I would like to say that I inherited my strong cardio vascular system from my mother, but I’m adopted. I did inherit mom’s love of distance sports. I don’t remember a time when my mom was not a competitive runner. I guess that would have been back in the early 1960’s when the average person believed that a woman’s uterus would pop out if she ran down more than a half court. The seventies were good to my mother, who married my father, Paul, took up competitive running and adopted me during this decade. My parents possess the dark eyes and medium complexion of Southern Mediterranean heritage, in contrast to my blue-green eyes, dishwater blond hair and skin that would be quite fair if I spent less time outdoors. Friends would remark upon how much I resembled my mother, our gaits and figures both youthful, although my mother was no longer young. The figures of my friends’ less active mothers thickened, but my mom remained as svelte as she’d been in a twenty year old picture of her wearing a mini-dress and a sash that read “Hoover Girl” from that 1960’s presidential election.

In winter, when I sometimes ran alone, my father followed my size seven footprints in the snow. No matter how many times he told me not to run in the woods alone, I still chose to cruise along Burlington Connecticut’s glorious trail system. I decided to avoid hunting season after I came across a party of deer hunters. Sure, I could out-run a bunch of pot-bellied, middle aged Bambi-killers, but even my deer-like movements could not outpace a bullet. Several years later, I became the youngest female finisher of the 1995 Venice Marathon. I had not trained for a marathon, but I still managed to finish on this jewel-like, island city in the somewhat respectable time of four hours and two minutes. I cried at the finish line. I missed my cross-country and track teammates in upstate New York, and my mother who was also often my running partner. I had never finished a race before and not seen a dozen or more familiar faces at the finish line. Mom and I belonged to the Hartford Track Club. We often both won: shoes, high tech running outfits, massages and sometimes cash at various three to twenty mile races throughout New England. My father displayed our medals and trophies, usually first or second places on a separate shelf in the living room and seasonally on our artificial Christmas tree. Eventually, my mother needed her own shelf. Now, my daughter, Annie, is out in the world, and no longer being bounced around inside me on runs (including a few races) and during daily Cardio Blast or Cardio Kick classes. I can only hope that I will bring up another runner, just like my parents did. It was one of the many wonderful gifts that they gave me.