Did He Say "Sweden"?

“Recovering” from a marathon can be rough, and as many times as I’ve gone through it, it still takes me by surprise. I focus so much on reaching the finish line that my forward thinking doesn’t progress beyond that marker, at least not in a rational way. I may picture a postrace haze of gold, a celebratory atmosphere, a state of bliss in which all my problems will have slipped away.

The problems return though, after about 10 minutes of post-finish line afterglow. The day after a marathon, my postrace haze consists of a headache, a gnawing hunger, and a simmering irritability. During a long drive home from a marathon this summer, my mother, who had accompanied me on the road trip, pulled out some hard candy she’d purchased at an old-fashioned candy store the day before. My mother makes no apologies for the way she eats hard candy: she does not suck it, she bites. I’ve known her long enough to be familiar with this trait. I tried to focus on the road as I listened to the rustling of the candy wrappers. My muscles tensed at the first loud crunch. “I can take this,” I told myself. “It’s not a big deal. It will be over soon.” I tried to breathe evenly. More crunching followed. More crinkling of wrappers. Finally I burst out, “How long is it going to take to crunch that candy?” My mother confessed it was taking longer than she expected to bite through her stash in the otherwise silent car. We both ended up laughing about it. For the rest of the trip, I maintained a thin façade over the growly bear I felt I had become. I don’t think my mother ate any more of her candy.

I was in another one of those funks, puttering about my apartment with a scowl and feeling bleak about the future and the world in general, when a word from the TV that I had on for background noise penetrated the fog and caught my attention: Sweden. Sweden? Did someone say "Sweden"?

I turned toward the TV in earnest. A Rick Steves travel show was coming up, and he was heading to Sweden.

Earlier this year, I’d considered traveling to Stockholm for the June marathon there, but then I realized the event had sold out months before. So I put it on my radar for 2012. Still, at the point when Rick Steves offered me a preview of a Swedish tour, I hadn’t committed one way or the other; I hadn’t registered for the 2012 event, and the prospect floated at the back of my mind, seeming very far away.

Sweden. Suddenly the word had magic. Suddenly a 2012 trip emerged from the realm of the distant future and drew near enough to look alluring. For Sweden, I thought, it might be worth sticking around.

I sometimes think of a particular line from the movie “Steel Magnolias,” which I first saw when I was about junior high age and have watched several times since. The character played by Olympia Dukakis has lost her husband and is trying to cobble together a life without him. She’s a longtime football fan, and at one point she quips, “Well, I really do love football, but it’s hard to parlay that into a reason to live.”

Sometimes I understand just what she means. Sure, I really do love running and traveling, but it can be hard to parlay that into a reason to live.

And yet, somehow, that single reference to a travel show about Sweden was enough to pull me out of my funk.

Looking back, I realize that every trip I’ve taken has become part of me, part of my identity. Right before I went to Norway in 2008, the undertaking seemed like an awful lot of trouble. Now, I can’t imagine not having gone. I love the memory of walking back to the lodging around 1 am under an overcast but fully lit sky, sleeping on a bunk bed in a wooden cabin with the square window next to me never darkening. Traveling to Iceland got put off from 2009 to 2010, but on the trip that almost wasn’t, I fell in love with a new country that reminded me of my native state of Idaho, with its geysers and lava rocks and small, independent population. Dublin drew me back for a second visit, and now I’m wondering how soon I can manage to return.

Geyser in Iceland--or could it be Soda Springs, Idaho?

I’m registered now for the 2012 Stockholm Marathon; my entrance fee is paid, my place is assured. Anticipation comes in waves: at the moment, it all looks far away again. It’s hard to see past the holidays and the crushing darkness of winter. My next scheduled marathon, in Myrtle Beach in February, seems as unreal as daylight in the evening. But if I remember that bleak postrace afternoon when Rick Steves came on TV to talk about Sweden, I can call up that prick of hope, too. Yes, I think Sweden may be worth sticking around for.

