2,405 miles. That's what the app tells me. I hadn't set goals for the year, which was good seeing how running went south for a while there in mid-February, a mileage goal for the year may have just been to much for me to take.
I was going to write a post like last year, summing up the best and worst of the year but as I began to think of the past twelve months I realized there was a hard line drawn when you divide the days of your life by best and worst and I didn't feel like doing that.
So instead I started to write a recap and this is what came out.
2013
New Year's Day, 15 miles in snow and ice on the Terrapin course with Jeremy, Todd, Kevin, Sam, Jared and a new guy, Phil Layman. I was the slowest of the group, still sore from a hard run the previous Saturday. This pain in my calf would continue to grow as I continued to fight the very thought of resting it until I was given no other choice. First run of the year, Frozen Toe 10k. I didn't win a jacket. I was still given a spot on the Aid Station's running team. January gave way to early morning runs with Alissa, Nicole, Kelly and lots of loops, both slow and fast, at Holiday Lake. Cold, dark mornings, some of which filled with rain. Double loops and more fast loops, I fought what could be the way I normally would, self-doubt. Start of the Lynchburg Trail Running Club, let's see where this goes. Holiday Lake PR, more calf pain, double runs the day after as if I only had a brain. More pain in the calf, let's run a 5k the week after. Pain, more pain. Stop.
That's stop running, for ten days, so that you'll yearn for it again, so that you'll learn from it perhaps. A long ten days followed by weeks of running with pain but not as much. Long slow runs in the mountains. Constant questioning will I even go to California? Terrapin. Promise Land. Going through the motions. Driven by fear and a little desire. Long wet run with Brian and Kevin, the kids came out to crew in the rain, this is real friendship. The cove race followed by extra mileage at home on Candlers in the rain with more friends who want to see me succeed, I spent the better part of those three hours further convinced I had no place toeing the starting line at Western States. Go ahead, buy a plane ticket, taper.
California, Tahoe. The Western States trail. The biggest pine cones I have ever seen. Lake Tahoe. The Donner Party. Scott, Sue and Eli driving up to crew us. All the notices about bears. The complete shutting off of my brain. I came to see the mountains, toe the starting line, I had hope that I would finish but not a lot of confidence. Ankle pain and macerated feet. More time off. More letdown. Floundering through the hot and humid summer months. Grindstone hell day 1. Grindstone rain day 2. So much questioning. Wondering. Indecision. Iron Mountain. So much vomit. Tears of frustration. More vomiting. The mexican dinner tirade, I am an idiot.
Douthat 40 miler. I just want to have a good day, enjoy the run. I have never met a goal in quite the way that I did this day. I had a good day, I enjoyed the run. Thirty miles with Brian Keefer, ten miles for Ultra Signup. Real surprise. Real enjoyment. Hell or High Watermelon. Good friends and good times. Shifting gears. Finally saying no to Grindstone. Moving on to Masochist.
Skipping Deep Hollow because tradition and family trump my selfish desires....sometimes. Long Mountain. Cole Mountain. Candler's Mountain. Rinse. Repeat. Government shutdown. Grindstone postponed. Grindstone cancelled. Fears. Doubt. Head trouble, a new kind of injury. Wednesday night therapy and mexican. Hellgate acceptance email. Masochist. Just an okay day in the mountains after a little hard work. Change the name to Blue Ridge Trail Runners, it suits us more anyways. Move on to marathon running. The love of other's success in themselves. I have become that person that runs marathons for fun.
Then something happened on the one Hellgate training run I did. I completely lost my mojo and I had little to work with from the start. Early taper. Ready for the year to just end. Doubt. Doubt. Doubt. Throw in a little Turkey Trot with the kindergartener and then it's time for Hellgate. Midnight start. But a fair start. Freezing rain and 2 am=unmeasurable levels of self-doubt, struggle. Tough love. Great friends. Finish line. End of year blues. The feeling that I need a new beginning.
2014: Looking Ahead
I am, and will always be, an imperfect person. My goal is to be better than I was before. I hope, someday when my 40, 50, 60...year old self looks back it remembers, that it realizes, that I tried to focus on the real and the right, that I tried not to focus on the small and petty, but I make mistakes, I am making mistakes. Time slipping away, time wasted.
The new year's resolutions of recent years have been very selfish goals on my part, run this many miles, PR this distance. In 2014, I aim to shift focus. I am not saying I won't run just as much as I did this year. I am not saying that the desire to be faster is not always present. I am saying I want others things more right now than just those things, that they are not the priority they might have been going into 2013.
I want to be a better person. I want to be gracious, adaptable, compassionate, tolerant. I want to love more, laugh more. I want to have more patience. Do more quality time with my children. I want these things because the unhappiness I have felt of late I know is coming within, from something I have misplaced or overlooked.
alexis
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