PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

  I remember how I used to wake up every Sunday morning with my mother not being at home. There was no Sunday she wouldn’t go out to run, no matter if there was a storm outside, she would go out.  She had various pair of tennis shoes, but when competing she always wore a pair of blue Adidas. Every race, every competition she had them with her. It was as if the shoes provided her with some kind of superpowers to win. They were so special she didn’t let anyone clean them but herself, as if by the simplest touch of a stranger would take away their power. I must admit the pair went through a lot. They survived 3 marathons and many 5-10 kilometer long races than I can remember, until the day they scratched. We often told her to change shoes, that they would eventually be torn and wouldn’t be able to wear them sometime. Although she didn’t like the idea of not wearing her shoes, she didn’t pay attention to our advice. My mother wore them for 4 years without problems, no holes, no scratches, until that summer morning of 2009. A little hole the size of a 10 cent coin appeared out of the blue in the right shoe. We asked ourselves so make questions about it that day. My mother, although she was a bit sad about the situation, didn’t let it overwhelm her. She fixed them and continued to run with them, still winning but feeling more tired after each run. Was it age? Were the shoes loosing their powers? Neither of us knew. From arriving in the first place, she came in second, and time later third. She couldn’t keep up the pace of the other runners, passing her by race by race. The years passed and her condition lowered, slowing her down to the point she didn’t win any competition at all. But she was still running. In that point I learned why was she was doing this all along. I wasn’t about winning and finishing first, the new running mates and friendships formed nor the shoes, although she cherished them a lot, but the feeling of achievement of finishing what she started. No matter the weather conditions, she still went out and did it. The shoes just gave her confidence. All along she just wanted to finish the race, and still is today.