Excerpt from, "My Mother Is From Mars..."

So there I sat with our three year daughter on my lap, puzzled by my own ambitions and lack of support by some from a couple of the charities, which I couldn’t comprehend for the life of me. In my distress I called Dante Ciolfi, my ultrarunning coach in Florida. I needed help in my thinking.

Dante picked up, “Well, hello Jody-Lynn. Whats going on?”

I responded, “Well, I’m so, ugh. I’m overwhelmed. How can I get this run done? I’m scared, I’m fearing failure, help me.”

Dante said, “Well, Jody this is normal… You ever been to Florence Italy?”

I responded, “No. Never been to Europe either. Why?”

Dante came back with this thought, “Well, there is this statue in Florence, Italy of King David. You remind me of that statue.”

I was aghast. Yes, Dante and I had ran many long runs together of thirty-five to over fifty miles, some of those miles on rocky trails, the Pine Barrens of New Jersey, through sandy trails for miles and miles and miles of macadam. Yet not once did I tell him or anyone of who I had originally tried to model part of my life after.

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