Be still.

I can run.  I can run and smile at the sky, step away from the water fountain and dance, look up at the sun and give thanks.  I can run and cry, feel sobs escape and tears build.  I can run and laugh, a feeling that bubbles out in gasps of glee.  

I know the feeling in my legs after a good 8 mile run, the warm, glad, alive throb of exertion.  I know the feeling of my steady pace, the breaths that match my steps, the sound of my feet scuffing the ground.  I know the feeling of salt dried on my face and sweat dripping off my nose.

I do not know how to be still.  My mind races when my body is still and when I need to think of nothing.  When I would like to forget and when life would be easier if I could.

The last week has been a tumble in rough surf, upside down and sputtering and choking on salt water, tossed on sand.  I'm well aware of my good fortune, and that even negative things don't mean it's the end.

I know what I'm thankful for.  I know the dozens of places where I've messed up and the ways I can blame myself.  I know my blessings.

I do not know what is going to happen.  I've heard that when you're spinning out of control, the hardest thing to do is to be still.  

I've been thinking.

Earlier this summer, several kids that I taught in the past were fundraising for mission trips to Africa.  One of them posted about the money he needed to raise for the trip: $4000.  I thought, wow.  That's so much money--is a mission trip the best way to spend it?  Is that the best way to help kids?  How much medicine, how much food, how much clothing could be bought with that money?

Soon after having these thoughts, I realized that the real thing I needed to focus on was my role in all of that.  Do I want to play the role of complainer or do I want to use my feelings to make something happen?  The answer to that is obvious.  Since I was thinking in terms of money needed by organizations that help the less fortunate, I chose two organizations to begin donating to: the Arkansas Rice Depot and MAP International.  I chose them because I wanted to help both locally and internationally.  It turns out it is very easy to have recurring donations set up using a credit or debit card.

I wound up donating to the mission trip of one of the kids anyway.  I realized that my feelings were about me and, after doing something about them, I felt better about helping the student with something that mattered to her.  I learned an important lesson.

I am repeatedly hurt and shocked by people who don't put lgbt rights on their list of priorities.  It just doesn't really matter to so many people.  When asked, most people I know will probably say that they don't really care one way or another, or even that they really do support equal rights, but since it doesn't affect them on a day to day basis, they don't think about it much.

It's weird to imagine not thinking about lgbt rights since I think about them all the time.  Every day.  I have to.  When the assistant principal asked me if I was married, I had to think about it.  When the guy I was running with in the marathon asked me what my husband does, I had to think about it.  When I call my partner to say goodnight because we still don't live together because of past difficulties relating to lgbt rights, I think about it.  I think about it all the time and when I realize that so many people just DON'T, it gives me a hopeless feeling.

I had that feeling earlier today, and then I remembered my past feelings about the mission trips and I thought, what problems do other people think about all day every day that don't affect me--and that I don't think about?  Hunger?  Whether or not my car is going to break down and I won't have the money to fix it?  Whether or not my son will get sick and I'll have to take off work and lose pay because I don't have sick leave and then I won't be able to make rent?  Whether or not someone is going to hit me when I get home from work or if my phone will have been cut off?

A kid told another teacher this morning that he couldn't do his poster for his speech because he didn't know they were going to be moving and he had to pack most of the night.  I wonder what his life is like, what that family's lives are like, to have to move suddenly in the night like that?  And then come to school tomorrow?

I wish more people would make lgbt rights a priority even though they aren't affected by the issue, but the best way for me to deal with my feelings is to make other people's problems something that I think about.  It's time for me to start giving my time to issues that are hurting people who are less fortunate than me, who have fears and worries that I'm lucky enough not to have.

This afternoon I wasn't going to run.  I have some ant bites or something that have my ankle swollen so I was going to take the evening off.  I even sat down and drank a beer.  But then I decided I really needed my miles and my ankle felt better after some ice so I went out for 5 miles.  I finished up facing down the street toward my house.  It was a picture of the simple beauty of everyday life: the sun was mostly down and the sky glowed peach with some smudges of cloud reflecting the light.  Crepe myrtles decked in full lavender and hot pink lined the street and cicadas sang.  I thought, "This is simple life.  Why can't we just live this?"  But we can't.  There's too much else.

Tupelo Race Report!

Here's how it goes: I train all summer.  It's hot and I get up too damn early and it sucks.  I wake slowly, decide to quit running, and then finally get up and go.  I feel fine afterward and happy that I keep doing it.  I run my short runs and my medium runs and my 20 mile runs and feel ready.  Then I taper.  I do the 12 mile run and it feels long and solid.  Then I do the eight mile run the next week and it feels fine.  Then I do a couple of short runs the week before, and it culminates in the night before with me thinking, "WHAT???"  Because it feels like forever since I've run far and the idea of running 26.2 miles at 5 in the morning sounds preposterous.

