Running Commentary

Thinking about my cranky comment that my blog is trivial, and, by extension, that individual stories are trivial. Not true, of course. For how do we learn to grasp the abstract unless we brush up against the real? People who run might find something of interest in my ups and downs. People who struggle to find a balance between staying fit and living a comfortable life might find something of interest. I can only hope so, as I continue to share how things are for me. As George Sheehan said, we are all an experiment of one, our own non-replicable lab. If you're not familiar with Dr. Sheehan, prepare yourself for a treat: http://www.georgesheehan.com/welcome/ The Couples Relay went well. More details at a later date.

Into work on a Saturday. Sitting here contmplating my recent up-down saga and feeling that, while it was a drama for me, in the larger light of what is important it was rather banal. This conclusion came to me when I was watching Olympic figure skating on TV the other night and following, in a most desultory way, the convoluted personal stories of the athletes. I became overwhelmed by melodrama somewhere along the way, and I stopped wanting to know even one more detail. Well, if these gripping tales ring somehow trivial to me, then what do I hold important? What would be a meaningful enough story to stir me as profound? The answer can't be conjured, no doubt, in a facile blog entry such as this. But the question has got my attention. The answer might have something to do with the picture at the top of the page--think about that. Don't get your hopes up--I'm nowhere near ready to abandon my blog. It is challenging to keep. I like that it forces me to write. But I'm not s...

Feeling a bit stiff and so happy about the pain--it's that post-run feeling. This morning about 4:30 I went out for 3 miles. At mile 1 I felt a little ache in my quad; at mile 2 my hip growled a little but didn't bark. At mile 3 I was smiling. Actually, this was my second run--went out Wednesday after work for a few laps on the soft dirt track at King school. That was a sissy run--today's was much closer to the real thing. So I feel I am officially back. The unknown is how far I am capable of going after a 2 1/2-week layoff. For today, I'm filled with the joy of being alive.

...yes indeed, and I'm talkin' about my shoes and me, and I'm hopin' that it'll all come back to me... Walked from the Transbay Terminal down to the Embarcadero and along the waterfront this morning, the first extended stroll I've taken since my attempt to burrow into the earth with my right hip. It was a glorious morning--runners streaking by, seagulls screaming overhead, commuters carrying paper coffee cups and talking on cell phones--and I felt truly blessed. I still feel a little weakness in my hip and my quad, but am very close to healed. I swam after work yesterday and was pleased to realize that since all I could do was the crawl (no breastroke--too hard on the hips), I had to do the crawl the whole time. And I could do it! Evidently my endurance capacity has stayed reasonably high during this down time. Not long ago I couldn't do the crawl for very long without alternating some other, easier stroke because I just got too worn out. But not last night....

I forgot that the first words of this song are, “Slow down, you move too fast.” Huh. Not likely. Anyway, I’m not feeling like Deena Kastor yet, but am feeling worlds better. It is inexplicable to me that for the first week after my fall I experienced no improvement—even felt worse as the days went by. And the second week didn’t get much better until Friday, when I awoke in the morning and said to myself, hey, I’m gonna live. The nurse practitioner I saw at Dr. F’s office Wednesday told me she didn’t think I needed to give up on the idea of the marathon, but then, she is young and is a distance runner. I doubt a fall like I took would keep her down as long as it is threatening to keep me down. But I loved her for saying it and for not saying, “Oh you must stop running for two months.” My son the doctor told me I could probably pursue what’s known as “active rest.” I love a good oxymoron, so after about five days during which all I did was walk from the bus terminal to work and back (fou...

And even they don't survive forever. Awoke with a head filled with black thoughts. Unable to understand why this injury, which is certainly non-fatal and is even in the long run non-disabling, has me so whipped. I think the answer can be found in the primal instinct to live and thrive—an instinct that I should rejoice in. I can't speak for the rest of the human race, but I know I have a horrendous fear of what my old friend DN used to call "the big D." (He was a huge fan of "the big L," but that's another blog post altogether.) I keep having flashbacks to different incidents during the last four years of my mother's life. She went from being an ambulatory and sentient senior citizen to being a wheelchair-bound little old lady lost in her own diminishing world of patchy memory and various degrees of pain. Before she died last July I don't think I really believed in death as anything other than what happened to some other people. I didn't hold ...