Lucky Number 13

When I first moved into a high-rise apartment building, I was amused to discover that it had no 13th floor. It had a 12th floor and a 14th floor, but the elevator buttons and stairwell signs ignored the existence of the number 13. Since I lived on the 9th floor, I couldn’t argue with the apartment manager over whether my unit number should be, say, 1402 or 1302, but seriously, no 13th floor?

Can I please see a unit on level 13?

I scoff, but the fact is I’m superstitious myself. This trait usually manifests in my reluctance to mention something I either hope or fear will happen. Who knows, maybe my stating a preference out loud will bring about the unwanted outcome. In certain situations, for example, you must never say the word “rain.” Shush, just don’t say it!

I’m not generally superstitious about numbers. I therefore find it funny in a painful sort of way that my 13th marathon ended up proving unlucky. It took place in 2009, which was about the worst year I’d ever had (um, maybe I shouldn’t have written that). I started the race on a fine March morning in Washington, DC, intent on demonstrating that my recent vague physical ailments meant nothing, absolutely nothing. My feet pounded the pavement, and wow, it pounded me back. Before long, I was ready to beg for mercy. I longed to quit. Heck, I wanted to die. I faced only one obstacle: I’d ridden to the race with a friend, who planned to watch the race from a few different points along the course, the first being around mile 18. I couldn’t think of any way to find him and tell him I wanted to go home other than running to mile 18. So I made it to mile 18 and there he was, and I informed him I felt horrible and wanted to quit. He seemed a little surprised but told me it was OK. And then I don’t know what happened. Maybe it was his incredulity that I was ready to drop out. Maybe it was marathon autopilot taking over. For whatever reason, I asked what was the next mile marker he could meet me at. He said mile 21. I said I’d see him at mile 21.

By mile 21, I figured I could walk to the finish and at least say I’d completed the race. But it would take a long time to walk 5 miles, a lot longer than it would take to run it, even if I ran slowly. More than anything, I wanted to end this ordeal. So I kept running. And yeah, I made it to the finish and got my medal, and later that day I went furniture shopping with my mom. She was searching for a new recliner.

So it doesn’t seem unlucky, but I blame that marathon for what happened in the following days. I noticed right away that my muscles felt more sore than usual. The Tuesday morning after the race, I went for a routine workout run and developed a shooting pain in my ankle. My first instinct was to run through it, but I changed my mind fast. Suddenly, I could barely even walk.

I went to see an orthopedic specialist, who put me in an ankle brace and ordered an MRI. Then he uttered those dreaded words: “stress fracture.” Or rather, he clarified, “stress reaction.” The upshot was no running for six to eight weeks. And then, as often seems to happen with injuries, the time dragged on. One injury led to another. I borrowed the word first brought up by my last orthopedic specialist the last time I got caught up in this cycle: “saga.” This time it was the Great Saga of Unlucky Marathon 13, or the Tragic Saga of the Unfortunate Year 2009, or something like that. At least I can always remember which marathon was number 13.

Earlier this year, after I finished marathon number 20, I started to lose count of how many marathons I’d run. Still, I can always figure it out by going back to number 13 and counting forward. When someone asked me this weekend how many I’ve done, I realized that the Richmond Marathon was number 25.

Wow, 25. Should I take myself out for a nice dinner? Maybe buy myself some jewelry? Or just be glad that any buildings tall enough to have a 26th floor usually have a 25th floor too?

Here’s to number 25.

Less Than

November 12, 2011, had to be one of the most beautiful days of autumn in Richmond, Virginia. I went out into blackness that smelt of winter, but by the time runners had gathered at the start of the marathon, the sun was there to touch them all with gold.

The predawn chill softened into crispness. The sunlight embraced us, but gently; trees with bronze-colored leaves tempered the glare. I would get so tired, so spent, and then the shadows would fall across me, the breeze would caress me, the river would gleam at me, and it felt like rest.

I noticed the banners advertising loft apartments. I saw the retro buildings of Richmond neighborhoods, and around mile 3, I mouthed a few lyrics of “Kryptonite” as a live band pounded their drum beat into our hearts and feet: “ ... with my superhuman might ...”

