Today was my last workout of 2018 with my Eugene CrossFit family. I’ll be so sad to miss the next couple weeks of workouts, but will try to keep up some semblance of a routine while I’m on the road. I’m really bad at burpees. I might do a lot of them, to try to get better. We’ll see.

It’s been a very hard year in many ways.

But for my mental and physical fitness, for my feeling of accomplishment, for the realization that I can do very hard things in the very hard years, this has been the best year ever.

So many friends have encouraged me over the years, and I appreciate them softening the ground for this year of incredible discovery. Running Roxborough hills with Kasey, tabata at the YMCA with Beth, lightpole runs with Dorrie and Deirdre, trail running in the Wissahickon…all of these experiences showed me that I could decide to do something a little out of reach, work for it, and do it.

I never expected to love Eugene CrossFit. I never expected going there to be the highlight of my day. And yet, that’s what it’s become: home, a place where I surprise myself, a place I always leave feeling better than when I arrived. It’s only December and there’s a lot of winter left to go, but I’ve found a thing that helps keep the hound of depression at bay.  I love the calluses on my hands, the ache in my shoulders, the salt on my skin. I love that I can run faster than I could earlier this year (a little), that I can jump higher (a little), and that the assault bike doesn’t scare me anymore (at all). I can pick up heavy things, and carry them. I can scale a workout, but I won’t cut corners, and my brain will always always always be clearer when the clock stops.

This has been a hard year, next year may be harder, and I’m so grateful for this little haven where I don’t have to be in charge, strategize, or worry about much, where I can just show up, do my best, and have a hell of a lot of fun along the way.