One of my favorite things about the long run is that so much can happen. I set out last night for a two-hour run. It had been a long day (I get up at 6:00 a.m., start working as soon as I pour a cup of coffee, and I finish teaching at 5:00 p.m.), but we all have long days. I hit the pavement at 5:25 and got home again at 7:30.
Getting out of the house is often a hell of a thing for me: between the grading, the prep, the letters of recommendation, my own writing, spending time with the kids, watching Caprica with my spouse -- there's always something else immediate and pressing that tries to keep me inside.
Last night, for instance, I was hungry. The kids were cooking pizza. I thought about eating pizza and playing Nintendo with them for a bit, taking my long run the next day. I had to practice some pretty serious discipline to grab some peanuts and get my feet moving.
I started just before dark on a breezy, warm, rainy January day. There's a spot on the bike trail where four white-tail deers stand and look at me, as if to say, "Want an ear of corn?" They were there last night. The rain picked up, really started soaking me, and I hadn't eaten enough peanuts. So I stopped by my office where I keep another jar of peanuts and several small boxes of raisins. Forty minutes into my run, I had this little snack and thought, I can get home in twenty minutes; an hour run's respectable; I can grab a slice of pizza . . ., but I pushed through.
It's that middle third of a long run that often gets me. That's also part of what I mean by "Running for the Middle" -- the first forty minutes is nothing, little more than a maintenance run, and the final forty minutes is often accompanied by elation or, at least, a sense of accomplishment -- a good kind of hurt. But those middle forty -- those moments are filled with the fear that I'm never going to get home; my work is piling up; the kids are growing up without a father; the crapradoodle will have run away and bit somebody or joined a circus . . .
I made my turn on the bike trail at close to 80 minutes and felt great -- forty minutes to go; I had worked out the creeks in my calves and hips; I had built up a sweat; my breathing was under control; my pace (9:00 min/mile) was exactly what I wanted. I made the turn for the final forty, and the wind I hadn't realized was at my back hit me full on in the face. The rain, I swear, was just this side of icicles. My shirt spoke out loud to my nipples: "Ha! You thought you were chapped before you made the turn.
I ran through town to get home. I passed a bank at 7:03, twenty-five minutes from home. By this time, the temperature had dropped twenty degrees, and I was feeling it. My forearms had gone numb -- I hadn't dressed for this weather -- and I thought about stopping by a friend's house to borrow a pair of socks for my hands. My long sleeve shirt had lost its efficacy when it became a crackling sheet of ice.
Ever read "To Build a Fire"?
At this point, I must have looked pretty doofy running along State Street shaking my arms above my head to get blood flowing out of them and then below my waist to get blood flowing into them and then clapping and rubbing my hands, and squinting because, you know, those icedrops, all the while listening to my nipples cutting holes in my t-shirt.
I ran like this passed businesses, the grocery store, restaurants, frat houses, the yoga studio, and back to the top of the hill. At home, I ran my hands under cold water while clapping and rubbing them and took my shower. I stood next to the heater and put an Angry Birds bandaid on each nipple. I ate another snack and drove through the snowy slush to catch the last lines of the fiction reading I had given up for the run.
Unlike our hero from the Jack London story, I was never in any great peril, my peril was much less perilous (I've been thinking of Monty Python today, I guess), because I could have crawled into a gas station or knocked on a friend's door, but the long run is about the closest thing I have to an adventure these days. I like the way it tests my limits, asks me to do things I wouldn't normally set out to do. I like the way I change and the world changes with me while I'm running. It's not a superhuman distance; I'm not fooling myself into thinking I'm doing anything noteworthy. The long run is a different distance for all of us, but I do think it's the crown jewel of my ten-day cycle, not because it's the most important workout for my training, but because it shows me that I can do more than I thought I could do two hours earlier.
Friday: 7.5
Saturday: 3.4
Sunday: ------
Monday: 8.4
Tuesday: 3.4
Wednesday: 3.4
Thursday: ~13.0
Friday: ------
Previous: 37.5
Year To Date: 50.5 miles.
Running Days: 8
Days off: 5
Is it a psychological thing (some folks like to call it a dysfunction, I like to call it a thing) that on days that I have a run planned, I don't want to run, but days I have off, I want nothing more than to grab another dozen miles?
