by Lisa M. Bartelt 杨舟

Unity is strength...When there is teamwork and collaboration1，

wonderful things can be achieved.

—Mattie Stepanek

團结就是力量……在有团队合作的时候，美好的事情就可以实现。

——马提·斯特帕尼克

I warned my husband that something crazy was about to come out of my mouth. “I think we need to run a 5K.”

我警告过我丈夫，我嘴里忍不住快要说出什么疯狂的东西了。“我觉得我们要跑一次五千米赛跑。”

I was not a runner. I was a stay-at-home mom. With my husband in graduate school， and a toddler2 and a baby in the house， exercise hadnt been a priority3. Running was just about the last thing I ever thought I would do for fun.

我不是赛跑选手，我是一个全职妈妈。我的丈夫在读研究生，屋里有一个刚学步的孩子和一个婴儿，锻炼并不是我的首要任务。跑步几乎是我最不可能为了好玩而做的事情。

But it was an idea I hadnt been able to shake for a couple of days. A friend had posted something on Facebook about a program that would take people from no exercise to running a 5K in nine weeks， and I was interested in it.

但这是我几天以来都没能动摇的一个想法。一个朋友在Facebook（美国一个社交网站）上发布了一个计划，可以让人们在九周内从不锻炼到跑五千米，我对此很感兴趣。

My husband， who had been to an army boot camp and served eight years in the reserves， was all in from the start. He started researching running gear4， jogging strollers5 and a 5K we could register for a few months later. Me？ Even though it was technically my idea， I was hesitant. In high school， one of the physical-education requirements was to run a mile-and-a-half every year. I always came in near last. I remembered how slow I was. I would sweat and feel like I was going to faint6 as my face turned deep shades of red. I had to walk part of the way. I was really in no shape to be running.

我的丈夫参加过一个军队新兵训练营，并在预备役部队服役八年，他从一开始就全力投入。他开始研究跑步装备、慢跑婴儿推车和几个月后我们可以报名注册的五千米赛跑。至于我呢？尽管严格来说这是我的主意，但我还是犹豫不决。在高中，体育教育的要求之一是每年跑一英里半（约2.4千米）。我总是跑在几乎最后一个。我记得我有多慢。我会出汗，感觉自己快要晕倒了，同时脸变得很红。我得走一段路。我真的不适合跑步。

Sometimes， I joked that the only time I would ever run after high school was if I needed to save my life. In a sense， I did. Our marriage was only three years old at this point and had been dealt a serious blow. While we both tried to keep our marriage together， it was going to take work. We needed a lot of help to repair our relationship， and for some reason I thought running would be part of the solution.

有时，我开玩笑说，高中毕业后我唯一会跑步的时候就是我要逃命的时候。从某种意义上说，确实是这样。我们的婚姻到现在才三年，就已经受到了严重的打击。虽然我们都致力于维系我们的婚姻，但这需要努力。我们需要很多帮助来修复我们的关系，出于某种原因，我认为跑步是解决办法的一部分。

I was desperate7 enough to think that training for a 5K would be good for our marriage. For one， wed have to spend time together several days a week. We had registered for a 5K that was exactly nine weeks from when we started the training program， so we had to keep to a strict schedule. Happy time as a couple was something we lacked， what with two small kids and no family within 800 miles. During our training， we had a few offers from friends to watch the kids， but buying a jogging stroller was our guarantee8 that we wouldnt miss a workout.

我出于無奈，认为训练五千米跑对我们的婚姻有好处。