Building Steam With A Grain of Salt- DJ Shadow
Today marks my last day in the Twin Cities. Bright and early tomorrow I will board a nice jet plane back to Portland for roughly a week and a half to spend some time with my family. I will then begin my journey as an assistant coach at Eastern Washington University.
The last ten months have been a whirlwind. At this time last year I was thinking about moving to the Twin Cities to branch out and try something new with my life. It has been a great ten months in which I have learned a lot about myself and made many new friends. I always joked that the "real world" wasn't as big and bad as everyone made it sound, but you learn things once you are on your own. The friends you have always had were there because you surrounded yourself by people like you. When I moved here, I came with one or two friends in town. After that it was up to me to meet people through running and work. Finding friends in running was easy. The big reason is that everyone is just as "odd" as you are, and there is a lot to learn about someone over the course of a 10+ mile run. To have met the guys here that I did running was a real blessing. The are all classy and fun guys and I am glad I got the chance to meet them all.
Finding friends at work however, was a different task. The first job I had was filled with a lot of people who were twice my age. There is absolutely nothing wrong with them being that age, but the problem was they tried to treat me as though I was just a kid. Yes, I am only 25 and am younger than the people I worked with, but to treat me as though I know nothing is the problem. I will leave the stores name out of it out of respect, but I will say that I won't recommend it to people if they ask specifically. In May, just before leaving for Bloomsday, I was let go from the store. This turned out to be another blessing. Although it took me nearly a month to get a new job, I was able to be hired on at Marathon Sports. This was a complete 180 of a store from the previous job. At Marathon Sports, we had a range of age and abilities. There were also guys that I could run with during the week either before or after the job, which is always a plus. The general mood of the store was awesome. I won't forget the people here even though it was only for two short months.
Now for the sad part. As I write this I am only about 17 hours away from catching a flight back home. Tomorrow at this time I will probably be at my parents house hanging out with my family for the next week and a half. This will be much needed. As much as this journey was something I have enjoyed, I have not enjoyed not being able to see my family as much as I would like to. My family is everything and always will be. After that I will move back to Spokane to begin getting ready for the upcoming cross country season. Although we will have a young team this year, I expect big things. My goal is to help take the team to top 10 finishes in the West Region in the up coming years.
As for this journey, it is not over. Some could say it was a detour or a speed bump in my life, but I would prefer to say that I took the scenic route to find something else. Minnesota has been a wonderful experience and I won't be able to stay away. Odds are I will come out for any of the races I can and visit all the great friends I have made here. To all of you who have made it that incredible journey, I thank you. And to my Pacific Northwest friends, I will see you soon.
Go EAGS!
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