indians and various things in between. Each birthday is a gift and perhaps sometimes even a symbol of surviving another year. Personally, I will take each one I get and be happy. 

On my birthday, I also remember friends and family who hit the end of the birthday runs way before I wanted them too. Like most of you, I have felt the pain of losing people way too soon - from cancer, from car accidents, from suicide, from heart failures, from AIDS and various other ending battles. As I sit in this Birthday/Pit Day Friday, my engine gets revved up for one of those groups. Dang it - we're going to find a vaccine for AIDS or at least go out swinging.

Tomorrow, I will ride for Gray. I never met him but feel like I did. His birthdays ended a few years ago. It might not have if access to medications had been an easier route. That makes me sad. That makes me mad. That makes me ride. I will not be riding at a NASCAR pace by any means - but I'll be happy and comfortable bringing up the rear in the caboose section and sponsoring a Gray party for any other riders who wish to join me!

Happy Birthday, everyone, on whatever day is yours!!