Go, Cooper, Go

So proud of Cooper today. It was his second cross country race after school. Last week was his first and he came in 46th place out of about 60 kids. His time was 9:58 for one mile. He was happy, he felt he did great. I was happy he was happy. But in the last week we've had a few conversations about it. I asked him if he felt he wanted to try and beat his time, did he want to set a goal for himself. He said 'yes' but not with too much conviction. Cooper is always satisfied with where he's at. Not a real go-getter but always a participater. That's good. But I still feel the need to encourage him to want to do better - always try as hard as you can. He decided that he would like to place in the top 30 this time around, eventhough only the top 20 get ribbons. I think he was trying to be realistic. So this afternoon, before the race, we talked about really going for what you want, even if it's hard. Envisioning the end result - all the typical pep talk stuff. We got to the school with not quite enough time. The parking was horrendous and we had to walk a long way and so he got to the starting point seconds before they started the race. I felt bad - I should have gotten him there sooner. But he did awesome. He came in 25th place and his time was just over 7 minutes. I could see in his face that he pushed himself so much harder than last week and that he felt really good for doing so. So, so proud of him. Next week I promised I'd get him there sooner and he'd have a few minutes to stretch and we'll see what he can do. My favorite moment was as we were heading back to the car Cooper said "It doesn't matter if you come in last Mom, it just matters that you had the courage to finish the race."