Coastal Musings

So last week I took a vacation. It was unexpected just how much I needed this break from our own reality. Even more unexpected how with 15 people to please, serve, feed and keep happy - somehow the whole affair went off without a hitch, thanks in large part to our wonderful, peace-keeping hosts.

There I was in the midst of a married-in family, one Jorgensen in a sea of Wildsmiths, happy, calm, at peace and finding myself falling back in love with the run. Daily, we would get up, put on our shoes and head off to some amazingly, impossibly beautiful trail or ocean run, a long line of ages, shapes and personalities - wandering through the beauty together.  It was a powerful reminder of just how essential it is to get out the door, one foot in front of the other, and move.   

Making it happen

The rabbit hole

Down there with little clue how to get out, an unexpected lifeline came my way. It was exactly what I didn't know I needed, and on that rope I found 5 solid days of running in a weeks time, as well as a beautiful glimpse at joy and a handful of genuine smiles. I'll take it.

And here I am at midnight on an airplane, heading off to a new family thanksgiving. My 2nd without the life force of Nana. And this year, for the first time, I am looking forward to forging new traditions and new paths. Thank you running. Keep up the good work!

The Bust of 2012

I miss feeling. I miss writing. I miss running. I miss consistency and routine. The fits and starts that began the year never materialized into a movement. And here I am halfway through November with little calendar completion and even less words. I suppose - what I did not count on or understand or read about - was that after the numbness wears off, the depression digs its heels into you, spotlighting with 20/20 clarity the understanding that life will never be the same again. Your emotions begin to play tricks with time and context. It is as if I did not want to get on with my life, as if I was intentionally squatting on my own dreams and future because I was very unwilling to give up my mother. 

I found myself, unbeknownst to myself, unwilling to move, knowing that each single step forward would be moments in life that my mother would not see. For months I would stop and start -  just a tiny toe into the new motherless world, but the pain seared through me. It was too intense; so I retreated. After all the suffering, the years of abuse my mother’s body went through as the disgusting disease ravaged her insides, I still just wished she were here.  And it all sounds like platitudes and common moments, no more special than anyone’s, but it honestly felt as if no one had ever gone through this particular hellish pain. 

All the while I was casting myself in stone - preserving the life - the only life I had ever known.  Right down to the very core of my being, I was not moving on. I picked up dozens of books only to make it 2 pages in. I started numerous projects only to abandon them within days. Sleep left me by even larger degrees, and I stopped - just stopped - being me. I stopped running consistently, living healthily, and loving with my whole self. I recoiled from the everyday to enter my own cocoon of self pity, angry at everyone who still had a breathing mother. I found myself terribly upset when encountering women over the age of 64, still alive while my once vibrant mother was swept away. Several times I remember thinking - I should be feeling this more - I should be taking this in and learning -  but I just couldn’t muster the energy to complete that sentence. 

Now here I am, waking up after the storm, wondering where the last 14 months have gone?  While going about the difficult task of developing the new context of my relationship to my Mom, letting go of the external one, I’m beginning to realize that it hurts to be pinched again. And here underneath the exhaustion, the anger, the depression echo the stirrings of a deeply determined ultra-marathoner - crawling her way back to relentless forward motion.

Hunger, Haribo & The Long Run

Being a vegetarian, albeit a less than stringent character, my healthy calories can sometimes be slightly harder to come by than digging into a dense steak dinner. As the mileage amps up during a training cycle I find myself constantly trying to catch up to my hunger needs. Healthy eating is important to me - it’s been a part of my life - almost my entire life - and while I VERY much enjoy the occasional bag of funyuns or handful too many of oreos, I’ve been a clean living sort as long as I can remember. Clean does not mean low fat. I eat cheese, butter, eggs, peanut butter, nuts by the large handful, granola, etc... But largely what goes in my mouth fits the standard definition of real food. So as the miles creep up and my calorie needs begin to multiply I run into the great food dilemma of a 1st world middle class life.... To powder and supplement with bars and gels or try to consume whole food for all my needs. I used to joke around with my brothers that my beer a night habit was calorie and carb loading in an all natural liquid way. But beer cannot really effectively be consumed on the long run, other than those rare marathon occasions when it’s super warm and the frat boys are out in force with their coors light and smiles. (Yes, my brothers and I did share a warm, crappy beer at mile 22 of last years St. Louis Marathon). And quite honestly I don’t have time to concoct organic home recipes for on the go running, so I do, often, find myself forking over cash for gooey food-like substances.

So far in this new training cycle I haven’t run long or far enough to justify a fuel on the run carry along, until this past Sunday that is. I knew I had a long run, 20 or so miles, on the schedule, yet I had forgotten to address the fueling issue until late Saturday night. In a pinch I ran over to Walgreens and purchased a bag of Haribo Gummy Bears. These candies are a childhood favorite of mine. I vividly remember my first time with these chewy, sweet confections. I was 8 years old and my family went to a German Fair. There was music, games, dancing, fun of all sorts, but the highlight of my trip came from a little booth giving away free samples of these treats. I savored my tiny little bag of gummy bears for three days, popping one in my mouth at a time. I thought they were the best things I had ever tasted. I simply couldn’t believe how good they were, and I wanted to delight in them as long as I possibly could. Since that time I have harbored a love of the gummy bear. I certainly never anticipated that love crossing over to my fitness needs.

