Yesterday morning I was woken up bright and early (7:30am to be exact…early for a weekend!) by the sound of this song blasting outside our apartment.
It was the morning of the Chicago Marathon and not only does the course pass by each end of our block, the corner closest to our apartment has a performance stage set up at the intersection. Which means that every year the same group of fabulous men sets up shop there and performs routines to the likes of Christina Aguilera and Madonna the entire time the marathoners are running by… and, well… I kind of love it (except for the part about my bedroom sounding like a club at 7am on a Sunday. Thankfully though – I’m a sucker for the marathon, so I get over that pretty quickly.)
As soon as I heard all the noise I rushed to get dressed and get my butt out the door (with camera in hand, obviously). A large crowd had already gathered and they were awaiting the front runners who would be coming any minute. The energy of the event is just insane to me (in a good way). If I were ever to run another marathon (which I don’t think is going to happen – as in – not even remotely a chance it will happen) it would be the Chicago marathon. I mean – there are people everywhere cheering runners on! It nearly brings me to tears every time I witness it. (I think part of it may be that I’m a complete sap to begin with… but another part is that having run a marathon myself – I know how much it means to have people encouraging you along the long…. loooong…. LONG route.)
One of my favorite parts about watching it where I do is seeing the runners’ reactions to the men performing on our corner. Each person turns to look where the music is coming from, and then they see it — grown men, grinning ear to ear, dancing their asses off with ‘rifles’ — and the runners’ faces just *light up*. Some of them clap, some pump their fists in the air, some yell ‘thank you’ and wave…. most importantly, all of them seem to appreciate it. Every time I saw this interaction yesterday – runners taking note, followed by the guys smiling and dancing even more fiercely in return – I got choked up. Like seriously choked up to the point where I needed to pull my sh*t together and stop myself before I looked like a lunatic for crying over gay men dancing with fake guns for marathon runners. Really? Who cries about that?! I do, apparently. (Maybe it’s the climate recently – with all the terribly sad news about gay teens committing suicide. The interactions I witnessed yesterday gave me a glimmer of hope perhaps. Complete strangers of all races, ages and backgrounds interacting and appreciating each other regardless of their differences. Cheering each other on… it was something to see.)
Anyway – when I wasn’t trying to stop myself from crying – I was snapping quite a few pics of all the action…
Congrats to all those who completed the marathon yesterday – such a fantastic accomplishment!!! 🙂
…
