Meet a SoleMate: Holly Jamin

Holly Jamin is a Girls on the Run coach at Kennard who ran as a SoleMate for the Chicago Marathon in 2009 and GO! St. Louis in 2011.  She’s a Superstar!  She speaks eloquently to the power of running with a group, running for a cause, running for yourself, and “saving the world in my own little head several times over.”  Here is her thank you letter to her runners and donors before the Chicago Marathon.

“In six days, I will run 26.2 miles.

Twenty weeks I’ve trained for this. Twenty Saturdays I’ve woken up at 5 and pulled on my shorts and my shoes and my ponytail holder. I’ve scraped the sleep from my eyes and tiptoed out my front door to join my group for yet another “long” one. Twenty Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays, I’ve run from my bed, my office, my children, my clients, my dirty dishes, my couch, and my crazy busy life, all of which called to me “come back, you nut! there’s no time for running today!”

But I ran. And I learned a few things along the way.

I learned that pre-dawn darkness is not so scary when you’re wearing running shoes. That nothing smells sweeter than fresh bread baking at 5:30AM at Missouri Baking on the Hill. And that some moms in bathrobes still do walk their sleepy-but-crisply-ironed husbands to their chevy malibus in the mornings, with lunchbox and thermos exchanged for kisses in doorways at 6 in the morning. (Mom, I miss you!)

That nothing smells more putrid than O’Connell’s at 7AM, when you accidentally take a deep breath as the sun rises over last night’s beer bottles and corned beef bits in the alley dumpsters. And nothing smells more delectable than that very same spot at 1 in the afternoon—fresh burgers grilling, onion rings in the fryer, ice cold air and cheer spilling out on the sidewalk from a heavy wooden door.

And that the animals at the zoo talk to each other before the sun comes up. Once I heard the monkeys laughing at something (me, probably) and a bear shouted across the park something like “go back to sleep, you crazy monkeys!” Then an elephant chimed in like Archie Bunker, and a toucan told me to just keep going.

I’ve learned that people are good, really. Helpful and kind mostly. Even the ones who yell from car windows or bikes things like: “get on the sidewalk you idiot!” or “get off the bike path….!” Helpful and kind, yes.

I’ve learned that bellmen are godsends and share cell phones and fancy restrooms, even with penniless people drenched in sweat, and shamed by a long run cut short by that peg leg problem at mile 14. I’ve learned that friends come back for you and pretend they wanted to walk too, or they leave you protein shakes on your car hood for when you finally finish that four-hour 18 miler.

What this training has done for my health, my girls, my team, and my soul is priceless. Thank you for supporting me. Whether you donated to my charity, let me brag about all the miles I’ve logged, ran next to me, wondered “when that race was again,” asked about my peg leg problems, or just reacted appropriately when I said things like “I’ll get back to you about that because right before this business meeting? I RAN 13 MILES.”

I’m so proud that I’ve trained for this marathon. It was not easy to borrow so much time from my life. It was not easy to run when I wanted to sleep or had worked until 2 the night before. But I did it. Twenty weeks–check. I will not win this race by any means—I won’t even finish in under four hours–but I’ve saved the world in my own little head several times over. There’s plenty of time to think out there, cursing your way up long, steep, stinky and sweet St. Louis streets for 20 weeks.

I so enjoyed the climb. And to quote my friend Sam, “that hill was delicious.”

Love,

Holly