About seven years ago I decided to try something athletic for the first time in my life and set a rather unrealistic goal: train for and run a 26.2-mile-long marathon. My first race was oddly addictive and I continued to train and run. Finally, after I had nine of the agonizing experiences under my belt, I met a few runners who literally ran several marathons a month and thought, well, if they can do a marathon a week, I can do at least one a month.

Fortified by massive amounts of Advil and a hugely stubborn nature, I made it through six months until the middle of race seven -- the San Francisco Marathon -- when my stubby little legs said no more. For the first time, I stopped at the half way point and climbed onto the bus for a trip back to the start line. I was miserable amid the excited half marathoners who had just finished their races. In my mind, I had failed and sat on the bus close to tears for most of the ride.

It wasn't until months later that I accepted the idea that the goal wasn't realistic, that once again I had failed the balance test. I needed to find a balance between running marathons and healthy legs, just as I have always struggled to find balance in other areas of my life.

I'm not alone: balance is the most sought after and most elusive goal. It is sought in all areas of society but perhaps no more than in nature where balance is the fundamental operating principle for all life. Take away balance and the network of life starts to crumble.

That's the message of a new short video from NRDC (see below) that highlight the struggle to retain balance in the Rocky Mountains. In this case, the struggle pits gray wolves and those who admire them against ranchers and other political powerful forces that despise them.

The film opens with one of my personal heros -- Louisa Willcox -- noting that after the Bush Administration ignored all scientific advice and decided to remove the wolves from the endangered species list last summer, a wolf a day was being killed by hunters and ranchers.

NRDC and other environmental groups successfully fought to overturn the Bush Administration's action and thought that we had won this round. But in one of its lame duck efforts to impose its political will, the Administration is trying again and advocates of balance and the wild wolves have only until November 27th to make our voices heard.

Why does this matter? As Louisa explains, "wolves and elk and deer have co-evolved over thousands of years. There is a balance that they create and maintain. the wolf population can never get so big that all of the elk would be gone or else they too would be gone."

Louisa continues in the video (approximately half way through for those overeager beavers!) to layout the many other benefits of wolves for the Rockies. Her story and those of the other experts in our video is well worth watching.

And once you watch the video -- Restore The Balance: The Case for the Wolves in the Rockies -- I hope you'll go to the action alert on NRDC's affiliate website to add your voice for balance.

After a lifelong marathon (47 years and counting), I've come to appreciate perhaps more than anything else the need for balance. Let's not let a lame duck Administration succeed in its ham-handed attempt to ensure the destruction of gray wolves and the balance they bring in the Northern Rockies.