04 October 2019

Skipping Increments

About two years ago Kevin set a goal for himself and the racecar.  He is the kind of human that needs a goal or it's just not fun for him. He is goal oriented and I am just not. This goal was different than anything he had done before so there was a big learning curve.

Last year we were inches from achieving that goal. Then his dad had his stroke and that was it for the year.  We were LITERALLY less than ten seconds from achieving it.  But it wasn't meant to be.

So, we reset the goal.  It would happen this summer no matter what.

And then WinterSpring happened and we didn't get to go racing until the end of what was called Juneuary here.  But we achieved the goal.  All the land was happy.

Now we had a new goal.  I'll put it like this: we wanted to hit increments.  .98, .97, .96  A more refined goal.

Then August was HAWT AF and Kevin caught me on fire, making it not a reasonable goal. But we persevered.

We hit that goal.

Now what?

A new goal, of course.

This was a more difficult goal, it would require the planets aligning. It would require near perfection.  We were hopeful, yet skeptical that it could be done. This was not an easily achievable goal.

Planets aligned.  We walked right past that goal to an unimaginable personal best.  All that waiting and Kevin's hard work paid off.

Without getting all racecar-y, by accident we're one of the fastest/quickest cars of our type of car in the nation.  In.The.Nation.

We met the goal without even thinking about that At All.  But if you know me IRL, you know that social media has been all racecar, all the time recently.  It's gained us some attention.  We didn't even consider that result until someone who is in that business AND much smarter than us said "You know that you're it, right?"  And then someone else confirmed it.  MINDBLOWN.

And to be humblebragging: it is pretty effing cool.

Kevin is not arrogant. In fact it's like pulling teeth for him to take any credit.  I am also that way so it's not all "LOOK AT US. LOOK."  In fact, nothing would make him more uncomfortable.

When we do well at the track, you will never hear me cheer or dance or celebrate.  The most you'll see is a fist bump to the Nephew and a smile.  It just feels like poor sportsmanship TO ME.

So when he ran his best time ever, I cheered.  I didn't for one moment expect it to happen and I was cheering before I even realized what happened.  I spun around to see our best friend standing here and he hugged me.  Other friends were there and cheered as well.  Definitely in the Top Ten of Moments.

When I met Kevin a few minutes later, he hadn't looked at his slip.  HE DIDN'T KNOW.  I yelled/ said "LOOK!!!"

He sat there in stunned silence.  He looked away then looked at it again.  "What does it say?" he asked  "Does that say 8.88?"  He was absolutely speechless.

Finally he looked up at me and he was teary, which undid me a little.  It was a big moment, for sure.  (Ranking up there with racing on the national stage in Vegas and me happy-crying ON the racetrack with the Nephew)  He pulled himself together then celebrated with his friends.  I think a little part of him is still in disbelief.

And of course, he's thinking about next year's goal.  Of course.

So, all that time, money, fight, and delays and catching me on fire finally resulted in joy.  It was worth the burnt hair. Kinda.