mindfirerunner

Wide awake I sit once again with nothing but my Mac, an old t-shirt of my husband’s on and my reading glasses. Oh Mac…how I love you. You’re always there, always warm, and always full of great ideas. You never talk back, and thank goodness you don’t have an autocorrect feature.

My husband and I switched vehicles yesterday, and while on my way to a massage appointment I was looking through the glove compartment for something to put my hair up with. You know girls, we leave hair things all over the place. Surely I could find something in a 13 year old Saturn. I didn’t find any hair clips, but I did find my very first marathon medal! Oh my stars!!! I couldn’t believe it. How the heck did that get in there? At first I thought it was one of my son’s wrestling medals but after closely looking I saw “Steamboat Springs Marathon” embellished on the old worn medal.

I remember that first marathon almost 11 years ago. Boy, do I remember that first marathon. I wasn’t new to running but I was certainly new to running a marathon. I read up on different training plans as best I could (the Internet wasn’t all that easy to navigate then), but I was far from ready to run a full marathon. In fact, the longest run I had before the event was a 15-miler. It was a boring 15-miler at that because we lived in a small little neighborhood in a not-so-safe part of town at the time, so I didn’t want to stray too far from the house. I remember quite vividly how that 15 mile run felt, and how the marathon felt.

I was excited and nervous before the marathon, that hasn’t changed. But these days I’m a bit more prepared. I enjoyed the first 10 miles of the marathon and even hooked up with a new running buddy and we ran in tandem through mile 13. Then, I stopped for a water break…worst mistake ever. My running buddy had moved on and my legs began to cramp up. I kept telling myself, “You can do this. Just run six miles at a time and you’ll be done.” That mantra ran out quickly though and by mile 20 I felt my ankle bones crunching with every step. It was the hardest thing I had ever done in my life. I relied on the crowds along the sidelines, cheering me on (don’t ever take them for granted), and finally…FINALLY…reached the finish line in 5:42:51. Just a few minutes to spare before the course was closed. From mile 20-26.2 I swore up and down I’d never EVER run another marathon – EVER. And then I crossed the finish line. Every muscle, joint, ligament, fiber of my entire body hurt but I had a smile on my face (a few tears in my eyes) and I said “I can’t wait to do this again”.

Since then I’ve completed a few more marathons and have trained a whole lot better because I don’t want to ever feel like that in a race again. My last marathon was over two hours faster than my first at 3:32:02. I enjoyed that little walk down memory lane and looking back at how far I’ve come. I always felt like I missed the boat in my youth to be a runner, and thought I might be getting too old now. But as I look back from where I came from, I can only think “It’s just gonna get better”.