Summer of the watermelon

Hello world.

It's been quite awhile since I've last put pixel to LCD and to be honest I'm a little scared. I fear that I've lost the ability to communicate my thoughts using this forum and that whatever I write from here on out will be rubbish. I want so badly to write something eloquent and meaningful.

Then I remembered that all I really have to do is write what's on my mind. Relieve that pressure that's been building between my ears by putting thoughts out for the world (OK, so maybe just for the few of you left reading this blog) to read. That will be fine.

So last week I got the word that I would be heading to California for work. It was a last minute thing but I always enjoy going to California so I don't mind the short notice. My first idea, once my travel arrangements were made, was to text my good friend Penny and see if she could meet me on the LA beaches for a run. I usually get to stay one night near the LA airport which is just a short hop from the beach and the wonderful, star-laden, beach front walky-runny sidewalk thingy (technical term).

Penny quickly replies that she would love to but will be in San Francisco all weekend. Bummer! Oh wait, isn't there a marathon in San Francisco soon? THERE IS! In fact it's this weekend and that's why Penny is up there! I'm quick like that you see.

This was on Monday and I was leaving on Wednesday for LA. Somewhere between getting to California and spending 2 long days in the dry desert sun, I changed my return flight origin from LA to SFO, bought a ticket from LA to San Francisco ($67! Score!!!) for Saturday, and began the search for a hotel room. The hotel always takes longer because I didn't want to get a car (driving in San Francisco SUCKS!!!, ask RBR) so I had to stay somewhere near the starting line and I didn't want to spend $1000 a night. Eventually I took a chance on a hotel 1.5 miles from the start that was offering a $65 a night rate. That's frighteningly cheap. I was frightened, but figured it was just for 2 nights and it was just me so what the heck.

Once I had everything arranged, I finally took a step back and realized I had to actually run a marathon in a couple days. I hadn't done that in awhile, in fact, I hadn't run more than 13 miles since fall! Crap, this might hurt. My mind took over though and I remembered that I'm bullet-proof. That helps with situations like this.

I made it to San Francisco on Saturday and discovered my hotel was wonderfully old and classy. I don't suppose most people would like it but I immediately fell in love with it's old, 50's era charm. I had my own bathroom and the bed was comfy. I even enjoyed the ride in the very old elevator. Everything about the place screamed that this is where Willie belongs.

I spent some time and huge amounts of money at the Expo. I decided since this was my 3rd year running this race I should probably have some memorabilia from it.

I'm going to finish this tomorrow.... Goodnight everyone. It feels good to be back writing.

Thanks for listening

Vacation

So I'm on vacation now officially. My toes have touched sand and my ass has been in the ocean.

After spending 2 days in the car driving across Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina, I decided that I should get a long run in as soon as possible to stave off atrophy in my legs.

I set out on a 12 mile run up the beach-side road at 6 AM while my kids were still asleep. It was quiet and lonely and lovely. A nice easy run that my legs were aching to do. They seemed to have a great desire for every step. So much better than sitting still for 10 hours a day. I didn't see many other runners at first so I had time to get my mind settled and make it concentrate on nothing but the task of putting one foot in front of the other.

Eventually I came upon a wonderful man who I ran with for a few miles. When I say ran with, what I really mean is that we ran beside each other. He with his headphones on and me with my mind clear and disinterested. After a few miles, I began to wonder about this man. I wondered what his story was. Was he a resident of this island or was he also a visitor? My mind eventually gave up the wondering and began to make up his story for him. His name was Henry and he was a Korean war veteran (didn't look old enough for WWII). He was here on vacation with his wife, Audrey. They had been high school sweethearts, been married forever and raised 4 kids. He worked as a pipeline repairman in the oil fields of Texas since he returned from the war. Retirement is looming and he was deep in thought about what he was going to do with the rest of his life and how he and Audrey were going to spend their golden years. His oldest boy, Lyle, ran his own business in Iowa and had invited Henry to come up and help him run the company. This appealed to Henry because he wasn't sure how long he could survive just sitting around East Texas with nothing to do. Iowa wasn't his first choice in retirement locations however and he was apprehensive about working so closely with his son. The weight of this decision and the weight of the years of hard work showed in his running style. Leaning slightly forward, looking almost bent over, he shuffled along at a good pace but it looked labored. He liked running for the feeling of accomplishment it gave him when a good run was finished. He got little satisfaction from his work lately and desperately sought that worthy feeling any way he could nowadays.

So I had this entire story written after only a few miles. I never spoke to this man. Mostly because I didn't want to bother him and partly because I didn't want to find out the truth about him and ruin my story.

