The maternal grandfather of TB's two kids, John Joseph Schauder took one look at the infant who would become Miss TigerBlog ’22 and said to TB: "She looks just like you. I hope that doesn't come back to bite her in the ass on prom night."
Then he flashed his huge grin and let loose with his low, firm laugh, something TB can still hear, all these years after the man they called "Pop-Pop" passed away. He was a man of great strength, right until the very end. He was tough — and he was also tender. He would have definitely appreciated what MTB’22 did the other day.
Among his other lifetime milestones, Pop-Pop was at one point a United States Marine. And there was his granddaughter (who long ago raced past her father in terms of looks) this past Sunday, running in the United States Marine Corps Marathon in and around Washington, D.C.
And she wore her grandfather's USMC pin while she did. There was something very, very wonderful about that.
Play four years of lacrosse at Princeton as a Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering major? Done.
Work full-time in the aerospace engineering field while pursuing her Master's? No problem.
Like he said, it's grit. Her tenacity defines her. It's how she went from overwhelmed Princeton freshman in 2018 to graduation day in 2022.
The same is true of how she came to run the marathon. She decided she wanted to do it and put her head down and did it.
Actually, that's what it says on the box of the necklace her father sent her after the race Sunday: "She believed she could, and she did." The necklace itself has a "26.2" symbol.
TigerBlog is not a runner. He has never enjoyed going for a run, and so training for a marathon was something he would never have dreamed of doing.
For MTB, it seemed to come naturally. To prepare for the race, she went onto the Boston Marathon site and found a training guide for first-time marathoners. Being an engineer, she followed it to the letter, or, more accurately, to the yard.
Unfortunately for TigerBlog, the race was the same day as a home Princeton field hockey game (Tigers 6, Penn State 1), so he was unable to be there to see his daughter. There was, though, an app on which he could follow her pace through her bib number.
The race began at 7:30. TB tracked his daughter pretty much the entire time, and he was probably more nervous than she was as she made her way around the course.
TB was struck by the fact that once she passed the 20-mile mark, it seemed like she had it made — only to realize that she actually had two more 5Ks to run to get to the finish. She was at the 24-mile mark when the field hockey game began, and TB was having trouble focusing on the stats and clipping highlights because he kept refreshing the app.
25.0. 25.2. 25.8. 26.0. 26.1 .... and then 26.2. She'd done it.
TB was mesmerized with the pride he felt that day three years ago back in Princeton Stadium, when he saw his daughter graduate. This was a different kind of pride, though one that in some ways actually eclipsed that moment at graduation.
And hey, he'll admit it. Just like at graduation, he teared up a bit when she saw "26.2" flash next to her name.
For the record, her time was 4:48:56. She finished in 14,252nd place out of 30,644 runners. She was 4.931st out of 12,612 women, 1,202nd of 2,354 women between 25 and 29.
How impressive is that?
Afterwards, she texted a picture from the finish, by the Iwo Jima memorial. It's a picture of pure joy, the kind that can only come from accepting such a challenge and then completing it. She had the same smile in her graduation pictures as well.
Somewhere, Pop-Pop had his own smiles, and his own tears.
His granddaughter is something very, very special.
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