But all the time, I was falling into that void of darkness and pain. I wasn’t the same runner I was in Dublin. My ankles had been swollen for days. My head hurt. I couldn’t keep track of the doses of ibuprofen and daytime cold medicine I’d taken.

Mindfulness, I could hear my therapist saying. A marathon has a beginning, a middle, and an end. I called up my old stand-by words of encouragement: time does tend to pass. This is long, but finite.

I tuned in to conversations around me. Two women talking about a friend with a new baby. It was happy and sad. “I might always be baby hungry,” one of them confessed. But she was OK, she added. She was OK with not being at that place in her life. Was her acceptance a goal, a wish, or the truth? It melded with the pain. My feet kept rhythm with hers for a long time, until gradually we floated away from each other.

I saw the skyline of Richmond outlined in azure. I heard my friend call to me from the sidelines. “Moab, Moab!” she shouted. It was our code word. It penetrated finally, in time for me to look and wave. I managed a real smile. I might come alive again.

The thing here, I told myself, is to keep going. Keep moving. And pray.

I prayed without saying "Amen." I didn't want to hang up. I pled for a lifeline, and somehow it came. For a while the course that had seemed so difficult felt easier. I didn’t study the elevation map beforehand. When I needed a rest, it was there.

“I am crawling,” I thought. So, crawl to the finish. The thing here is to finish.

A cop at an intersection cheered us on. “You all look like you haven’t run more than two miles!” he lied.

There was a quote I’d been trying to get hold of. Something from President Hinckley, something about life being like an old-time rail journey, with lots of … with … keep moving, keep moving, keep moving … with … with …

The idea drifted through somewhere between words and impression. But there was one word I wanted; I knew it was in there.

Life is like an old-time rail journey, but sometimes … “thrilling.”

Mile 26. Thrilling, thrilling, thrilling. The course dropped steeply. I put on speed. I could see the finish line. I could see the finish clock. Down, down, down. My feet moved of their own accord.

Almost there, almost there, and then over the timing mats. Volunteers waited with their arms full of medals. I bent my head to let a girl hang a medal around my neck. The gold ribbon caught the orange flare of the trees along the street.

And I tried to remind myself how hard it had been. How the words of Pink had driven me: “Pretty, pretty please, don’t you ever, ever feel, that you’re less than …” I happened to hear her song on the radio when I was driving down to the expo. I never expected to be inspired by Pink. But it was like the Katy Perry song I heard on my way into Myrtle Beach: “Baby, you’re a firework, come on show them what you’re worth.” Right words at the right time.

I collected a Mylar blanket and managed, with my fingers clumsy from cold and exertion, to get it around myself. It felt like a royal robe. The leaves overhead crowned me.

I say I do all this for the T-shirts. I don’t know if that’s true. Maybe for the medals? I don’t know.

Mindfulness, my therapist says, is a suspension of judgment.

In a marathon, I am so vulnerable; I am aware of things I don’t ordinarily notice. I feel my own weakness, but also my strength. Is it the body or the spirit that ultimately pulls through?

Or do those elements suspend their war temporarily, and prove that they are both essential? The memory is there, in the blue of my Richmond Marathon T-shirt: “You almost stopped, but you didn’t stop.” The thing here is to finish, in order to have made the journey.

Weren’t You Wearing That the Last Time I Saw You?

Apparently my aforementioned fashion rut (see The Big Question) extends to marathon wear. Around mile 10 of the Richmond Marathon, a girl asked me, “Did you run the Charlottesville Marathon in March?” Well, actually it was in April, but yes, I did, and yes, I remembered talking to her. I could picture the steep hill in the Charlottesville Marathon course that we had confronted around the time we had a conversation about elevation change and how an elevation map just doesn’t give you the same impression as surging headlong into a climb.

