My purple shoed friend had to leave work early today. She is a co-op student who decided to accept a co-op term with my employer. I kind of feel like a surrogate mother. I keep telling her that it will all be ok. And that it really was a good idea to sign up for her very first Around the Bay Road Race.
In any case, I was first introduced to her when a fellow co-worker over heard me bemoaning the fact that I couldn’t find anyone to talk to about 24. As it turns out, she also watches 24. But we really hit it off, when she told me she runs.
Except, as I often raz her, she runs on a treadmill.
“Bet the scenery is great on your treadmill,” I tease her. “Now you know what it feels like to be a rabbit on a treadmill.”
Or her personal favourite, “Are you part hamster?”
I am trying to convince her to run outside in the real running world. But soon after we met, she has been plagued by an ongoing thigh injury.
Despite what I previously said about self diagnosis, diagnosing other runners is fair game. So I offered her my opinion.
“Has it hurt for more than two days?” I asked with a serious doctor face. “Cuz you know, I read somewhere, probably in this really great magazine called iRun Canada, that if something hurts for more than two days, you really need to see a doctor.”
So after much whining and carrying on, mostly on my part, I convinced my purple shoed friend to go and see a sports injury expert.
She went to see him tonight. I told her it would be ok. That with Around the Bay so close, Dr. Levy would let her run in her very first Bay.
I can’t wait to see her cross the finish line. I will be waiting in the wings, with my camera in hand. Snapping pictures like any proud surrogate mother would.