I can't run in silence.
I either need headphones with music blaring, some game on TV, ocean waves crashing--something.
When I was a passably competent runner in high school, I'd listen to a very bizarre assortment of songs--Janet Jackson to U2 to Led Zeppelin--on a CD player or Sony Walkman.
In all the years since, I've failed to ever develop the running bug despite a few wasteful registrations for half marathons that I never participated in.
Still, I've at least maintained a little running--usually intervals, since I read once that that was more effective than a sustained run. The last few years, I've hopped on the treadmill at night, sometime between Teddy's bedtime and his first arousal for some more milk and a cuddle, and I'd get 20 minutes in before calling it quits.
I think the possibility that I'd someday do what my healthier friends were doing around me was enough, though. Some day I'll sign up for that 10K. Some day I'll start waking up early and zipping around the neighborhood before the kids get up. Some day.
The last race I actually ran in was Komen Columbus, a 5K. I couldn't even tell you what year it was--too long ago.
The first 5K in which I participated was for Komen, too. My mom--who wasn't a runner--decided to run in honor of her beloved aunt, who had recently died of breast cancer. I was probably around 12, and I ran the last few hundred yards with my mom across the finish line. My father wasn't a runner either, though he'd dutifully use the stairmaster at the gym. The one time I ever remember him running was a Komen Columbus 5K as well. He ran for Mom, who became a breast cancer survivor while I was in junior high, and who later became a super volunteer and fundraiser for the race.
There's something motivational about not being able to run, however. And weirdly, despite all the injuries I accumulated in July, and being sedentary for several weeks, the one thing that was unaffected was my ability to walk. When I started at the rehab center, the wonderful physical therapist I was working with suggested we head outside one day and see what happened. We wandered all the way to Mirror Lake and back, a good 45-minute jaunt given the slow pace at which I was moving. A few days later we went a little further, through OSU's library, to Ohio Stadium, and wandered back down Neil Avenue--a few blocks from where my alma mater of a law school is located (but won't be for much longer--a bemusing decision for another time).
I've been walking as much as I can since I've gotten home. And it just feels so damn normal to be able to do it. I feel like slow Forrest Gump when he just had to get out there and move.
I've always walked too fast, as it were. It drives Lori nuts. And in a fit of validation, my physical therapist timed me during a six-minute stretch last week, and reported that I walk faster than 93% of people my age and weight. Lori was tickled. But I digress.
Much as I have enjoyed walking, if I want to return to normalcy, I need to be able to run. Or at least jog. I've been anxiously awaiting the green light from my physical therapist to begin to jog. But my bones needed more time to heal. Enough time has passesd, however, and this week, that permission was granted!
(I made a joke about yogging to someone at the therapist's office, and she had no idea what I was talking about. Which makes me feel even older than the 44 I'm about to be. But I digress.)
I am absolutely elated about this, and am determined to run in this May's Komen Columbus Race for the Cure.
Of course, my stamina is dreadful so far. Kinda like this.
But I'll get better.
And in the interim, I'm happily strapping on my old running shoes--a gift from one of the nonprofit leaders I work for, Girls on the Run's Sarah Hider, from when I participated in their fashion show back in...I don't know when.
They're in far too good of condition still, which means I have miles to go before I sleep tonight and for many days and nights to come.
