Thursday, September 23, 2010

22 Miles, I Love/Hate You.

So. I did it. Sort of. I mean, I ran for most of it, walked a couple of times, sprinted, powerwalked, trotted, dragged ass, hobbled. . .


On Sunday, I attempted and completed a 22-mile run in Central Park. It was not easy, it was not fun. I almost cried a couple of times, but looking back on it now, I'm not really sure why. Sure, it wasn't a soothing experience, nor would I deem it "pleasant", but it wasn't really painful. I didn't die from exhaustion. I wasn't bleeding, nor was I screaming in pain. I think after about mile 17, my brain was like, "Seriously, Mira. This is stupid. Why are you running? You're tired. Just stop, you moron." But there was no good enough reason to quit, other than just wanting to. The fact that there was no good reason to quit made me grouchy.

suck it, Pheidippides

But I started off the run feeling pretty confident and strong. I had a good music playlist on my ipod, was well-fed and hydrated. I wore wedgie-proof undies and good socks that cost $11, so I was sure they would prevent blisters. Then the sun started to pierce, and the track got crowded. And my $11 socks did not stop my feet from getting really hot, sweaty and soggy. Then there were the hills. Almost all of my runs have been in Brooklyn's Prospect Park, but on Sunday, Andrew suggested that, since this was such a long run ("you'll probably be out there for 5 hours"), I try out a new spot, one that I wasn't quite as familiar with. I thought this was a good idea. It WAS a good idea. But it was a bad idea to do the whole 22-mile battle in Central Park. Little did I know (or did he remind me) that Central Park has a LOT of uphills. Like, it seemed that there weren't a sufficient amount of downhills to match the amount of ups.

damn slopes . . . grrrrrr.

The hills kicked my ass. They made the run MUCH more difficult, made me hate it, and everything that crossed my path. And the fact that I was running uphill for my longest run made me realize quite early in the run that it was much less likely that I'd be able to conquer it. Which I pretty much didn't. I didn't own that run. It owned me. I just wanted to get it over with. I was grouchy, and felt duped. "Hey look! Another hill!" was pretty much all I said to Andrew during the 5 hours we were in the park (he was on a bike) other than a grunt here or there. It wasn't pretty.


At a certain point, say mile 12 or 13, I stopped listening to my ipod, too, because after a certain point, the music stopped motivating me and just started to annoy me. I told it to shut up.

Maybe I was talking to myself--to the thoughts running through my head of how much I hated running. Maybe I was telling my ego, my weakness, to shut up and just let me run. I had to finish, and as much as I hated that damn run, ("hey look! another hill!"), I had no good reason to give up. There was no blood, no broken bones, no heart attack, no heat stroke . . .

I'm about to vomit here.

So I finished. I'm obviously still angry at this run. Maybe when I get over it (and myself), I'll dig a little deeper into some meditations on what happened that day. But right now, it's time to recover.

Regardless, I still love running. We didn't break up. Andrew forgave my bitchiness, too. And oddly, I wasn't sore at all the next day.

I did an 8-mile run this morning, and have a 7-mile run scheduled for tomorrow. My parents are stopping by on their way to Greece, and they'll be visiting the actual city of Marathon, where this damn race began. For the story of how the marathon is said to have started, click HERE

The marathon is in 16 days! Time to taper down, rest up, eat a lot and start getting excited to have pretty feet again some day.

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