On the way back, I noticed a street that ended at the ocean-front. The funny thing I noticed about this street was that it was named "West Summer". I'm at the Atlantic Ocean and this road ended at the ocean front. West Summer? Where the heck is East Summer, Africa? You can't more East in the United States than the Atlantic Ocean. I supposed there was someone running up the African coast by "East Summer" road and wondering the same thing.

I'll be at the beach for the next few days.

Thanks for listening

The heat is on

Someone turned the heat on in Oklahoma again. It's about time. I got the final confirmation of the return of summer when I ran on Thursday evening and I saw sweat flying off my hands with each stride. It was heaven. When I finished I looked like I had just climbed out of a pool. 6 miles and I felt like I had run a marathon. AWESOME!

My eldest child is away for the month of June and I miss him already. He stresses me out with his absent-minded ways, he causes me pain every time I look at his un-cut hair, he annoys me to no end with his constant requests to practice driving, he give me a heart attack when he actually does practice driving. I love it all. Is that what love is?

I'm hoping to get a running routine back soon. I've been stuck in a Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday thing for awhile now. I'm really struggling to get any kind of mileage in for the week. I need to get my arse back in the gym and get my legs out on the road more. Soon.

Thanks for listening

Feel

I've had this lingering pain in my knee for awhile now. I hurt it on a 12 mile run when I decided that I would run sub 7 minute miles for the last 2 miles of the run. It felt great to run that fast but as soon as I stopped both of my knees were throbbing. The left one healed quickly but the right one is still giving me pain. That was 4 weeks ago.

This knee pain is interesting in that it isn't something that stops me from running. I'm the biggest wimp of them all when it comes to pain but this pain is something I can run through. It just bugs me during the run and causes me to limp for a few hours after.

So in true Willie form I decided to make this pain go away with the help of vitamin-I. So I started taking Ibuprofen before my runs and I had no pain for a few runs. My theory was that since I could run through this pain and it wasn't getting any worse I might as well mask it. Why be annoyed?

As with most of my plans it worked for awhile but failed miserably in the end. The problem wasn't my knee though, it was my stomach. I hadn't taken Ibuprofen regularly for a long time and it seems my stomach had become happy with not having this drug around. I, of course, didn't come to this conclusion myself. I had to be told. I was taking massive amounts of Tums everyday and was still having heartburn during my runs. It took my fabulous girlfriend to finally put two-and-two together and remind me that I had started taking Ibuprofen at the same time my heartburn started. So I stopped taking the pain killer and have run heartburn free ever since.

My knee pain, however, is still lingering.

My point here is concerning the importance of feeling. I spend a lot of time and money trying to cover up feelings in all aspects of my life. The perfect example of this is described above. In trying to cover up a pain I ended up creating yet another pain that I tried to cover up. This chain could have continued until I was covering up so many pains I would have forgotten what I originally started covering up.

Feeling is an important part of being human. Every feeling means something and has a root cause. Covering up these feelings is, in some ways, betraying the gifts of being human. Pain, fear, love, anticipation, irritation, frustration. Both humans and animals can feel these things but only humans can feel them and understand them and possibly learn from them to make ourselves better.

Thanks for listening

A new first run

I ran 6 miles tonight in my new shoes and it felt wonderful! It was like running on a cushion of air. I can't explain to you how different it felt to run tonight. I guess I was so used to pounding in the old shoes that these felt like a whole new experience.

I suppose that just proves the old saying that you never know how good you got it until you don't have it. I would add another line to that and say that you really realize how great it is when you lose it for awhile and then get it back. Our bodies are wonderful at adapting to circumstances and they will make do with whatever we give them for as long as they can until something just gives out. Tonight I think I heard my knees sigh and say thank you. They get a bit of break, call it a vacation.

Thanks for listening.

New Shoes!! Happy Knees!!

Natural Running goes too far

There's this big fad in running right now that involved running without "real" shoes. There's some book that promotes the belief that you should run naturally, without the aid of cushioning or motion control. I find this mildly interesting and must admit that it has some valid reasoning behind it.

I, however, readily accept that I'm a lazy American and that my feet are, and have been, spoiled. If I had been running barefoot since I was a kid I could probably go out and run a marathon without shoes but I haven't therefore I won't. Maybe one day I'll take the time to try this idea but if I do I figure I will have to take it slow and re-learn how to run. I'm not interested in that right now so I'm sticking with my shoes.

This is the point where you say, "Damn Willie, where are you going with this?". I know that you are saying that because that's what I'm thinking. Oh yeah, now I remember. Since I recently became poor I haven't been able to buy new running shoes for over a year now. I've been rotating between 3 of my old pairs, the best of which has 4 marathons on them. I knew I was heading for disaster in doing this but I figured this was the closest I would get to trying this "natural" running theory. I wasn't concerned about my old shoes not giving me the motion control that I need since I wear orthotics which handle that area nicely. The area that bit me is the lack of cushioning.