But that's how it goes.  Kristin rode down with me.  We had pasta at Olive Garden the night before, grabbed some last minute stuff at WalMart, and I was in bed by 9.

It's dark at 5 am, and no body really gives any cues that the race is about to start.  We all started drifting toward the start, clustered around for a bit, and then, just like last year, everyone started moving.  I ran for a while with David from Mississippi, maybe, or Tennessee?  Having someone to talk to made the first 5-6 miles go by quickly.  Then I ran with a guy named Steve from Louisiana.  His cajun accent kept me company for a few more miles.  After that I was mostly on my own.  There was a maniac just in front of me for quite a few miles, but he slowed to a walk at one point and I went on.

Thank God for cloud cover.  It was cloudy and breezy for the whole race--the sun only peeked through a few times, more than enough to show me how horrible the race could have been without the clouds. 

I felt strong throughout.  On a few downhills my knee felt twingey, but it never became anything more.  I never had to walk except through aid stations (always well staffed in Tupelo by cheerful, helpful people.)  I know I could have run it faster if I had someone to push me some.  I don't know if I'll be able to put up a faster time later this year or if I should just wait to try for a PR again in Little Rock.

I prayed.  In the over-20 miles part of the race, I thanked God that I could be out there and asked for strength for everyone I could think of, and for everyone feeling weak and needing a boost.  I prayed for strength for myself to finish the race and for others to somehow be able to feel that strength.  I was thankful that the two snakes I saw were already dead...

After the race I grabbed a beer, took off my belts, and sat on the concrete to drink it and watch some people finish.  Then I went and got Kristin and we came back for a while, watching some more finishers and talking to some runners that I know or had met.  We were finally on our way home before noon.

We stopped before we got to Memphis and had lunch at Applebees.  The food was great and our server Randi was fun (the guy who sat us said she was fun when she wasn't moody and was cute but unfortunately for him, already had a boyfriend.)  We had beers and more pasta and dessert shooters and it was great to spend another meal enjoying a good friend.

Then last night J and I went to a great party with some more great friends, met a few new people, and had a wonderful time. 

I ask myself a lot, when I'm in th middle of training for a race, "Why do I do this again?"  But with that great post-race finish in my heart yesterday, as I was getting in the car to go get Kristin, I felt reminded, "This.  This is why."  And I'm so blessed to have been able to do it again and to have felt good through the whole race, to feel like, oh yeah, this is something I can do, something I do. 

More drowned rat look.

Yesterday was crazy.  The first day of school is Monday and it's wild and crazy up at the school.  I worked non stop all day and then had to have a few drinks with a friend to chill out.  I woke up this morning and contemplated quitting running. Ha.....  But I did let myself sleep in a bit.  Then I checked the radar.

It wasn't looking so good.  I thought about running the neighborhood but that sounded so boring and painful. I packed my stuff and headed to the river.

There were a few other crazy people out, so I put my gear on and got out of the car and on my way.  It was raining softly but steadily; more concerning was the intermittent lightning and thunder.  I tried to ignore it.  I rationalized that it was a purplish-pink lightning rather than the whitish-blue type--pink lightning is softer and hurts less, right?  I passed a cyclist and had this crazy thought that I should ask, are we safe out here?

Then I realized how crazy that sounded.  I'm running outside on a trail with lightning around me.  How safe can I be?  I know your chances of getting struck by lightning are pretty slim--how much does the chance go up in a storm?  Not a big storm.  The rain was soft.  Like the lightning.

I turned around and went back toward the bridge, figuring I could either quit and go home and get the miles later or keep on if it seemed to get better.  It did get better.  There was more lightning and thunder from time to time. but it lessened and I felt less crazy.

In the wide open area of Two Rivers Park I saw deer off in the distance.  They were far away but started to run as I passed them, and I counted 8 spread out against the tree line.

So my 12 miles in the storm went fine.  It was cool and sweet outside.

Deer, bald eagles, and liberals.

I had a plan for getting up this morning: set the alarm for 5, snooze once; when it went off again, turn on the light and start petting Max; Max would see that I didn't go back to sleep.

I was semi-successful.  I left the house around 6 and got to the river and started running by about 6:20.  I looked over my shoulder to see the pink sky as the sun rose behind me.

As usual when I get an early start, I went south on the other side of the bridge and ran past Murray Park and the golf course, through Rebsamen Park, and back.  I watched the sun rise higher, a shimmering large orange ball just over the horizon.  I watched some deer at the treeline; they looked calmly back towards the trail.