How did she recognize me, though? I wouldn’t have noticed her in particular if she hadn’t spoken to me, and then I thought I remembered her voice and her headband. She must have remembered my bright blue shirt, my prize from the Moab Half-Marathon. Um, yeah, I wore the same shirt in Charlottesville. Usually I like to change things up, but OK, I like the blue shirt, and the pictures from the Charlottesville Marathon didn’t really do it justice. The print I ended up buying is pretty small, and I get to share the foreground with my running pal Elvis, which is cool and all, since Elvis made the last six (hilly) miles of the Charlottesville race way more fun than they would have been if I'd been running alone. But I wore the blue shirt again and hoped for, yes, I admit it, a photo with me, me, me in the center!

Maybe fashion ruts aren’t so bad, though. How else would I have been reunited with my old Charlottesville Marathon buddy-of-the-moment?

Boy with the Lime Green Earring

You know that country song by Travis Tritt, "Well, it's a long way to Richmond / Rollin' north on 95 / With a redhead ridin' shotgun / And a pistol by my side"? I always think of that when I'm driving on I-95, as I was last night to pick up my race number for the Richmond marathon. Of course, I was driving south, not north, and I didn't have a redhead or a pistol. But I'll tell you, it sure felt like a long, long way.

When I made it to the parking lot for the marathon expo, it was dark and raining, which always makes me feel lonely, and it was cold when I got out of the car and I thought I'd never find the way into the sports center, since I passed about four signs with arrows supposedly directing me to the expo entrance ...

And then, you know what? I was handed my race number by a teenage boy wearing a lime green earring. For some reason, that just made it all OK. :)

The Big Question

I have another marathon coming up soon, and of course I’ve been mulling over the BIG question: what am I going to wear?

There are a few factors that reduce the options. This time of year, I generally wear long sleeves and gloves. Still, those constraints leave me with a multitude of possible ensembles. Now, I certainly can’t compete with my fashion icon friend e, who is pulling off a 30 Skirt Challenge by shopping in her own closet … and my favorite TV fashion/design gurus Stacy London, Clinton Kelly, and Nate Berkus would probably stage an intervention if they gazed into the abyss of my fashion rut. I mean, it’s hard to keep things fresh when buying a new pair of pants requires either facing my phobia of selecting a size or hunting down the elusive drawstring style that’s fit for wear outside the gym. But even if I concede that I sport almost exactly the same outfit everyday (and yes, I do my laundry frequently!), it’s not as though when it comes to aesthetics I just don’t care.

After all, it’s really for clothes that I got into running in the first place. When my awesomely speedy cousin won first place in a Fourth of July 5K in Yorktown, Virginia, I wasn’t jealous of her $100 prize: I was proud, I was thrilled! But that T-shirt, the one the race organizers handed out to all the participants (which didn’t include me)—oh, I can still picture it. Yes, the shirt I coveted. And I didn’t just want to have one. I wanted to have earned one.

Then there was that perfect first pair of workout pants I accidentally discovered at Kohl’s. When I took them to the cash register, I found out the price had been marked down even more than I thought. Don’t you love that? I’d had sweat pants before, and of course the required shorts for high school and middle school PE. Blech! I may never be at peace with my knees: I’d rather not see them. So I’m not a fan of shorts, and the sweat pants I’d owned were baggy and shapeless and made me look like a hoodlum. Those cheap little gems from Kohl’s somehow fit cute—was that possible? Suddenly, I was excited to put on workout clothes. Which meant that I needed a reason to put them on as often as possible. Which meant going to the fitness center whenever I wanted to look cute. Which meant a lot of running!

I wore those awesome workout pants in my very first marathon (and a group of older guys warned me I was going to “stroke out” because of the heat since I wasn’t wearing shorts and, well, it was July), but I had to retire them long ago. Since then I’ve encountered the wonder of an Under Armor outlet store. Still, when it comes to upper body armor, my running shirts of choice usually come from past marathons. Reading other runners’ shirts can help pass the time during a long run. I wore my black sweatshirt from the UHC North Carolina marathon in another race a few months ago and got cheers of “Go, North Carolina!” In the 2007 Dublin marathon I had on my bright yellow shirt from the Top of Utah, which generated the comment, “Top of Utah—that sounds hilly.” (Yeah, fortunately mostly downhill!) Running in Reykjavik, Iceland, in my Hartford marathon shirt, I was questioned by another runner who disputed the event date listed. Or not disputed, exactly, but he could have sworn that when he ran the Hartford marathon it was in November.

But really, it’s not the other runners I’m trying to impress. It’s the photographers, and ultimately myself, as I allow the purchase of one photo from each marathon and, dang it, I better have a good one. Early in one Top of Utah marathon I stopped off at a port-a-potty and was pleased when it turned out to be the luxury model, equipped with a small mirror inside the door. I checked out my hair and smoothed some of the wilder strands because I just knew a photographer waited not far down the road. Unfortunately, I can’t show you that pretty, pretty picture because I do not yet have photo-scanning technology.

I was disappointed at my failure to get a photo with green and purple hair in the Dublin marathon, and I don’t know that I can manage colored hair for Richmond, since time is growing short again ... but I will sure do my best to choose a photogenic running ensemble and program the decision into my autopilot tonight, since in the darkness of Saturday morning, any capacity for rational thought will have devolved into panic about not being able to pin my number on straight. Thank goodness the timing chip works even if you wear it crooked!

Yeah, I'm from North Carolina ... uh huh (uh uh)

The Pink Shoes

It’s early in the Dublin marathon, and I am running through Phoenix Park in my pink-trimmed shoes (see Bring the Mizunos and Throw in Some Magic Jelly Beans). I feel the pavement beneath my feet. Rain has stained the road dark and left shallow puddles. I feel the breeze on my face, and a few stray raindrops. I see the still-green trees and rolling meadows. I focus on a runner ahead of me, a young woman. Her shoes kick up a fine spray. I think about my shoes, still fairly pristine. All around me are runners, thousands in front of me and behind me on the course. I realize this is what my shoes are for.

Later, they get indiscriminately soaked as I walk back to the hotel through a postrace downpour. In my room, I peel one sock gingerly away from my heel, which is caked with blood. My mother notices the red stain spread across the back of my shoe. “Oh, on your new shoes!” she says.

I smile and reply, “They’ve been christened.”

Coming Up ...

Looking forward to running the SunTrust Richmond Marathon in Richmond, Virginia, this Saturday!

Event Recap in Long

I was going to name this entry “Event Recap in Brief,” but then I decided to let it all out. After all, I’m not forcing anyone to read this. (Although I ought to offer chocolate to everyone who finishes!) So here’s the story, not so briefly.



Notice the slogan



First, it’s always hard coming off a marathon. I don’t often deal with sore muscles anymore, but lots of other sore parts. I always have a bad headache and general body aches the next day. It doesn’t hurt worse when I move or bend; it feels more like the beginning stages of a cold. And the initial glory of finishing the race fades quickly, leaving an emptiness in its place, a restlessness, a nagging “what are you going to do next?” That’s the worst soreness. I once told a friend that the really addicting part of marathon running happens within about 10 minutes of crossing the finish line, so it’s a lot of work for a short (but intense!!) reward. She pointed out that scrapbooking and other types of crafting provide much longer payoffs—and I’m not going to argue with that.



On the plane from Dublin, ready to give up the ghost

So, you finish, you taste the glory, and then what? Since I was in Ireland, what I did the next day was go out on a bus tour of the countryside south of Dublin. And the day after that I flew home. But I’m still restless and out of place. It’s hard to return to the daily routine. Fortunately, this time, I have another race coming up soon. Unfortunately, the next one is not in Europe!



Dun Laoghaire (“Dun Leary”)



Now, let’s backtrack a little. I arrived in Ireland with two pressing missions: (1) get to the race expo at the RDS in Ballsbridge, Dublin 4 (which turns out to be the Royal Dublin Society convention hall south of downtown Dublin), to pick up my race number with the timing chip and my final instructions, and (2) find something (preferably hairspray, but I was ready to be creative) to put some colored streaks in my hair for race day. I checked in at the hotel so I could dump my backpack, and then I set out, afraid that if I stopped to rest I’d have trouble getting up again. I had mapped out the route from the hotel to the expo beforehand. It would be about 3.5 miles roundtrip, so I decided to walk it rather than untangle the complexities of the bus system.

It developed into an interesting journey. Most of my photos come either from this walk or from the bus tour. I never took a picture on the day of the marathon. Within a block of the hotel, I found a promising convenience store and stopped in to check out the food supply and inquire about the hours. Yay, it was open late and early … so I was going to be able to eat. I continued on, cycling between a sense of urgency (night was coming, the expo would be closing, and heck, I had to remember that I was running a marathon the next day) and irresistible engagement in my surroundings. So much to see! Dublin, I missed you! I had a guidebook in my purse, but I navigated from my memory of the maps I had already studied and my previous visit to the city. I had a good sense of where I was headed. I almost couldn’t believe how familiar it all seemed, and I wondered how I had forgotten what a great city Dublin is … how could it have taken me four years to come back?



On the way to the expo



For a while, I pushed away the urge to zip out my camera. Once I get started with that toy, I can’t seem to put it away. I keep seeing new images that absolutely must be captured on film. I finally took it out to photograph an ad on the side of a bus. The ad promoted an American movie, and I found something about the wording amusing. But I can’t remember what, and I can’t refer to the picture, because after trying to get exactly the right angle and zoom and then racing against the movement of the bus as it began to pull away from the curb, I managed to take a shot I felt satisfied with. I browsed through my pictures to delete the failed attempts and accidentally deleted the good one, too. Oh, well. That should have taught me to put my camera away and get on with my errand. But I kept popping it out now and then.

 

Miraculously, I managed to make it all the way to the expo. I realized I was getting close when I started seeing clusters of people carrying bags with the marathon logo. I arrived at the convention center without consulting my map—and once inside the expo, I found I still needed my navigation skills.

As usual for such events, the layout required me to skirt an impressive collection of vendor booths offering running-related products, from apparel to training tips. I found my way to the second level to pick up my race number and then descended the stairs on the other side of the hall, ending up right in front of the sales area for official marathon merchandise. Now, you always get a T-shirt for running; it’s a given. So why would you need more marathon paraphernalia, at an extra cost? Last time I ran in Dublin, in 2007, I got drawn in and splurged on a marathon sweatshirt and a hat. I had buyer’s remorse as I figured the cost in dollars, but the sweatshirt soon became a treasured possession as I learned I hadn’t packed warm enough clothes on that trip! This time, I had packed better and I resisted all the alluring shirts and hats. It may have helped that I overheard one of the sales representatives telling a potential customer that they had already sold out nearly everything. No—I’m sure it was my willpower at work.

On the way back to the hotel, I tried to focus on my second mission, finding something to streak my hair purple and green. Sadly, I had no luck, although in the next two days, after the race, I passed several shops offering Halloween costumes. That’s Murphy’s law at work in its native land.

Back at the hotel, I passed the evening in a blur. I woke up to sunlight at 7:30 a.m. Ireland time, 3:30 a.m. my time. I got dressed and ate breakfast while I watched a morning news show on the BBC. I saw the weather report a few times without the details ever sinking in. I did notice that the forecaster kept mentioning something about a band of showers.

With 14,000 runners registered, the marathon would start in three waves. I had been assigned to wave 2 based on previous marathon finish times, and my wave was scheduled to be let loose at 9:55. I crossed the starting line about 8 minutes after the elite runners.

And what a crowd! Even with the staggered start times, the course was choked. (Here’s a link to some video showing the pack at mile 5: http://mysports.tv/default2.asp?e=DM11M&n=ESPLIN+AMBER&r=4139&nt_s1=&ct_s1=&nt_s2=00:50:26&ct_s2=10:45:34&nt_s3=02:02:23&ct_s3=11:57:31&nt_s4=02:50:45&ct_s4=12:45:53&nt_s5=&ct_s5=&nt_s6=&ct_s6=&nt_s7=&ct_s7=&nt_s8=&ct_s8=&nt_s9=&ct_s9=&nt_s10=&ct_s10=&nt_s11=&ct_s11=&nt_s12=&ct_s12=&nt_s13=&ct_s13=&nt_s14=&ct_s14=&nt_s15=&ct_s15=&nt_s16=&ct_s16=&nt_s17=&ct_s17=&nt_s18=&ct_s18=&nt_s19=&ct_s19=&nt_s20=&ct_s20=&nt_s21=&ct_s21=&nt_s22=&ct_s22=&nt_s23=&ct_s23=&nt_s24=&ct_s24=&nt_s25=&ct_s25=&nt_s26=&ct_s26=&nt_s27. The truth is, it looks a little scary from on high … worse that it did from my perspective!) I let the crowd provide me with an excuse to stay slow and easy as we ran through my favorite part of the course, a several-mile stretch through Phoenix Park northwest of the city. At mile 11, I was feeling good and relaxed; in fact, it occurred to me around that mile marker that I had achieved a state of Nirvana, which felt wonderful and was, unfortunately, not going to do much for my finish time. After I passed the big clock at the halfway point, I convinced myself to speed up and push a bit. I adopted a new approach: boxed in I may be, but I couldn’t run frustrated. Have you ever found yourself driving down the interstate on a road trip listening to some good music and enjoying the ride, only to realize you are following a driver going 45 mph? Feeling relaxed is great, but you’re trying to get somewhere, and you have to wake up and pass! I decided I had to keep finding the gap to pass runners going at a slower pace than I wanted to maintain. It’s hard for me to pass in a crowded field because I’m a lifelong klutz. But I kept to my goal of not running frustrated, and I knocked only a few people down … OK, I didn’t knock anyone down (!), and I bumped only a few arms; I hope the wind didn’t whip away my instinctive exclamations of “Sorry!”

The field remained crowded all the way to the end, and the spectator support stayed consistent as well. This race had no long, lonely stretches on country roads or forested bike trails where it’s a struggle to keep some other runners in sight. Spectators lined most of the 26.2-mile course and shouted their encouragement. In Ireland, cheering comes out in phrases like “Well done, lads,” and “Brilliant—you’re running brilliantly!” (Is the latter a reference to the mental strain or to a marathon glow perhaps related to a sheen of sweat?) But I also heard the typical (and usually false) assertion that we were “almost there” and the call to “finish strong.” In the last couple of miles, the shouts of “almost there” made me wonder if I had missed a mile marker; I seemed to have been “almost there” for a long time without ever getting “there.” I owe extra gratitude to one spectator standing across from the 25-mile marker who kept his arm up to point out the sign to passing runners (it was turned sideways, and in the midst of the crowd, it was hard to spot).

As long as they may seem, marathons are finite; the last two miles may feel like four, but eventually you reach the finish line, and suddenly, so suddenly you can’t really believe it, it’s all over. I had enough of my intellect intact to smile during the last few yards in hopes of getting a good finish photo, and then I was approaching two young female volunteers handing out medals. The girl who gave me my medal actually placed the ribbon around my neck, a special gesture as it brings to mind an Olympian achievement. Next, another volunteer directed me farther into the finish chute to pick up my T-shirt, and bless her, she recommended an extra small. I collected my goody bag from a grandfatherly man wearing a court jester’s hat complete with bells on the ends of the multicolored prongs. I smiled and told him I liked his hat, and he gave me a hug and wished me a happy Halloween.

So I got to enjoy some postmarathon glory before the downpour started. I was making my way out of the narrow gate at the end of the finish chute when the rain stopped playing around and grew earnest. Outside the finish chute, the crowd was pressing toward the stream of exiting runners, searching for their family members and friends. I tried to slip through the tangle of people so I could orient myself, but when I found a sign pointing the way back across the River Liffey, which I had to cross to return to my hotel, I found my route blocked by the marathon course. I worked my way down, paralleling the course and the river, but I feared losing myself in the rain and my postrace frenzy; I didn’t know how long I’d need to walk in that direction before I could get around the street closures and turn north to reach one of the river bridges. And in that chilly rain, I didn’t want to take a single step or spend a single moment that wasn’t moving me toward my new finish line: the front door of my hotel. After about 40 minutes of walking, I stepped onto the hotel porch and met a couple coming out through the front doors. One of them held a door open for me and congratulated me with a “Well done!” I was wearing my race number and my medal, so it was easy to spot me as a marathon runner, but I still think the hardest part of what I did that day was making it back to the hotel. The congratulatory phrase wasn’t specific to my accomplishment, but it was specific to me, so I guess I get to take the kudos any way I want. Anyway, I needed a little encouragement then; that kind stranger couldn’t have any idea how much.

Back in my hotel room, I broke down in sobs while my mom tried to offer comfort. Could she help me get some of my wet clothes off? Had the whole marathon been miserable? She must have thought I was pretty squirrely. I couldn’t express anything coherent until after I’d spent some quality time in a hot shower. After that, I put on a rain jacket and a hood over dry clothes, and we went out to get some postrace food (thank goodness for the close convenience stores, with their wares of fruit, yogurt, sandwiches, and my ultimate lifesaver, diet soda). The rain had let up some, but the skies stayed thick with crowds and the approach of dusk. Another marathon over; a great medal; a T-shirt I hadn’t really looked at yet … and it was time to reflect. I finished in 3:50:08, not bad, not great, not Boston qualifying, about halfway between my best and worst times ever. Well, a little closer to my best time, so that’s something. (Results are available at http://dublinmarathon.ie/results.php; my race number was 4139.)

Before the downpour had shut off all thoughts but those of reaching the hotel, I had overheard some runners talking about their finish times. One of them lamented that he never managed to run the marathon quite as quickly as he hoped. “And this time I did everything right,” he explained. He slept right, he ate right; he couldn’t have been better prepared. I’m skeptical about whether there’s a right way to go into a marathon. Certainly, there are lots of wrong ways. It helps to get some sleep, if not the night before, at least in the nights leading up to the race. It helps to get some food in before the run, and it’s tricky figuring out what works in your body, what gives you some energy without causing digestive problems along the route, once your intestines have been shaken around for a good spell. (Thank goodness for port-a-potties.) But what’s the right way? I don’t know. I haven’t solved that puzzle yet, and maybe this runner hasn’t either. I just know that crossing the finish line feels good, so good it’s addictive, and when you cross and you can’t believe the finish clock because there’s no way you thought you could ever run that fast, well, that feels amazing. But being close to your goal is addictive, too, maybe like sitting at a slot machine in Vegas. Oh, I’ve almost got it—that jackpot is just around the corner! It’s a reason to keep running, to put your body through the stress another time. Because who knows, a new PR (“personal record”) could be there in your future, if only you keep putting one foot in front of the other.

The tote bag my T-shirt came in is bright red. The Spar convenience store logo covers the bottom, and above that, a big smiley face tops the words “I’m glad I got out and ran!” I don’t think I could sum it up any better.

Dublin Calling

It seemed night was always coming on, the sky turning overcast by four, near dark by five, promising the approach of winter.

The weather swung between dampness, downpour, chill wind, and mildness (“I can’t believe how warm it is,” exclaimed one of the runners early in the marathon—before the atmosphere shifted again). Rapid contrasts mirrored a city of contrasts: brooding clouds low over the gray stone of Trinity College and the sad columns of the Bank of Ireland; blue lights strung through trees standing soft and dark just off a main road; students, tourists, revelers coursing through the neighborhoods, spilling in and out of the erratic streets of Temple Bar; Georgian mansions with bright yellow or red doors; cathedral spires rising above Spar convenience stores and Burger Kings; green fireworks for Halloween; green lights under a bridge across the River Liffey, just because.

Bright and dark, graceful and pushy, cheerful and tragic, hedonistic and soulful. Familiar and still disorienting, Dublin is the only foreign city I’ve ever visited twice (outside the confines of a school group).





Beautiful Dublin, I was sad to leave, and anxious still to come home.