when your soul embarks
There are many things I want to say about running, but let's start with this.
Two weeks ago, I ran farther than 10K for the first time. Not even much farther -- 6.92 miles to a 10K's 6.2 -- but I recognized it for what it was, a ceiling breaking. Suddenly I could imagine larger numbers; suddenly greater distances were within my reach, close enough to think about and talk about and try.
Last week, I ran eight miles for the first time. It took me one hour and forty minutes, one hundred whole minutes of continuous running. Somewhere between mile four and mile five, I squeezed a small packet of vanilla bean GU into my mouth and washed it down with water from a small bottle, newly acquired, that I carried in the pocket of my running jacket, also newly acquired. Each of the thousands of the steps in the last two miles was a fresh reminder of how sore my feet were, even in two layers of socks; a footfall was a small, sharp nip. And when, at last, I sailed out of Central Park, eight miles, one hundred minutes later, there was none of the previous week's sense of possibility. Could I really hold up for another two miles? Another five?
That night, I committed to do both, signing up for my first ten miler, the Prospect Park Track Club Cherry Tree 10 Miler on February 17, and my first half marathon, the Greater Binghamton Bridge Run Half Marathon on May 5. After all the months of thinking about it and talking about it, I found myself barely willing to click the "Register" button in my browser. I held a stuffed elephant in my lap, as though we were somehow doing this together. And then I moved my finger, and it was done, and everything felt warm and liquid and I was moving slightly too fast, speaking slightly too loud, nerves and anticipation, fear and foreknowledge combining in physical form.
Signing up for a race is an act of faith. It is saying to my future self, I cannot do this yet, but I believe that you will. It is a promise: I will do what I must so that you can.
In fifteen weeks (closer to fourteen, now), I will become a half marathoner.
It is still unthinkably far. I imagine landing in Inwood, at the far northern tip of Manhattan, and being given two and a half hours (my goal) to take myself to Battery Park on foot, and I can't really imagine it. All the miles of Broadway, the many neighborhoods in between, blur together into an intangible vision of distance.
Last night, my eyes heavy and tired, I dragged myself to the gym to run yesterday's scheduled 5.2 miles on the treadmill, not having dared brave the afternoon's cold temperatures and colder winds to run outside. A few minutes later, when Lawrence stepped onto the treadmill beside mine, I paused my podcast, pulled my headphone from my ear, and told him I wasn't sure I would be able to finish the run. But an hour later, I was still there, completing the last few tenths of a mile.
Every night like this one, I tell myself that this is what I must do if I want to become a half marathoner. Each time I churn out an unending distance on the treadmill, each yoga class, each time I spend sixty or ninety minutes on the bike or the rowing machine or the elliptical, each time I do the crunches and squats and step-ups and planks I still haven't learned to like, I invest in this mythical Connie the Half Marathoner and earn her -- earn me -- the body that will carry itself forward 13.1 miles in 2.5 hours.
And then there will come a time when I must run with my heart. I read this in the comments of an article about someone's first half and knew it to be true. They say to run the beginning of a race with your legs, the middle with your mind, and the end with your heart. I know, if I keep going for long enough, that I will reach a point when my body and mind shut down and only my will will remain. It is like Kipling said in "If," long ago:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
So I run when I am tired. I run the day after I've run farther than I ever have. I run when running is the last thing I want to do. Because I am training my body, but also I must train my will. I must grow the capabilities of my heart.
I read my own words and know that I cannot do this. My eyes tear up if I consider it closely enough. Thirteen miles. Two and a half hours. I know many people -- including some of you -- have done this before, but I still can't help thinking, how is that even possible? But this is me now. This is my life now. Not who I was, but who I have chosen to become.
In these next fourteen weeks, I will make this impossible thing possible for myself.
Two weeks ago, I ran farther than 10K for the first time. Not even much farther -- 6.92 miles to a 10K's 6.2 -- but I recognized it for what it was, a ceiling breaking. Suddenly I could imagine larger numbers; suddenly greater distances were within my reach, close enough to think about and talk about and try.
Last week, I ran eight miles for the first time. It took me one hour and forty minutes, one hundred whole minutes of continuous running. Somewhere between mile four and mile five, I squeezed a small packet of vanilla bean GU into my mouth and washed it down with water from a small bottle, newly acquired, that I carried in the pocket of my running jacket, also newly acquired. Each of the thousands of the steps in the last two miles was a fresh reminder of how sore my feet were, even in two layers of socks; a footfall was a small, sharp nip. And when, at last, I sailed out of Central Park, eight miles, one hundred minutes later, there was none of the previous week's sense of possibility. Could I really hold up for another two miles? Another five?
That night, I committed to do both, signing up for my first ten miler, the Prospect Park Track Club Cherry Tree 10 Miler on February 17, and my first half marathon, the Greater Binghamton Bridge Run Half Marathon on May 5. After all the months of thinking about it and talking about it, I found myself barely willing to click the "Register" button in my browser. I held a stuffed elephant in my lap, as though we were somehow doing this together. And then I moved my finger, and it was done, and everything felt warm and liquid and I was moving slightly too fast, speaking slightly too loud, nerves and anticipation, fear and foreknowledge combining in physical form.
Signing up for a race is an act of faith. It is saying to my future self, I cannot do this yet, but I believe that you will. It is a promise: I will do what I must so that you can.
In fifteen weeks (closer to fourteen, now), I will become a half marathoner.
It is still unthinkably far. I imagine landing in Inwood, at the far northern tip of Manhattan, and being given two and a half hours (my goal) to take myself to Battery Park on foot, and I can't really imagine it. All the miles of Broadway, the many neighborhoods in between, blur together into an intangible vision of distance.
Last night, my eyes heavy and tired, I dragged myself to the gym to run yesterday's scheduled 5.2 miles on the treadmill, not having dared brave the afternoon's cold temperatures and colder winds to run outside. A few minutes later, when Lawrence stepped onto the treadmill beside mine, I paused my podcast, pulled my headphone from my ear, and told him I wasn't sure I would be able to finish the run. But an hour later, I was still there, completing the last few tenths of a mile.
Every night like this one, I tell myself that this is what I must do if I want to become a half marathoner. Each time I churn out an unending distance on the treadmill, each yoga class, each time I spend sixty or ninety minutes on the bike or the rowing machine or the elliptical, each time I do the crunches and squats and step-ups and planks I still haven't learned to like, I invest in this mythical Connie the Half Marathoner and earn her -- earn me -- the body that will carry itself forward 13.1 miles in 2.5 hours.
And then there will come a time when I must run with my heart. I read this in the comments of an article about someone's first half and knew it to be true. They say to run the beginning of a race with your legs, the middle with your mind, and the end with your heart. I know, if I keep going for long enough, that I will reach a point when my body and mind shut down and only my will will remain. It is like Kipling said in "If," long ago:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
So I run when I am tired. I run the day after I've run farther than I ever have. I run when running is the last thing I want to do. Because I am training my body, but also I must train my will. I must grow the capabilities of my heart.
I read my own words and know that I cannot do this. My eyes tear up if I consider it closely enough. Thirteen miles. Two and a half hours. I know many people -- including some of you -- have done this before, but I still can't help thinking, how is that even possible? But this is me now. This is my life now. Not who I was, but who I have chosen to become.
In these next fourteen weeks, I will make this impossible thing possible for myself.