A Tale of Two Mighty Men

 
Before I even savored a sip of coffee last Saturday, I traversed sand dunes, watched the sun rise, and whispered silent prayers as a mass of humanity pressed forward into the channel at the start of the Beach to Battleship Iron Distance Triathlon.



It was epic. Even without coffee.

We arrived in Wrightsville Beach, NC Thursday night. While Sam turned 22 years of age on Friday, we ignored his birthday. He needed to check in, deliver his transition bags, and cook his brown rice syrup, flax seed, honey, protein powder, and peach potion that fueled him during the race. When the condo's blender didn't work, the schedule was thrown, forcing Courtney to spend extra time on the road in bad traffic, waiting at draw bridges in order to buy their very own birthday blender.

While Sam finished his concoction, Courtney cooked chicken to go with the brown rice I prepared.

The next hiccup came when Sam tried to top off his bike tires. As he wrote, "Turns out my tube is older than I realized, and my valve broke off as I tried to pump my front tire up, releasing all of the air. This was at 6:10 pm, and bikes have to be checked in by 7. For a moment, I thought my race was over before it even began, but fortunately they have a repair tent and I was able to get a new tube fairly painlessly."

Yikes!!

Once everything was in place the married duo went to bed while I waited for Nathan's midnight arrival, meaning the early get up jolted us both. When we woke, I found Courtney helping Sam adhere required number tattoos all over his physique. Her constant support spoke volumes.

Tattoos in place, we drove just over a mile - and walked a long way - before traversing the sand to the starting line.

When the horn sounded, hundreds of bodies entered the water.

The troupe movement looked more like a shark feed than a race. But while I soaked it in, a woman next to me shared that her friend with Lupus was out there fighting her disease as well. The divine encounter let me know my son wasn't the only one proving something to himself despite a serious diagnosis.

While the walker proved a necessity for me on concrete, it didn't work on the sand. So Nathan carried it to and from the starting line. This particular walker converts into a wheelchair so when we hit pavement, Nathan pushed me when possible. By the time we reached our car and avoided road closures after the start, we realized if we didn't hurry, we might miss Sam at the bike transition. So Nathan ran while pushing me - and I only almost fell out a few times when the wheels hit a rut.

Sam arrived only minutes after we found his bike at the transition point. He was smiling big, having enjoyed a buoyant swim in the required wet suit. 

 

Thankful that he looked good, we found a local coffee shop and indulged before heading back to our condo to rest. Nathan went straight to bed while Courtney and I lingered on the beach. Soothing waves provided a perfect background for prayer.

 
 

Tailwinds pushed Sam's bike finish up, so again, we almost missed the transition. But we didn't. I don't have photo proof, but we were there when he took off on the marathon run. While he ran, we hung out near the battleship finish line.  

 

The next two plus hours were the longest of the day - much more so for Sam than for us. As the sun set and we calculated his finish time, we headed to the long chute where runners celebrated their final steps. When he finally approached, a surge of emotion surprised even Sam.

 His finishing time? 
12: 41: 24.

He placed 10th in the swim; 185th out of 352 men; and 241st out of almost 500 men and women finishers. According to the web site, about 650 people signed up for the race.  Whether they dropped out or didn't show, we don't know. But Sam performed beyond his expectations.

As I updated friends on Sam's progress throughout the day, I saw a FB post about a boy I met through the internet last summer. He did my "crack an egg on your head for mito" challenge and totally blessed my soul. Take a minute and meet Mighty Matthew:



While Sam fought mito by doing an Iron Man, Mighty Matthew underwent emergency surgery that ended only after surgeons removed his entire colon. Paper thin, Matthew's colon had basically disintegrated due to a lack of cellular strength.

The irony was not lost on me. While I stressed over my Sam stressing his body, a fifth grade boy and his family faced life altering changes. Matthew is still recovering, fighting infection in his body. So will you pray for him this week?  

I'm in awe of what my son accomplished, enduring blisters that doubled the size of his pinkie toes and overwhelming fatigue. But he did it. And by finishing, he demonstrated an inner strength few embrace. 

But so has Mighty Matthew. 

Small in stature, he has a grin that lights up my FB page. I don't know all the symptoms he faces daily, but I know his short life hasn't been easy. Still he presses on and worried about not finishing his homework while in the hospital.

So instead of finishing my blog post yesterday, I wrote him a song and made a rough recording. While it's really for all the Mighty Matthew's fighting out there, it will always make me think of him.