Yet on Sunday morning, I popped open the bag, threw a handful into a smaller plastic bag, laced up my shoes and headed out for a beautiful, long run. An hour or so into the run, I tossed half of the gummy bears in my mouth, filled my belly with a few swigs of water and continued on the path. While not the same jolt of energy from an accel gel or gu, the gummy bears did their job and kept me from crashing. After my 2nd hour running I polished off the small bag of gummy bears and made it back to my front door with energy to spare. I’m not sure if it is the increased fitness from several weeks training or the magic of the black forest delight - either way my week ended on a high note with an easier than expected first crack at a long run, and gave me some hope that I can get back to form for this season! Looking forward to building on this confidence and energy for the next few weeks.

Miles Run: 50 +2 hours yoga

The True Adventures of an Incredibly Average Runner

There is a saying in Tibetan that “at the door of the miserable rich man sleeps the contented beggar.” The point of this saying is not that poverty is a virtue, but that happiness does not come from wealth, but from setting limits to one’s desires, and living within those limits with satisfaction. The saying rattled around my noggin all week long during my first structured training week in over a year. When you’ve been out of the game for such a while - it is hard to jump right back in, address your weaknesses head on and realize that you are not as fast, as fit, as spiffy as you once were. One of my frustrations last year came not only from the physical illness, surgery, recovery, the emotional exhaustion of death, but also from the unrealistic expectations placed on myself in the midst of all of the crazy. I lost sight of the process. I just wanted to be there already - to be as good as I possibly could, if on the best day I was as fit as I’ve ever been. And even then - if that were the case - I would still be telling you the tales of an incredibly average, at best, state-ranked runner.

I’m not great. I’ll never be on the olympic team, nor could I even set my feet on the starting line of the trials. But I can stand next to those running giants, and that is one of the reasons I love this sport so much. I pound the pavement behind the best in the sport - directly behind them. I step over their sweat and spit and cross the same finish line they do. How many athletes get to shadow the best of the best? If you love baseball, but don’t have the skill to make it in Yankee stadium, the closest you get is a seat on the sideline. For us runners, we get to stand toe to toe with those who are at the peak of the sport. We get to stand in the same arena, go through the same journey. This is one of the beauties and wonders of running. And while it’s certainly important to set goals - and to have “stretch” goals in your peripheral vision - we must be happy with the process. We should revel in the fact that we are here at all, that we are moving, pushing, learning and growing right along with the greats. And my incredibly average-ness doesn’t matter, it’s the goals set, the structure and life they give me that moves me along. Setting those goals, being realistic about my own limitations, physically, time wise, etc.. is a productive first step in being satisfied within the limits.

In that mindset I began the week, full of anticipation and ready to take the dive. And I did. And it wasn’t so bad after all. I forgot how much I love a plan. The structure, the pressure, the insistence that you can’t get better if you don’t try. 1 week down - 13 more to go before challenge #1 of 2012.

Miles run 44 + 1.5 hour yoga

The Reckoning

We knew death was coming. We watched it for almost 7 years, peeking through the glass, dipping it’s toes in the bath, hiding in the closet. We knew it was losing patience with my mom’s desire to stay here, with us, as long as she could, and yet when it finally came, when we saw it open the door and enter the room, when we stared it in the face we couldn’t help but be shocked that it does actually exist - that it will take away from you the breath of the one you love most.

Have you seen death? Have you watched the shallow breathing of a loved one slowly subside, seen the last life breath, felt the skin, still warm to the touch start to cool, watched the veins turn purple, the skin white and glistening, the body growing rigid - difficult to walk away, to say goodbye. It changes you. It shifts your insides around, forces reflection in serious and uncomfortable ways and pushes you to the brink of exhaustion, depression, emotion....

It’s been almost 6 months, and not an hour of the day goes by where I am not still profoundly saddened by this loss, by my lack of peace in her not being here, present, in this life, surrounding me with her love, her encouragement, her way of grace. When you lose your mother, when you become an orphaned adult, you lose the context of your life, the keeper of your memories, the place holder of the one person who knows you from the tiniest formation to the fully realized you. And moving through this grief does not happen quickly, does not happen in a linear form, and is NOT something you can check off the list and move on to the next. I am learning, just now, to live WITH this loss and not let the loss be what defines my movements and moments. I am progressing. It is slow. It is painful, but it is real and honest and the only way my mother would want it to be. Of that much I am certain.

And as a new year comes crashing into the calendar, my first year without a mother, I am ready to look into it, put my big girl shoes on and start moving forward - Relentless Forward Motion.... Toward that end - I’ve tacked up a training plan, signed onto a social networking site for runners, told everyone around me my goals and desires for my 2012 running year and re-dedicated myself, to myself: to the movement, the relentless forward motion, the breathing in & out, pounding, sweating, heart pulsing joy that is running. I’m smiling again - in bits and pieces - and hoping that this essential piece of my life ushers me through and onto the closure stage of grief - so that I can begin to honor my mother with true joy and reflection and understand this cycle we call life. My focus is on building a solid mileage base in order to really succeed at the Ultra Distance in the way my body is capable.

February 25: Cowtown Half Marathon - Ft. Worth, Tx
March 11: Quivering Quads Trail Half Marathon - Troy Missouri
April 15: Go St. Louis Marathon - St. Louis, Mo
May 31: Soldier Field 10 mile - Chicago, Il
August 25: Lean Horse 100 mile!!!!! - Hot Spring, SD (Top 3 overall finish)
October 21: Rock-N-Roll St. Louis Marathon - St. Louis, Mo
November 16: JFK 50 mile Boonsboro, MD (Top 10 overall finish)

Endurance Training 2012 begins now. Follow me as I train and race my way through the year!