December 2022 Monthly Running Challenge

I have to tell you all about something that happened this morning that reminded me why I love runners. Even the speedy ones that I always feel look down at me for being slow and old and taking too many walk breaks.

It's raining today and I didn't want to go do my scheduled painfully long intervals on the trail by the river as it can be dangerous down there (like a couple of people usually get swept away and drown every year) so I went to the road the fast road runners like to use for intervals. It's about a mile long, flat and not too busy.
So anyway, there I was toiling away in the drizzle when it turned into a storm. I like running in the rain but thunder and lightning not so much, but I was 2 down 2 to go and thought I'd just keep going. I hadn't seen anyone else out there (guess I'm in the really crazy minority!). Finally, I was nearing the end of the last interval, and when everything in me was screaming at me to just quit I looked at my watch and saw I had just over a minute left, so I yelled out loud "Come on woman, you can last one more minute!!!"
I hadn't heard that there was a guy coming up behind me and was about to pass me. For context, I run so slow that the fast guys overtake me like racecars even while I'm going as fast as my little legs can go!
So... he comes up beside me... looks at his watch, falls into pace with me and holds next to me for a minute, then as soon as my watch beeped he sped off ahead. Never said a word. I probably wouldn't have stopped because I'm a stubborn *kitten*, but that silly little thing, having someone 'supporting' me, made such a difference to how hard that last minute was!