A Rumination Full of Blues: How 10K and Bill Ackman Snapped Me Out It.

Cloutless and gloomy in Cape Elizabeth since a June thumping, I have spent hours questioning myself. Today I got the answer.

A winning family is my purpose. Being true to myself and my community are just rewards.

It took a hot and steamy 10K race and reading about a billionaire bungling a billion-dollar IPO that snapped me out of rumination. I finally feel forward motion.

Until now the only lesson I could parse from jumping in the primary for state representative as a moderate democrat thinking independents and republicans would rally in support was how stupid it was.

The idea was that the investment of my time would pay off because the campaign would elevate the cause for affordable housing for families in Cape Elizabeth - a cause I have spent three years working on and one I thought fellow democrats would dig.

It turns out the campaign did nothing for the cause - it remains stuck awaiting environmental tests - and opponents of affordable housing are gleeful about my defeat. What the campaign did was give the new far-left faction of the local party an opportunity to flog me for instigating a petition that killed a pet project and questioning the au courant gender ideology, it turns out.

And I figured a short primary couldn’t cost that much because of public financing, right?

Wrong. Running as a dark horse had huge costs. Bridges were burned. Professional opportunities squandered. I gave up a paying TV gig as a political analyst on a major network in this presidential election year!

There was no upside. The glass was empty. Forlorn was my way until Saturday’s 10K.

Running with members of my family who traveled from afar to my hometown on the coast to share meals and enjoy being among the sea of 6000 runners and thousands of spectators and volunteers in a beautifully choreographed spectacle was my chicken soup.

I can still run, love and be loved. That’s the lesson! That’s what matters.

And apparently everyone makes stupid costly mistakes. Did your schadenfreude shine like mine reading about Bill Ackman pulling the plug on his pet Pershing Square fund because, it turns out, it was a really bad idea with really high costs? Oops.

I hope he learns a lesson.