Tired

I fully intended to get some speedwork in today but that idea fell through when I awoke this morning and was just as tired as I was when I went to bed the night before. It seems that I always go to bed later than I want and that I run out of time each evening. By the time I get home from work and fix dinner, it's between 7:30 and 8:00. Then it's at least an hour of CFA studying, taking me to 9:00 at which point I should start to get things together for the next day (lunch made, running clothes laid out if I'm running the next morning, etc), but usually I just want to chill out for a while. Then it's 10 and I'm behind the 8 ball to get to bed, which usually doesn't happen until closer to 11. That leaves just 6 sparse hours for sleep, when I would really prefer 8. But going to bed at 9 PM just seems obscene to me so in bed by 10 is more realistic.

Anyway, last night I was watching a special about the professor from Carnegie Mellon, Randy Pausch, who recently died after fighting pancreatic cancer. He's most famous for his "Last Lecture" at Carnegie Mellon, which I would encourage you to check out on You Tube. The interview was definitely worth staying up late to watch. If I ever have to face accelerated certain death (because really, we're all facing certain death if you think about it) from cancer or some other malady, I would hope I could do it with as much Zen-like strength as he did.

They talked to several people who had been inspired to embrace their lives after being diagnosed with their own illnesses or having confronted some other seemingly immovable obstacle in their lives, and I think they captured Randy's real message. It's not really dying with grace or dying well, but about what you do with the time left, that matters. To paraphrase John Keating, he squeezed the marrow out of life without choking on the bone. You could actually see him doing this at the end of the interview, when he spent the day at the Pittsburgh Steelers' training camp catching passes from Hines Ward and kicking field goals and talking to the players. As he was standing there, he looked around, savoring the moment with the look of a man who has the luxury and the terrible burden of knowing exactly when he is going to die and filling the pages in between with as much happiness and as many dreams as he can. Awesome.

Now, I realize that for most of us, it's not so easy to embrace that aspect of our minds. Without something as horrible as cancer staring us in the face, we always latch on to our more tangible responsibilities (bills, jobs, etc). I'm no different as you don't see me quitting my studying for the CFA so I can devote more time to my dream of visiting every major league baseball stadium at least once. But I think Randy is most inspirational to me because he never lost sight of those dreams (including being a professional football player) even as cancer shortened his life.

Anyway, it was worth watching and missing my workout this morning. I'll be out doing my sprints tomorrow, of course. Chasing my dream of that 7:00 mile pace that is so damn far away right now!