Getting out of the house is often a hell of a thing for me: between the grading, the prep, the letters of recommendation, my own writing, spending time with the kids, watching Caprica with my spouse -- there's always something else immediate and pressing that tries to keep me inside.
Last night, for instance, I was hungry. The kids were cooking pizza. I thought about eating pizza and playing Nintendo with them for a bit, taking my long run the next day. I had to practice some pretty serious discipline to grab some peanuts and get my feet moving.
I started just before dark on a breezy, warm, rainy January day. There's a spot on the bike trail where four white-tail deers stand and look at me, as if to say, "Want an ear of corn?" They were there last night. The rain picked up, really started soaking me, and I hadn't eaten enough peanuts. So I stopped by my office where I keep another jar of peanuts and several small boxes of raisins. Forty minutes into my run, I had this little snack and thought, I can get home in twenty minutes; an hour run's respectable; I can grab a slice of pizza . . ., but I pushed through.
It's that middle third of a long run that often gets me. That's also part of what I mean by "Running for the Middle" -- the first forty minutes is nothing, little more than a maintenance run, and the final forty minutes is often accompanied by elation or, at least, a sense of accomplishment -- a good kind of hurt. But those middle forty -- those moments are filled with the fear that I'm never going to get home; my work is piling up; the kids are growing up without a father; the crapradoodle will have run away and bit somebody or joined a circus . . .
I made my turn on the bike trail at close to 80 minutes and felt great -- forty minutes to go; I had worked out the creeks in my calves and hips; I had built up a sweat; my breathing was under control; my pace (9:00 min/mile) was exactly what I wanted. I made the turn for the final forty, and the wind I hadn't realized was at my back hit me full on in the face. The rain, I swear, was just this side of icicles. My shirt spoke out loud to my nipples: "Ha! You thought you were chapped before you made the turn.
I ran through town to get home. I passed a bank at 7:03, twenty-five minutes from home. By this time, the temperature had dropped twenty degrees, and I was feeling it. My forearms had gone numb -- I hadn't dressed for this weather -- and I thought about stopping by a friend's house to borrow a pair of socks for my hands. My long sleeve shirt had lost its efficacy when it became a crackling sheet of ice.
Ever read "To Build a Fire"?
The cold of space smote the unprotected tip of the planet, and he, being on that unprotected tip, received the full force of the blow. The blood of his body recoiled before it. The blood was alive, like the dog, and like the dog it wanted to hide away and cover itself up from the fearful cold.I thought about that just then.
At this point, I must have looked pretty doofy running along State Street shaking my arms above my head to get blood flowing out of them and then below my waist to get blood flowing into them and then clapping and rubbing my hands, and squinting because, you know, those icedrops, all the while listening to my nipples cutting holes in my t-shirt.
I ran like this passed businesses, the grocery store, restaurants, frat houses, the yoga studio, and back to the top of the hill. At home, I ran my hands under cold water while clapping and rubbing them and took my shower. I stood next to the heater and put an Angry Birds bandaid on each nipple. I ate another snack and drove through the snowy slush to catch the last lines of the fiction reading I had given up for the run.
Unlike our hero from the Jack London story, I was never in any great peril, my peril was much less perilous (I've been thinking of Monty Python today, I guess), because I could have crawled into a gas station or knocked on a friend's door, but the long run is about the closest thing I have to an adventure these days. I like the way it tests my limits, asks me to do things I wouldn't normally set out to do. I like the way I change and the world changes with me while I'm running. It's not a superhuman distance; I'm not fooling myself into thinking I'm doing anything noteworthy. The long run is a different distance for all of us, but I do think it's the crown jewel of my ten-day cycle, not because it's the most important workout for my training, but because it shows me that I can do more than I thought I could do two hours earlier.
Friday: 7.5
Saturday: 3.4
Sunday: ------
Monday: 8.4
Tuesday: 3.4
Wednesday: 3.4
Thursday: ~13.0
Friday: ------
Previous: 37.5
Year To Date: 50.5 miles.
Running Days: 8
Days off: 5
Is it a psychological thing (some folks like to call it a dysfunction, I like to call it a thing) that on days that I have a run planned, I don't want to run, but days I have off, I want nothing more than to grab another dozen miles?
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