Back at the bridge at around 9 miles, I headed north towards Two Rivers. I thought at about that time that things had been pretty slow so far, kind of dull, and then I looked up just ahead of me in time to see a bald eagle flying low, maybe two stories up, directly above the trail.  I could see his white head and his beak.  So cool!

I thought a lot about the school year starting and what I need to do to get ready.  I thought about the upcoming election--nothing new to say about that, really.  Except for one thing.  A really great person that I taught a few years ago, Rachael, was discussing being liberal vs. conservative on facebook.  Rachael is an extremely awesome straight ally to the gay community, someone I am very proud to have taught.  She explained, in response to a question on facebook, that she considers herself to be a socially private conservative because of some decisions that she has made for herself--but that she doesn't think those decisions need to be forced on other people, so she identifies as a social liberal.

But isn't that the point of being socially liberal--that regardless of your own decisions, you don't think they need to be forced onto other people?  Why is it that assumptions are made about a person's behavior if they identify as socially liberal?  Why is it so hard for people to make whatever decisions they want about their own lives without wanting or needing to make those decisions for other people?  Why should Rachael have to make that distinction?  Being liberal is not about what I do or what you do--it's about making decisions for yourself based on what is best for you and being comfortable enough in those decisions to not need to make them for other people.

Last election I really let some of these issues get to me on a personal level. I know that in some ways I shouldn't, but it did.  I hope to maintain some distance this time.

So about distance--because this was about a run---I covered 20 miles this morning with very little difficulty. The weather was perfect.  There was a breeze blowing off and on and in Two Rivers Park, and there were wisps, drafts of air.  Off and on a cooler one, like a fridge had been opened in the underbrush, would flow across the trail.  It felt delicious.  I had thought about doing 22 miles, but my timing and route were good for 20--that, and the end of that 20 happened just after the uphill on the new approach on the Big Dam Bridge.  I stopped in the middle of the bridge and took my time coming down.

It was this time last year that I was preparing for my first marathon and went for the 20 miler and had to stop with a knee problem.  I'm thankful for no problems today and  hope to go on into Tupelo feeling good and strong and confident.

I'm not running today....but I am.

At 6:15 this morning I hit snooze.

At 6:30 I decided I was not running today and I turned the alarm off.  I ran 5, 8, and 5 this week, I run 20 on Sunday, and I don't need to run today.  I'm tired.  I don't need this 5 miles.

At 7:45, finally awake, I got up, got dressed, and hit the road.  I figured I would pay for the late start by being cooked out on the road at 8:00, but I was wrong.  The first mile or so was bad because of my tight calf problem, but the weather was surprisingly nice.  It wasn't muggy, and there was a fresh-smelling breeze.

I couldn't talk myself into taking the left into Stonewall to make the 5 mile loop, and I considered just cutting the run to 3  miles.  After all, I nearly skipped it--3 is better than nothing, right?  But instead, I finished out the 3 mile loop and then repeated part of it.  The breeze kept up and there was still shade and it was nice.  The leaves on the ground are a reminder of the drought, but they also remind me of fall, which seems both near and far.

In the last mile or so, I thought about how I felt at 6:30 and how badly I did not want to run, and how evenly matched that feeling was by the gladness that I did.  Letting myself have that extra hour of sleep wasn't bad, though.  I'm sitting here now feeling pretty good.

Clear sight.

Sunday I did my "short" long run of 12 miles and it was not great.  Compared to the 20 miler from the week before...it seems like a different person ran it.  Whatever, though, it's in the past.

I woke up this morning yet again with thoughts of forgetting it all.  Sleep and laziness sounded nice.  But you know me.  I got up and, eventually, out.

It was a decent morning for running even though the high today is 102.  The humidity is low-ish for August in Arkansas and there was a bit of a breeze blowing.  I don't remember my calves feeling like they were filling up with concrete, which is great because that's how it's been for weeks.  I was a little tired but overall pretty good.

I was in Sherwood this morning so I ran out of the neighborhood and onto Kiehl.  Down the hill on Kiehl and left onto 107: at this point I was at about 3.5 miles and planning to turn around at 4.  The next half mile would be uphill.

As I made the slow turn and started up the incline, I looked up at the ridge and the dying grasses and something was beautiful about it and I felt the need to pray.  I held that thought in my mind as I looked up at the sight, trying to put into words what my heart was seeing.  The trees were crisply set against the blue morning sky, the sun falling across the ridge with "a certain slant of light," a gentle morning slant.  The grasses sloped down towards me and I realized what I was praying for: clear sight.

I pushed up the hill and also up the hill heading towards home.  I spent a delightful minute in some misty sprinklers.  I finished.  But I have that ridge with me still.