dumb.

You know what's dumb?  When people lie.

Right now, I'm lying to myself.

I'm telling myself that I don't care.  That I'm over it.

But I'm not.

Even though, I knew a long time ago.

Actually, when I think about it, the day I knew was the exact day that I started lying to myself.

That's dumb, too.

starting from broken

Starting to run from scratch was difficult.  There were times when I did not think I could do it.  And there were many more times when I realized, in awe, that, despite the odds, I had.  

I remember dreaming of effortlessly running for hours and then the devastation when my lungs and muscles were screaming after minutes.  But I remember the progress, too.  I remember the first time I ran for 3 miles straight through - I was on a treadmill and I thought for sure that it was going to explode as I wondered if anyone had ever run that far before!  Ha!  I remember the first time I ran 7 miles.  I was at my favorite park, which I had been trying to conquer for years; I couldn’t stop smiling when I realized I had made it the whole way around, and then more when I realized I wasn’t even as tired as I thought 7 miles should have made me.  I remember when I finished my marathon, I cried as I crossed the finish line.  My dad had been very sick through most of my training, so sick that I almost stopped training all together; but, I am happy to say that he was there on the other end of the phone, waiting to celebrate my finish with me.  

It was this time last year that I started to feel the pain in my legs.  I was confident in my ability to run the distance that I was starting to work on my speed.  By the end of April last year, I was out of commission with surgery scheduled.  Nine months after surgery, after 13 odd weeks of physical therapy, after countless stretches, lunges, and squats, I am ready to start training again.  I have my sights set on a half marathon in June - the one I was training for last year when I tore the labrum in my hip.

Now, I am starting from broken.  And I think this time around it is harder.  It is humbling to set out for a 3 mile run, a quick, down and dirty workout before, and realize that I can’t do it yet.  I feel like I’m the chunky little kid of my childhood who wants so much to be athletic, but whose dreams are bigger than her ability.  My runs are leaving me frustrated and previous landmark triumphs taunt me.  I’m trying to be forgiving and understanding, reminding myself that I am starting from scratch again and that there will be good and bad days.  But I’m not starting from scratch and the bad days seem to be taking over and the mental scripts that I thought I had conquered are fighting to comeback.

This time, progress is going to be a mental battle.  I tried to remind myself today that even if I had to walk, I was still moving forward.  I have to remember that I am capable of the physical aspect, that is what drove me before; now it is time for a mental triumph.  It is a call to take accountability and control in a way that I have lost track of as so many things in my life are willy-nilly.  I learned once upon a time, in my non-runner life, that the cure to almost all ills is to keep my attention focused on the present.  I still have my sights set on that hometown half in June; but right now, I’m focused on three quality miles.  

Sticks and stones

I've been feeling very temperamental these last few days.  Maybe I'm torn in too many directions, burning the candle at both ends, getting too much sleep, not getting enough; really, the possible explanations are endless.  Tuesday morning, I couldn't wake up soon enough in anticipation of my first run since April and this morning I almost talked myself out of it.  The only things that seem to be concrete right now is how short my fuse is getting and how much I end up changing my mind in a short time.  I am, right now, in a word, crabby.


This morning, once I finally committed myself to the cause and pressed "start" on my Garmin, and started running I waited for the euphoric runner's high to wipe away my bad mood.  And then I waited some more.  My current regiment calls for three rounds of 2 running minutes and 8 walking minutes; after the initial 2 running minutes, I was certain that my morning jaunt was going to haunt me more than release me.  What felt freeing on Tuesday, felt cumbersome today; what motivated me then, had begun to daunt me; the disappointingly short 2.5 mile loop began to seem like 25.  But I trudged on, obediently switching gears according to the beeps and I finished in what seemed to be a shorter time than Tuesday.


I did finish quicker than Tuesday, by almost 2 minutes; and that first cumbersome interval, turned out to be the fastest pace I've been able to sustain possibly ever.  All of a sudden what seemed at first to be a rough start to the day became a ray of hopeful light.  Isn't it funny how a simple definitive result can affect a whole experience!  This morning it was a good thing, but what about the times when the end result shadows the joy?  It has been said that true rewards are found in the journey, not the destination.  This morning, the reward was defined neither by the run nor the effort, but by the Garmin.  Even thought the feeling was brag-tastic it was external, none the less.


I always think that running is a metaphor for life; that whatever I experience in life can be explained and examined through a run and whatever lessons I learn from a run can be projected into life.  In a strange way, my handy dandy GPS watch has become an interloper; another metaphor perhaps.  Maybe electronic feedback can be just as disheartening as public opinion, that is, if I choose to allow it.  As Eleanor Roosevelt, so famously, said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." 


Ultimately, I want to feel good; we all do.  Maybe the lesson is that I've grown to depend too much on the data, the external sources, to define happiness.  Maybe the various directions that my life seems to be pulling me, the burning candles, and my sleeping habits aren't really the cause of my crabbiness; maybe its that I'm depending on the external feedback to define my journey after the fact instead of using my internal barometer to help navigate the course. 

And so here I am...

There are several ways to build a character, it seems I am one best built in media res and so I will tell you that it is generally my constant effort to free myself from my calculating J. Alfred Prufrock mind and drink the "free spirit" that dances in my soul.  Ok, so I'm a bit over the top.  I guess that's a start.

At any rate.  I'm a runner.  Sort of.  I wasn't, then I learned.  I fell in love, then I got hurt.  Now, I'm waiting on surgery that will *hopefully* (those are my fingers crossing) allow me to run again.  I wish I could tell you that it was some fantastic accident that bore some type of unsung triumph.
Nope.
Apparently, I was born with a deformed femoral head.  Yup, a square peg in a round socket that just finally took my hip cartilage past its breaking point.  That's all there is, folks.  And while I know hip joints are pretty necessary for running (and so I've learned, just about everything else as well) it seems like such a minor thing compared to what other human beings overcome.

So here I am.  It's 11:51 on a Wednesday night.  For the second night in a row, I'm having anxiety about having this surgery and what my life will look like if running is still not a viable option for me.  Maybe I would feel differently today if I had known on that April morning that it was going to be my last painless run (albeit, pumped full of ibuprofen) through my neighborhood.  Maybe if had been ready then, this wouldn't be so hard now.  But.  I wasn't.

And so this is my story, as it unfolds, of how I overcome my square peg and learn, despite the limitations and inconveniences along the way, to stop measuring my life in coffee spoons.