More like a rock-headed one. Feeling worse today and wondering if the swimming did me in. Dr. R, my dear brother-in-law, thinks I may have traumatized my bursa. Yikes! Anyway, I have an appointment to see Dr. F or (more likely) one of her minions tomorrow. I'm reduced to not caring whether I ever do another marathon--at this point I'd settle for being able to take two steps without pain. Whose idea was having bodies, anyway? As I wait for resolution, I'm concentrating on cutting back on my calorie intake a bit. I can see myself rolling out of this experience 30 pounds heavier. Not sure I ever logged my vitals into this blog, so here's the basic me: height, 5' 4", weight 120 and gaining. Normal heart rate 48 to 50 bpm. For my normal level of activity, about 1800 calories a day works well. But now-- stay tuned.

Feeling slightly more positive. I did go swimming today, for 20 minutes non-stop lap swimming. I went slowly and alternated between the breaststroke and the crawl, monitoring my hip and my back muscles as I went. When I finished I felt so wonderful to have oxygen in my blood once more! I realize I’m used to at least three long hits per week of heavy aerobic activity, and have been starving for it. I have to say neither my hip nor the side of my back (my obliques? my traps?) feel much better than they did a week ago. I plan to call Dr. F. tomorrow and get either an appointment or referral for physical therapy. The old broad as Chester is getting really old. But at least I no longer feel like such a victim. I rode my bike to swimming and back today, and seem no worse for it. I guess I’ll postpone ordering that wheelchair. Sheesh, sometimes I’m such a big baby.

I have to remind myself I'm not an inactive person now, I'm an active person who is injured. Rode my bike out to the El Cerrito Bart station before work today (about 2.8 miles) and, of course, will ride back tonight. Putting much weight on my injured hip is still painful, and my left obliques kept me awake last night. I had a better attitude yesterday -- was able to slow down and be more accepting -- but this morning I'm feeling that four days is long enough to rehabilitate. No, I am not very realistic about this. It is a lesson in being in the moment, for sure. I know it takes about three weeks to lose fitness, so I'm still OK. I was going so strong that it just kills me to have it slip away. Trying to accept my challenges as friends, who offer me a precious chance to change and grow.

Mean as she can be... That's how I feel, disabled as I am. I guess logging my training process has to include logging the downs as well as the ups. I am so bad at being hurt (I know, who's good?). Feel slightly better today, but still find that bearing weight is painful to my right hip. And my obliques, both sides now, are, as my MFN would say, yakked. Sunday night around 3 a.m. I had to move out to the couch and fortify myself with the heating pad and a painkiller stronger than anything I've taken since the 1970s. Last night was better, but the jury is out on whether riding my bike to my Tuesday night meeting (about two miles each way) was a good idea. I wish I could take a long swim in Pyramid Lake (yes! I uploaded another photo!) Maybe I'll amble on over to the King Park pool this weekend, since Pyramid is a bit far away for amblin' to. In 1985 my knee seemed irreparably hurt, so I took the year off and swam at least three times a week. Toward the end of that pe...

I discovered how to post a photo. Yay!

I now have the answer to my hubris-born question, "When will this string of good runs I'm having end?" That answer is yesterday. I had on a nice new pair of Sauconys -- plenty of traction! -- and was running down the bumpy road with my sweetie, Z, when I became airborne for ten minutes. Anyway, that's how long it felt between the time I tripped and the time I hit the ground. I had time to realize I was in shorts and a T-shirt and was about to scrape all the skin off my hands, arms, elbows, knees, and shins (past experience told me this was true), and time to contort my body in a gruesome twisting motion to avoid such scraping. Result: no scraping, except for my right palm, but a big bruise on my hip and sore muscles in my right groin and quad, and -- the oddest injury -- a deep pain in my left oblique muscles. That was some twist, I guess, and not like the one we did last summer. So I'm hurt, and very depressed. I figure three days rest will fix me right up and ye...

The theme for yesterday was Hello Darkness My Old Friend, as I did a 6.25-miler at 4:30 a.m. It was a fine one. No spectators offering advice, only one homeless person on Solano Ave. who looked at me and lamented, "You're working so-o-o-o hard!" What is there in an old broad running that makes people think they can say whatever pops into their heads. I just told him it wasn't hard at all -- and as I went by him I thought, "It's not half as hard as being out of shape, as not being able to catch my breath, as feeling lethargic and bloated -- ." But then, I'm crazy, so what would I know? Today I took a sick day from work (speaking of lethargy). I wanted to loaf around, but first had to do a 4.5 miler. Love running when the sun is actually up! Even when it's in the fog, like today. There are a few blossoms beginning to star the skeletal trees, a few birds chirping as they scout real estate with nest-building in mind. Today's run was truly work. I...