The Day That Held Both Grief and Fire
Some days don’t make sense when you try to hold them all at once.
They feel too heavy in one hand and too full of possibility in the other.
And yet, somehow, they exist together anyway.
This was one of those days.
A few weeks ago, I sat in a church saying goodbye to my friend Ali.
Thirty years old.
A mom of two.
A woman who documented her life so beautifully, so honestly, so fully—even in the middle of the unimaginable.
Colorectal cancer didn’t define her.
If anything, it revealed her.
She showed up for her life in a way that most people only talk about.
She was in the gym.
She was showing up for her kids.
She was being a friend, a light, a presence.
She lived—really lived—even when it would have been easier not to.
And sitting there in her memorial service, I kept thinking:
What does it mean to live like that?
At the same time, there was something else pulling at me that day.
A few weeks earlier, I had seen that Mark Dowdle—someone who had quietly become a huge source of inspiration for me—was speaking in Hermantown about his experience at Arrowhead 135.
I started following him last year, right around the time I was finding my way back to running.
Back when every mile felt hard.
Back when I was training for HYROX Boston and still questioning if I even belonged in this space.
He popped up on my TikTok one day, and then suddenly I was following along as he and his friends ran from Duluth to St. Paul.
On a whim, I messaged him.
Bought them a round of drinks when they passed through Pine City.
Ran into one of them at a gas station like it was the most normal thing in the world. It was so cool!
It wasn’t just about running—it was about possibility.
About pushing limits.
About doing hard things on purpose.
So when I saw he’d be speaking, I knew I wanted to go.
We had it on the calendar.
And then life shifted.
Ali’s funeral was the same day.
And suddenly the question became:
What matters most right now?
The answer was clear.
But grief has a way of opening something in you.
Sitting in that church, listening to the story of her life, I realized something I hadn’t fully put into words before:
She didn’t wait.
She didn’t wait for the perfect time.
She didn’t wait until things were easier.
She didn’t wait until it all made sense.
She lived anyway.
Fully. Fiercely. Honestly.
On the drive home, emotionally drained and sitting in the weight of it all, I got a text from Chad:
“We’re going to Mark’s talk. Meet me at the firehall.”
It was also—because of course it was—a blizzard warning.
A 1.5 hour drive to Hermantown.
Through winter roads.
To hear someone talk about pushing limits in the most extreme conditions.
It felt a little wild.
But also… exactly right.
Because here’s the thing I’m starting to understand:
Hard things don’t compete with each other.
They build each other.
Grief.
Growth.
Fear.
Inspiration.
They can all exist in the same day.
That night, sitting in that room listening to stories of Arrowhead 135—the cold, the isolation, the relentless forward movement—I couldn’t help but draw a parallel.
Ali ran her race.
Mark runs his.
And here I am, at the very beginning of my own 50K journey, learning what it means to keep going when things get uncomfortable.
Learning what it means to show up fully.
Learning what it means to stop apologizing for wanting more—for pushing more—for becoming more.
This season of my life feels different.
Less about proving something.
Less about pace and performance.
More about alignment.
More about asking:
Am I living in a way that feels true to who I am?
Ali’s life reminded me that time isn’t guaranteed.
Mark’s journey reminds me that limits are often self-imposed.
And this 50K journey I’m stepping into?
It’s not just about running.
It’s about becoming.
Becoming someone who doesn’t shrink.
Becoming someone who chooses the hard path on purpose.
Becoming someone who lives fully—right now, not someday.
Unapologetically.
Because if there’s one thing that day taught me, it’s this:
You can hold grief in one hand
and possibility in the other—
and still choose to move forward.