Yes We Really Did Volunteer....

Friday morning found the girls and I wearing our "race official" bright yellow t-shirts and getting syched out for a new adventure. Somehow, we had gotten ourselves sucked into volunteering for the 2007 Hood-2-Coast race. How did we get involved at all? Well, my husband, oldest daughter, son, and brother-in-law were all on a team together.

I must say it was an interesting experience. We worked section 2 just east of Rhodedendron where runner 2 hands off to runner 3. We worked the first 5 hours of the race so we were able to experience the very beginnings of the thrill and excitement. As we directed traffic and parking on highway 26 and tried to keep runners safe, we came across so many different kinds of people. There were the amatures who were pumped on the idea that they were actually doing it and there were the pros who expected everyone to get out of their royal way. There were people from other countries who didn't understand when I said, "get out off the highway and back on the shoulder before you become road kill". A few teams were upset that we would have the audacity to tell them where to park, but most people were grateful for our help....telling us thank you for putting up with all of the crazy people and even giving us little gifts.

I think the part that I had the hardest time with though were the people in charge of our section. One bragged to us about all of the cool stuff he was given as a high ranking responsible volunteer. We heard about everything from the clothing to the rental car, the food perks and the room at the beach, the parties and the elbow rubbing. Even with all of that "look at me" praise going on, he became suddenly scarce when it was time to give out our job descriptions and actually be in charge of things. There was a lot of back stabbing and slander going on with the "big guys" and obvious times of "passing the buck".

From it all I learned.....
- people are people but I am always responsible for my own actions
- I can yell at anybody and say anything as long as I wear an offical shirt and do it with a smile
- guys don't like for a girl to direct their vehicle anywhere
- cutie pie teeny-bopper girls can't direct traffic .... AT ALL