I'm bigger than your average runner (too many donuts and too much ice cream) so I need some cushioning. I don't look for those super-duper cushioning shoes but just some form of shock absorbent material between my feet and the pavement. It turns out these old shoes just aren't doing it for me. My Thursday evening run hurt my knees horribly and it was only a short, easy run. I felt good but could tell that I was really pounding my legs. By the end of the run I was in real pain in both knees and knew that I had pushed these shoes too far.

So natural running is out the window for Willie. Shoes are a necessity for me. Maybe I'll cut down on the ice cream and donuts. Nah, probably not going to happen.

Thanks for listening

www.problem.com

I was recently lamenting my dismay (please note the words lamenting and dismay in the same sentence) with Brooks discontinuing the Infiniti model shoe which is my all-time favoritest shoe.

sidebar: I haven't actually bought these shoes for a few shoe cycles but that was only because Brooks limited the available colors of the Infiniti to puke orange and ass-colored something else.

So I was talking about this when someone mentioned that they buy their shoes online because they can still buy older models. What a brilliant idea! The Internet! Why didn't I think of that? I'll tell you why. Because I have a deep love for the local running store. Any local running store. There's just something special about having a place to go and talk running with people who share my passion. The local running store is like a favorite bar that you go to see those people that know you and you know them. You could drink at home but it wouldn't be the same would it?

So now I have a problem. I found my favorite color of Infiniti's online and they have my size but my guilt has kept me from clicking that little "buy" button. What should I do? I pose this question to the few of you who still bother to come by and listen to my dribble.

Thanks for listening

OKC Memorial Marathon 2010

The Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon seems to be my new nemesis. In true comic book fashion it's one of those rivals that was born out of a friendship and love first. I love this marathon, it's my (current) hometown marathon, it gives me the opportunity to meet celebrity runners, and it lets me call it "my" marathon.

Beginning last year, however, it stopped loving me and began to fight me. If you remember last year, I ended up in the medical tent following the Memorial marathon and had an absolutely horrible experience. I wrote this off as an isolated incident and could easily explain why it happened.

After running a 3:37 at the A to A marathon a few weeks before the Memorial, I had high hopes for running a decent time and enjoying a great day with "my" marathon. It didn't happen that way. I tried hard to stay up with the 3:30 pace group but lost them around mile 15 and never recovered. I don't have much to say about the experience other than to say I finished in 3:51 and was lucky to have achieved that time. Massive stomach problems plagued me throughout the race and for many hours following the race. It was a beautiful day and the weather was perfect for a PR but "my" marathon bit me....again!

I'm trying to convince myself that "my" marathon still loves me and that she's just raising the bar and beckoning me to a higher standard of performance the way a true love does. This feeling is competing against the feeling that "my" marathon has rejected me for some crime I have unknowingly committed against it.

It's hard to having something you love cause you trouble. I think that's the hardest kind of trouble to deal with. You care about it so you can't just write it off or deal harshly with it. You have to find a way to resolve the conflict with as little collateral damage as possible because you can't imagine living a life without this thing in it. Stupid love, makes things so difficult.

Thanks for listening

Moments

I've had my moments.

I may not look like much now and I may not feel like much ever, but I've had my moments when I did things that I never thought I could do. Unfortunately those moments span both sides of the line that separates good and bad. Also unfortunately I remember both the good and bad moments with the same level of detail and clarity.

I've run 17 marathons in my running life. There was a time when I never thought I could 26.2 miles.

While I was running those 17 marathons I lost a piece of my life that I'll never get back. There was a time when I never thought I'd ever give that piece up.

I've met many wonderful people in my running life, people I now consider dear friends, people I never would have imagined being friends with before.

I've also lost many friends along that same journey and even made a few enemies. There was a time when I couldn't have imagined having enemies.

This is life. This is my life. I'm living it and I'm learning it. I hate that I've done some things and I wish I could take those moments back but I can't. I also love some of the moments and wouldn't trade them for all the gold in the world. Someday when I'm lost in this world I'm going to remember some moments and they are going to be all I have. My hope is that the moments I remember will make me happy. Maybe that's the sign of a life well lived.

I have many stories to tell about my recent runs but if I'm ever going to get back to writing I need to write what's in my heart at the moment and get it out so it doesn't clog up the channel. This song hit me today and I felt the need to write down these thoughts. It's a start, I'm trying, I've missed it.

Thanks for listening