Running In Place

This day of 7 miles (had been thinking 6 for some reason, but Kurt straightened me out) was almost a wash.  I’ll have to start out by admiting that I was pretty full up with self-pity about today’s missed race, even though I knew it was for the best (and thanks to everyone for talking me off the ledge, by the way).  I made the unwise choices of beer and chicken wings last night while staying up till midnight to finish watching the last disc of Season 3 of SFU.  Surprisingly, when the alarm went off this AM, I was less than enthusiastic about going to the race to cheer or getting started on my own run before the temps got too high.  So.  I dicked around and sat in front of the computer.  And ate a fluffer-nutter, and some potato chips, and some Cool Whip in between 2 graham crackers.  Man, what a baby, huh?  As the day wore on the excuses were coming more easily - it’s getting too hot, there’s supposed to be thunderstorms some time today, if I go for a run now I won’t have time to clean the house (like that was gonna happen).   On and on it went - trying to justify my sloth but knowing well enough that I was about to make a very bad choice.  I started thinking about when I was taking karate and some 10th grade little shit who was an all-full-of-herself brown belt said something in class about how she had a “black belt mind” - while she leaned against the wall and demanded us into endless roundhouse kicks, knife-hand stikes, and high blocks.  I wanted to punch her in the face, though she surely would have laid me out flat once she regained consciousness.  But in the end, in her own cocky, high school way, she was relaying a message to me - well, no, she was just bragging, but the point is that it’s a message I now chose to receive.  I need a “marathon mind.”

Though now armed with a little Zen-ification, I was pretty much dreading the run and made sure to whine plenty to my husband as I was getting ready.  He was appropriately sympathetic but reminded me that I would be glad I went and did it.  Since it was now, like 3 in the afternoon, sunny, 80F, and fairly humid I chose a towpath that has a good amount of shading, as well as a dirt & gravel surface and no hills.  I didn’t want my body to give me any excuse to shitcan this.  I strapped on my water belt and packed up some Sport Beans and hit the trail.  I stopped during warm-up to join a guy on a bike who was watching Mommy & Daddy swans who had made a little nest near the stream.  They must have gotten accustomed to observers because they just continued hanging out. 

Back to running, I set Garmin and grimaced at the task at hand.  6/10ths into the first mile and I had a sensation of pressure directly behind my right kneecap and I was thinking that this didn’t bode well for the rest of the run.  I walked for about 30 seconds and the sensation went away, when I resumed running it slowly returned but less so.  By the end of the first mile it was gone so I trundled on.  I was hot.  It was just so freakin’ hot and sticky and every now and then I’d get a kiss from a deerfly, and I was just tolerating the whole affair.  I did what FGGF # 8 told me and pasted a smile on my face (which actually helps in some weird way) and told myself periodically that I was feeling strong, I was gonna finish, and I had plenty left in the can.  Chris, you might just have saved me out there today.  At 3.5 I turned around and struggled with the glass being half empty or half full but just kept plugging along.  Shortly into mile 4 I started to get a pronounced tightness on the outer aspect of my right hip so I stopped for about a minute of ITB stretching which really seemed to do the trick.  Again, just a bit into the 5th mile the tightness returned and I did the stop & stretch again - and again with success.  I had been drinking my water right along and had probably popped 7 or 8 Sport Beans (which are waaaaay more tolerable than sucking disgusting gel, to my mind) and I was getting a little surge in energy so I picked up the pace a little and rode it as long as I could.  At about 6.1 my hip kicked up again and I thought, hell there’s less than a mile so I’ll just tough it out, but by 6.2 my hip was saying pay me now or pay me later, lady!  So another tree, another stretch and I made it to 7.  Seven sweaty, tight, crybaby miles but dammit I did it!  But only because I finally got my ass out there, in spite of myself. 

Sensei Eleise is now a Black Belt.  Clearly she knew something my ego couldn’t give her credit for at the time, but now I am seeing that the development of the mind precedes the development of the body.  I can’t say I loved this run but I love that, for the first time, I busted out the Marathon Mind - it’s just a baby, it’s got alot of growing to do, but I’m going to do my best to feed it and love it and make it welcome in my world.