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)

Coming Up ...

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