Nothing to pull me out of my funk like a news story about someone incredible. 21 year old Rachael Scdoris finished 7th out of the 20 rookies who took on the Iditarod this year, reaching the finish line yesterday at 1:42 am. What an accomplishment! She’s even from my neck of the woods, the great Pacific Northwest.

The Iditarod is a grueling 1150 mile journey across Alaska’s frozen wilderness. The athletes race their teams of 12 to 16 sled dogs from the starting line in Anchorage, reaching the finish line in the tiny town of Nome in about 10 to 17 days. The race commemorates the history of dog sledding as a means of transportation in Alaska, particularly during the diphtheria epidemic of 1925 in which 20 mushers and 150 sled dogs rushed medicine to Nome in record breaking time, saving the city and surrounding communities from disaster. Participants face incredible obstacles, such as scaling rocky mountainsides and crossing miles of frozen river. Temperatures frequently plummet below zero. Both men and women compete in the Iditarod, each of them with their own reasons for “going the distance”.

Rachael is certainly one of the youngest athletes to attempt the race, but the most amazing thing about this woman? She’s legally blind. Rachael was born with a rare disease that makes her nearsighted, farsighted, and colorblind. In other words, all she can see is blurry shapes from a few feet away. She is the first legally blind participant to ever complete the Iditarod. Her website chronicles the accomplishments she has achieved in her short lifetime, and you can even track her progress across the Iditarod in Alaska.

How incredible is this woman? The determination she has just blows me away. Her bio on the Iditarod website says that she has been mushing since she was three, and has planned to race the Iditarod since she was eight years old. How I wish I could have been there at the finish line to share the triumph of the moment her dream came true.

Stories like this always have a way of putting things in perspective for me. They remind me that my trials are so small, and my blessings are so great. They remind me to look back on my life and remember the amazing moments I have already achieved, and look ahead to the victories yet to come. Most importantly, they remind me that if you are passionate about pursuing your dreams, anything is possible. I think that’s something we all need to remember. We should write it on our bathroom mirrors in lipstick, or tape a sign to the ceiling over our beds. If we wake up every morning with that thought in our minds, think how much farther the day will take us! Rachel is someone whose journey has just begun, and whose incredible personal achievements stretch out before her as far as the eye can see. That’s the kind of person I want to be.

“Some call my blindness a disability. To me, ‘disabled’ means ‘unable’. I am by no means unable.”
— Rachael Scdoris

You guys, I’m in a rut. A physical, spiritual, mental rut. I feel like I’m in some sort of haze… my mind is so cloudy and my body moves slowly, as if underwater. I can’t form any coherent thoughts and I find myself nodding off whenever I am still for longer than a few minutes. Not sure what’s going on, but I thought you should know. Sorry I’m so out of it.

Me: Babs, get back in bed.

Babs: How come you noticed me?

Me: Because I’m a mommy and I’m good at things like that.

Babs: I thought that if I was very quiet you wouldn’t notice me.

Me: I’m a mommy and I notice everything.

Babs: I’m a big girl and I’m very quiet.

I used this picture during December’s “Reflections” challenge over on Eulallia.com, but I thought it fit so perfectly with March’s “Time” challenge that I decided to use it again. To see more pictures go to the Self Portrait Tuesday blog.

When I was five years old, my mom rented a video camera to document a day in the life of our family:

My sister has just turned two, and my dad has a huge bushy beard. We live in the house by the freeway with the hideous green shag carpet and metallic flowered wallpaper. My mom wears glasses with lenses almost as big as her face, and the blue parakeet that died when I was six flits around the house, perching on shoulders and lampshades. My uncle is young and healthy, the cancer yet to ravage his body. My baby cousin is small and still, years of surgeries ahead of her to correct her birth defects. My sister keeps singing “Frothty the NOOOOman!” and she’s wearing only one blue sock. She insists she’s a boy named Matthew. I spend the majority of the time trying to get people’s attention, sticking my face in front of the camera and once swearing loudly from the corner with the Barbies. My grandma’s hair hasn’t turned gray yet, and my grandpa is tall, strong, and thin. My mom’s voice sounds the same.

…

Andy Warhol said, “They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”

I wonder if that’s true.

This entry was originally posted to Woulda Coulda Shoulda on July 18th, 2005. I am re-posting it with permission from the unsinkable Mir. She told me that it is one of her favorite posts, even though it was from a very raw time. She said that “it’s about the kind of comfort that only your very best girlfriends can give,” and I hope you are as touched as I was by this simple and beautiful tribute to the women in her life.

If I close my eyes, the part of my mind that is adrift will actually impose an undercurrent of motion on my senses. It’s a slight but steady pull. My eyes always pop open before it gets so strong that I’m washed away. But I’m tired, you know. Bone tired. And when I’m too tired to lift my eyelids again, I half-expect I will be taken out to sea.

It must be the rain.

Anyway, if you thought I was in a jovial mood this morning, you shoulda been around this afternoon! Murphy has a bone to pick with me. I don’t know what I did to anger him so, but it was a doozy. I don’t think he’s done with me yet, either.

But that’s not what’s on my mind. I mean, yes, it’s on my mind every single nanosecond, but that’s not what I want to tell you about.

I have friends that I don’t deserve. I love each and every one of them and wonder if they know that I would be lost without them.

I love the friends who answered my distress call with a barrage of emails designed to buoy me and stop my self-torture.

I love the friend who listened to me cry into my phone as I sat huddled in my car, trying to pull myself together before I got the kids. I love that she lectured me about the ulcer I’m working on, and how mean ulcer-creating people suck.

I love the friend who came to get me out of the car, who held me while I stood there and bawled until my chest hurt. I love that she kept trying to feed me until I told her I was afraid that if I ate I would puke. I love that then she said if I did, the dog would clean it up.

I love the friend who just sat with me and held my hand, and then chatted with me about this and that and didn’t mind that I mostly just nodded. I love that she laughed when I suggested we drown one of my kids in the pool, just to see if it was possible that I could feel worse.

I love the friend who hugged me in the middle of a crowd, and made me look her in the eyes so that she could tell me I’ll be okay. I love that she called me later to tell me again. I love that she understands that I don’t know it yet.

I love the friends who are reaching across to me however they can, to tell me I’m allowed to feel. That they’re sorry I feel this way, but I’m allowed.

Thank you.

— Mir, of Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda