Boston, Part One

I mostly avoided the news all week. From the moment I made it back to my car on Monday night and turned on the radio, I let it in a few lines at a time. I would listen to descriptions of the scene and numbers of casualties and I would start to feel sick, wanting to shut it off, turn away, escape. Earlier in the day, when I sat stranded at a Wendy’s because the subway had shut down, the scope of the incident had seemed so much smaller. No one in the Wendy’s on Massachusetts Avenue knew exactly what had happened at the Boston Marathon finish line. A girl waiting to order at the counter was texting with a friend working in the finish area. “I’ve heard different numbers,” the girl told me. “I’ve heard half a dozen injured ...” She went on to speculate about other possibilities, but “half a dozen” stuck in my mind.

“No one killed?” I asked. “No one killed, right?” She couldn’t say for sure. My mind interpreted that as, “Right, no one killed.”

When the truth began to filter in on Monday night and throughout the day on Tuesday, I couldn’t shut out the ugliness of it. I tried—I wanted to keep my eyes clenched tight against it. But the darkness was inside me and all around me; I couldn’t get away. The spring sunlight couldn’t dispel or even camouflage the despair. I could see it everywhere. I could hear the sadness on the radio. I could sense it pressing on my chest as I sped across the freeways of New England and New Jersey, crying.

By the end of the week, I could reflect on a spectrum of emotions from euphoria to horror. Friday afternoon I watched some coverage of the manhunt in the Boston suburbs for the surviving bombing suspect, until finally a breakaway to ESPN offered a welcome respite.

Developments in the bombing case have seemed to erupt quickly. I expect that by the time anyone else reads this, more information will have come to light. But I am not writing an analysis of terrorism. I want only to tell my part of the story while the experience and the emotions are fresh in my mind. I am dividing this account into two parts because, of course, there is so much to pour out about the aftermath of the bombings. But there is also so much that came before: after a long, long journey to Boston, the race itself.

Stories and a Storied Marathon

I get excited whenever I drive into Massachusetts. Signs with place names I recognize from history class compete for my attention along the roadways. The first time I passed through the state, on my way to visit a friend in New Hampshire, I believe I even cheered for a sign listing Lowell. I love American history, particularly the Revolutionary era—but it isn’t only Lexington and Concord that can get my blood pumping!

Maybe it’s odd that before my marathon trip I had never been to Boston. I’ve visited Salem and Marblehead twice, I’ve spent part of a Thanksgiving weekend on Martha’s Vineyard, but I had never ventured into Boston. I’ve long accepted it as a given that I would go one day. How could I not be drawn to the setting of so many important historical developments, the city where the heroine in my favorite novel grew up ... such a storied place rich with the drama of generations?

I knew I would visit Boston someday, but I was less confident that I would go as an entrant in the Boston Marathon. You can’t hang around marathon runners for long without absorbing some ideas about this famous race. It is the oldest annual marathon: the 2013 event marked the 117th running. Like Boston itself, this race has a past, and plenty of stories to build its legend. Even before I ran marathons, the race was on my radar. When I was just starting out with a few miles a day, I read a book by several-time Boston Marathon winner Bill Rodgers (The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Running). His attitude of welcoming everyone from beginners like me to famous marathoners of his own caliber into the running community made such an impression on me—and his advice and clear explanations of running jargon did so much to boost my confidence in spite of my late start as a runner (in my twenties, so ancient!)—that I have always counted him as one of my running mentors.

I remember reading an account in Runner’s World of a close race to the finish over the last 12 or 14 miles of the Boston Marathon course. I remember watching a piece on television about the first woman entrant, trying to run unnoticed by race officials in an era when marathon running was considered unsuitable, even harmful, for women. I remember a documentary about preparing for the race. I’d read about the starting area, in Hopkinton (my friend’s father spent his childhood in a home nearby), and of course I’ve heard about the notorious Heartbreak Hill. So much about the Boston Marathon has become part of marathon lore. It has occurred to me to wonder how the legacy of the race will be affected by the events of April 15, 2013.

           

As a marathon runner, I’ve come to view Boston as a standard measuring stick. Qualifying for Boston provides the substance for many a conversation between runners. “Have you ever qualified?” people will ask, and the prestige connected to “yes” is sometimes subtle, but it’s undeniable. For years I’ve kept track of the qualifying time for my age group and gender. I’d already completed a few marathons before I believed in my own chances to qualify. At my best, I would tend to finish 20 minutes too late. Then in 2008, when I topped out at my record weekly mileage, I discovered speed. Every marathon felt easier and the mile markers flowed by faster. I ran my best-ever time of 3:28:34.1 in Pocatello, Idaho, in August 2008 and matched my new PR pretty closely in Hartford, Connecticut, in October that year. I registered for the 2009 Boston Marathon and received my Ivy League-esque acceptance from the Boston Athletic Association.

Unfortunately, the running pattern that sets me up for speed also works out poorly with the timing of the Boston race. I top out with my weekly mileage sometime in the spring, I sustain that high through the summer and into the fall, I struggle, I tire, I become overwhelmed, I don’t want to cut back, I don’t want to let go ... I am faster and faster ... I crash and burn.

In 2009, a stress fracture in my ankle put an end to my marathon training and my Boston hopes. It was an end I couldn’t argue with or negotiate.

So far in 2013, I am injury free. But I’ve been on the same trajectory since the spring of 2012: running too much, finding myself overwhelmed, worrying that I couldn’t hold out for Boston. The final two weeks stretched like a gulf I could never cross. It was a relief, finally, when I loaded up my car on the Saturday before the race and set off on my mission to Massachusetts. I’d had to scrap any plans for sightseeing or extra-marathon fun. My focus was narrow and intense. I had to go and run that race. Run and finish.

On the Way

On the drive up I found a couple of sports stations and let my mind rest into welcome diversion. Sometime after dark in Connecticut, I listened to a conversation about a basketball player’s recent injury. Would he ever really recover? The commentators weren’t optimistic. The player was in his thirties, after all. A comeback would be difficult.

That’s kind of depressing, I thought. Thirties isn’t old, is it? I brooded for a while before I cheered myself up with the thought that I am not a professional basketball player, but a runner. “And I am going to run forever!”

I stayed overnight in Connecticut, and the next morning I set out for the final hundred miles or so into Boston. I turned on the radio again and found a station broadcasting classical music. The sounds of a choir singing a religious piece gave me chills. The music coming from my tiny car radio was grand enough to fill a cathedral or float all the way up to the sky. I caught my breath. At the end of the performance, two guys hosting the morning’s show on public radio noted that the piece was reminiscent of Gabrieli. “Gabrieli!” I cried. I knew it! Back in college I first heard Gabrieli’s “O Magnum Mysterium” in a music appreciation class. It always stirred me with excitement and awe. Now I remembered how much passion music could evoke. Why had I forgotten that? In the moment, the beauty of the music I heard and remembered brought pure, sparkling joy. And I thought how these beautiful things, these pieces of music, had been created by human beings. Human beings at their best, manifesting their divine natures ... and I wanted to be at my best, true to the best parts of myself, this weekend and beyond.

Later I tuned into stations broadcasting from Boston, and several times I heard deejays talk about Marathon Monday. One station was playing show tunes selected in honor of the marathon. I listened to “I Hope I Get It” from “A Chorus Line” and pictured a Broadway audition. I was glad that marathons are more inclusive: I knew the runners tomorrow wouldn’t fit a single physical mold. But it was fun to hear all the hype about Monday’s event. I’d never before been part of a marathon big enough to be celebrated with show tunes.

Sunday morning in Connecticut

Prelude

I parked at the Riverside subway station in the Boston suburbs and rode a train into downtown. On board, I stood at the window staring out at a gray sky and drably colored buildings. Eventually the train ducked underground and the window showed me my own reflection. I looked as solemn as I felt. I had a map of the train system (called the “T”) and another map of some key sites for the marathon. I was headed to the Hynes Convention Center to pick up my race number and packet at the expo.

At the Hynes Convention Center station I was pleased to find directions to the convention center posted above the exit doors. The instructions read something like, “Proceed to the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Boylston Street.” Outside, I found that intersection only a few yards away, but then I stood on the corner uncertainly. I watched the flow of people and tried to pick out the marathon crowd. Across the street, I noticed a building labeled Berklee College of Music. Interesting. But not the convention center.

 A woman came up to me and asked, “Do you know how to get to the expo?”

“I’m trying to figure that out myself!” I told her. She moved on down the street. I decided to get moving, too. Her question cheered me up. I had just met a fellow marathoner—and another visitor to Boston who had no idea where to find anything!

I started walking and merged into the general flow of foot traffic. I inhaled breaths of chilly air and wrapped my arms around myself to hold out the cold until the exercise of walking began to warm me. I gazed around, down the street, and up at the tall buildings surrounding me. I noticed people walking toward me with big yellow bags that marked them as marathoners coming from the expo. So I knew now I was traveling in the right direction. Excitement burst up into my stomach and chest. Here I was, in Boston, on my way to the marathon expo. I was invited to this party. I had to pull out my cell phone and call my mother.

She answered the phone and I yelled above the noise of traffic, “I’m in Boston!” I appreciated the din of engines passing since it gave me a reason to shout. “I had to call and tell you—I’m in Boston!” My mother managed to sound suitably excited, even though she was probably wondering, “Well, where else would you be?”

I think I told her I didn’t like all the dark-colored buildings, but then I glanced up at the sky and noticed something absolutely amazing—a patch of blue. Since morning the clouds had thickened, but now I could glimpse a few rays of unfiltered sunshine. The sun, I thought, could make all the difference.

Before long I found my way into the convention center. Escalators glided up from a central atrium ringed by balconies on three or four levels. I took out my camera and snapped some photos of expo signs, but it was the grand architecture of the center that I really wanted to capture. And I couldn’t. From the second or third floor, I hung over the balcony railing gazing down and then up, and I wanted to convey the scope of the building and the sense of organized movement as people floated up and down between levels. I could never get a wide enough shot. Eventually I had to settle down and move through the marathon expo itself, picking up my racing number, the big yellow bag I would use to check in my gear before the race, and my Boston Marathon T-shirt. Maybe it was the convention center that wowed me, but this initial brush with Boston Marathon organization also made an impression. In spite of the large number of people gathered at the expo, I was able to pass quickly through the different areas to get my items. I finished my business at the expo in a fraction of the time it had taken to commute to the center by train.

Hynes Convention Center

Multiple levels, continuous movement

Welcome, Elite Runners and Boston dreamers

Number and PowerBar equally important?

Quick pass through the expo

Once I had all my gear tucked into my yellow bag, I wandered a bit, hoping to find a restroom without a line. I rode the escalator up to another level and walked along a hallway lined with windows. This level was quiet, with only a few people: some runners stretching on the floor of the hallway and, further down, a girl sitting near the windows, reading. I passed doors with signs announcing them as entrances to ballrooms, and eventually I found a nearly deserted bathroom. Back in the hallway, I took time for a little sightseeing from within the warmth of the center. Looking down at street level, I noticed a Trader Joe’s and a Staples. Higher up, I could gaze out across the rooftops of Boston. It made me think of Mary Poppins and dancing chimney sweeps. But I didn’t notice any of those at the moment.

The long hall

Runners' lounge

Hey, a Trader Joe's!

Sightseeing from indoors

Passing "America's first sports bar" on the way back to the T

 I had planned to go on from the expo to explore the marathon finish area and the loading zone where I would need to board a bus for the starting line in the morning. But I was cold and tired and faced a long train ride back to the suburbs. I could feel anxiety rising along with the excitement. Finally I was here; time was moving forward. After so much waiting, the day of the marathon was drawing close.

The ride back to the station where I had parked went more quickly than the ride in. The train wasn’t nearly as crowded and could speed over the route with mere pauses at the stops. Once I got to my car, I had a short drive to my hotel in Waltham. I walked into the lobby with my yellow marathon bag at the same time a small group of people were walking out. One of them called, “Good luck tomorrow!”

I smiled. “Thanks,” I replied.

  

Sightseeing from inside my warm car

At the hotel

Marathon Morning

I awoke around 2:30 Monday morning and was too nervous to go back to sleep. I didn’t want to doze off and wake up late. I listened to the TV while I got showered and dressed. CNN was playing Anthony Bourdain’s show, an episode about Myanmar. The show played twice in a row so I got quite familiar with the introduction.

I left the hotel around 4:30 and drove to the Riverside T station so I could catch one of the first trains to leave, around 5:00. I’d had trouble finding parking the day before, so I was relieved to pull into a nearly empty parking lot close to the entrance to the train platform. It was a lonely ride into downtown, though, and I arrived at the Boylston Street station much earlier than I had expected. Not wanting to spend too much time waiting in the chilly morning air, I hunkered down on a bench to let some time pass. Every few minutes—sometimes every few seconds—a train would pull into the station and people carrying the yellow marathon bags would get off and walk toward the exit. I was glad to see I’d have easy beacons to follow to the bus loading site when I left the station.

Not long before I was ready to leave, a man wearing a blue jacket and carrying a yellow bag sat down next to me. “No reason to go up this early, Boston Common is right there,” he remarked. Boston Common was the loading site for runners busing to the start. I waited a few more minutes and watched more runners head up the stairs that led out of the station. Finally, I got up to follow them, but I turned back to the man who had sat beside me on the bench. “Good luck today,” I said.

“Thanks,” he answered.

Climbing up out of the station, I discovered that Boston Common was indeed “right there.” I stepped away from the station entrance and whirled around, taking in the panorama. Hints of sunlight promised a fresh, beautiful morning. Across the street, the red lights of Loews Theatre still glowed along the marquee, and in the open space ahead of me, runners converged from all across the Common.

First look at Boston Common

Loews Theatre

Waiting for buses

I joined a long line and watched as yellow school buses loaded up and pulled away from the curb, to be replaced almost immediately by another procession of yellow buses. As I got closer to the loading points, I began to read the labels on the sides of the vehicles. I realized that some were school buses and others were buses from charter or tour companies—it seemed that the Boston Athletic Association had marshaled every bus in the Boston area to shuttle runners to the start on marathon morning. In spite of their varied origins, the buses worked in efficient harmony, with no apparent break in the rhythm of load up, pull out, pull in, load up. The runners, too, moved along smoothly. I heard some complaints about the lack of partitioning that let runners from all three starting waves mingle in the same lines and board the same buses, but no one jostled in the crowd or got testy. I know of another marathon that claims to be the “friendliest,” and I don’t want to challenge that title … but I was beginning to think the Boston Marathon might have a decent claim to that honor, too.

Loading

Buses from everywhere

On the bus I found myself next to a friendly seatmate who talked about running with his coworkers through a park in New York in winter. He had already completed the Boston Marathon several times. We talked about some past runs and the uncertainty of April weather in Massachusetts. You could get a nor’easter. Or you could get heat, like last year in 2012. The record-setting temperatures prompted the marathon organizers to offer deferred registrations. Some runners entered in last year’s event would be running their race today. But in cold or heat, the marathon had always gone on. “The Boston Marathon has never been cancelled,” my seatmate informed me. An impressive record, I agreed.

We sat in silence for a while, and I watched trees go by outside. We had left downtown Boston. “The problem with a long bus ride,” my seatmate commented at one point, “is that it makes you realize how far you have to run. I mean, 26.2 miles …” Still, when eventually we arrived at the Athletes’ Village in Hopkinton, I got off the bus feeling fired up and happy. The sun shone clear. The air tasted fresh. The starting line I had waited for and traveled for was almost in sight. “Running is the fun part,” my seatmate had said. So bring on the fun!

I threaded my way through the Athletes’ Village. (“Cool!” was my reaction when I first read about the Athletes’ Village in the marathon information packet. I get to feel like an Olympian!) Tables set up under white tents offered breakfast items like bagels and bananas. I tried a banana-flavored PowerBar, nibbling tentatively at first. Not bad, I decided. More important than the food, though, were the lines of port-a-johns circling every section of the Village. I got in line early, figuring it would take most of the time I had left to make it to the front. My wait was rewarded with a classy port-a-john: it featured a dispenser of hand sanitizer. You can’t count on that in just any port-a-potty! I guess port-a-johns are special? Or maybe just the ones at the Boston Marathon are.

After the necessities, I had time to stand around in the sun, listening as the wave starts were announced over the loudspeaker. I heard Wave One go up to the start. Even in the sun, I was cold. The last half hour dragged. Exhaustion from my restless night hit me. When Wave Two was called up to the start, I worried that my leg muscles felt stiff from the chill. I squished into Corral 7 with many fellow runners. Everyone was still polite and friendly and happy. I felt like a zombie. Too bad that I had survived the ordeal of waiting, only to crash now.

Athletes' Village

Wave Two’s official start went off and the runners in Corral 7 began walking slowly toward the front of the line. The crush of people dissipated slightly, enough for everyone to begin a jogging pace. I crossed the starting line feeling as if I was stumbling along. “I can’t do this,” I kept thinking. “I’ve lost it, I’m so tired, my legs are stones.” I could only hope I’d warm up and feel better after a few miles. Until then, I couldn’t let being a zombie serve as an excuse. I focused on not crashing into anyone around me (a difficult task!). I had to keep moving forward. If I could keep running, I would feel better, I promised myself.

I vaguely registered my surroundings. I remember running through the streets of what seemed like a charming village. I don’t really know, though: I may have been dreaming. We passed the 1-mile marker very quickly. I realized later it hadn’t been the 1-mile marker, but the 1-kilometer marker. No wonder it came so fast.

I reached my magic mile around marker 5. The blood had begun flowing again to my legs and brain. My feet moved without stumbling. My mind emerged from the fog. Everyone said it was a beautiful morning, the best weather anyone could hope for, cool and clear. I settled into my pace and listened to the friendly talk around me.

Keep moving, keep moving, I thought. You can do this now. This is a guaranteed thing. This is one of the few things in life you can count on—you do the race, you get the prize. Run to the finish line and you’ve got it. You get the medal, you can love the T-shirt, you will always know you finished the Boston Marathon. Keep moving and it is a guarantee. So I told myself in the early stages of the race.

The Wellesley Scream and Onward

Approaching the halfway point, I began to anticipate the Wellesley Scream. I had heard about this phenomenon from some other runners, including my seatmate on the bus ride. He informed me that the Wellesley girls prided themselves on their cheering, lining up along the marathon route as it passes by Wellesley College and screaming multitudes of runners on toward the finish. I couldn’t decide if a Wellesley “Scream” was something to look forward to or dread. I never imagined it could prove to be as enjoyable as it actually was; in fact, I still can’t articulate the appeal of running down a long stretch of pavement in front of crowds of college-age girls yelling and holding signs like, “Why are you running to your dreams? I’m right here!” I clearly wasn’t the intended audience of their creatively phrased “Kiss me!” invitations. (“Did any of the guys run over and kiss them?” someone asked when I described the scream. I didn’t see anyone do it—but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.) The Wellesley Scream was just fun!

Later, we would run by Boston College as well, and the students there provided some spirited cheering. I guess there’s a reason, though, why I heard about the Wellesley Scream several times before I experienced it, but I never heard about the Boston College … uh, cheering. Wait, that’s not fair: all the spectators who cheered contributed to my success that day. I’ve run other marathons noted for the crowd support, but nothing like this. And especially when it came to the hills, the warm-up to Heartbreak Hill and then the infamous heartbreaker itself, I could feel the encouragement nudging me forward. Spectators promised us a crest at the end of the ascent, and when we reached that summit, they lauded our achievement as their own. “The Heartbreak is over,” announced one sign as large as a store window. I know I was smiling as I ran by.

Another time, music from a spectator’s bagpipes brought tears to my eyes. The bagpipes struck up a tune as I passed; their melancholy notes trailed after me. “I think I am going to do this,” I realized. “I think I’ve got this.”

Along the course

After Heartbreak Hill, it was down to the final miles. It seemed a matter of staying in the game, fighting the impatience that always grips me around mile 23, maintaining a steady pace forward. I couldn’t believe it—I was about to finish the Boston Marathon. And even though I’d started off feeling like a zombie, the clocks at the mile markers indicated that my finish time would be several minutes better than I had dared expect.

The last 1.2 miles always stretches on and on. I tried to run hard, alternately straining my eyes for the finish and talking to myself to calm down. There were some turns near the end, and then I could see it, that line I’d been looking for and dreaming about for so long. I could hear someone announcing the runners’ names over a loudspeaker as the runners crossed the line, and I wondered if I would hear my name—so many of us were crossing close together. I noticed the photographers lined up behind the finish, and the clocks marking the time. I stepped over the final band of timing sensors and heard my name. It was over. I had run it.

Crossing the finish line

I made my way deeper into the finish area, anxious for my medal. First came a heat sheet, the royal robe of runners. One volunteer handed me a sheet, and another fastened it in place with a sticker. I’ve received numerous post-marathon heat sheets before, but I’ve never had a sticker to hold it in place. The sticker makes a big difference, because it frees up your hands. Usually you are using one hand to try and hold the heat sheet around you.

Beyond the volunteers handing out heat sheets and stickers stood volunteers handing out medals. The woman who gave me my medal smiled and wished me congratulations. I thanked her and moved on through the finish area, retrieving my yellow bag, which carried my cell phone, camera, jacket, long pants, and a few other items. I had checked the bag in at the start of the race in Hopkinton so I could have my gear available at the finish. Once I picked up my bag, I asked directions to the nearest T station. Soon I was descending into the Arlington station and lining up with other runners along the train platform. While I waited for the train, I considered getting out my cell phone to text greetings from the Boston Marathon finish line, but I decided I was too cold and my hands were too full, with my yellow bag and a water bottle I’d received in the finish area. I would wait until I got back to my car.

Finished!

A train pulled up, and we crowded on. Some people laughingly apologized about the smell. Nonrunners and runners alike huddled close together in the cramped cars. The train lumbered forward. I stared up at the ceiling, the only clear space in the car. I told myself it wouldn’t be long and we’d be out of downtown, and people would start getting off. At the next stop, Hynes Convention Center, the driver got on the loudspeaker to make an announcement.

“Everyone must leave the station,” he ordered. “There’s been an emergency. Everyone must leave the station.”

No one believed him at first. We disembarked slowly, reluctantly. I heard a plaintive remark about Boston’s subway system. Gradually, people filtered up toward the exit.

I had descended into the subway on a bright, beautiful, perfect marathon afternoon. And when I came up out of the subway, everything had changed.