TheBanyanTree: this is what addiction is like

[Julie Anna Teague]

For weeks now, my running partner, Tanya, and I have whined and 
complained about being dead tired of running. We both have full time 
jobs, kids, husbands, homes, yards, and all manner of things that 
require our time and energy.  We have things we should be our would 
like to be doing on Saturday mornings besides running.  We'd like to 
have a lunch hour occasionally instead of running and then scarfing 
some food at our desks.  We couldn't wait until this damned race was 
over and done with so we could move on to doing other things.

So, we ran the half marathon on Saturday.  It was the hilliest course 
I've ever run in my life.  Painfully hilly.  And it poured rain from 
mile six on.  At mile ten, when I thought it couldn't rain any harder, 
it rained harder.  It rained so hard I threw my arms up and laughed out 
loud at the sky.  It was a muscle-chilling 55 degrees, a quite nice 
temperature for running if not for the wind and rain.  My quads cramped 
up in a way they had not before.  My knees hurt so bad I considered 
crying.  My feet, socks, shoes, clothes, skin, hair were all soaked 
through.  But I finished at a respectable time for a middle-aged office 
worker, with an average pace of 8.7 minutes per mile.  The miles were 
going by much faster than that in the first half, and much slower than 
that after I took on five pounds of water in each shoe.  Tanya finished 
ten minutes behind me.  Although we are not competitive with each other 
at all, I was glad to have held my own with someone fifteen years 
younger than me.  I figured she'd tromp me good, but that would've been 
fine, too.  I would've been pleased as punch for her, and I know she 
was pleased as punch for me.

Overall, it was a miserable experience running that race.  The course 
was a functional 13.1 miles but it was not pretty.  Parts of it were 
grim.  The race organization fell down in spots and I was nearly 
clipped by a city bus that should not have been on the course at all.  
We were soaked and shivering and hurried home as soon as we finished.  
No after-race snacks and socializing.  It was over.  Done with.  We 
could quit running.  We were both in pain.

Now it's Monday, and we are both back in the office, rehashing the 
whole event with another co-worker, Barb, who talked us into running 
the race in the first place.  She is surviving breast cancer and she 
wanted to walk a half marathon as proof that she could get her life 
back.  She finished the race, too, was deliriously happy with herself 
this morning, and we were thrilled to see her so happy.  She is not 
only alive but so very alive that she could walk 13.1 miles at a fast 
clip!  We should just all go lick our wounds, but instead, we are 
talking about doing another half marathon in 7 weeks.  A more fun half 
marathon north of Indianapolis that has lake views and crosses bridges 
and has music all along the route and seems like it will be much more 
fun than the sodden ordeal we just went through.

And the other part of it is that once you spend so much time running, 
you forget what else you did with that time before you ran so much.  I 
know the hours would fill themselves without much effort.  It's 
gardening season and all that.  But while running is not always fun, 
it's so...rewarding.  It's something we go out and do just for 
OURSELVES.  Not for our husbands or kids or anyone else.  And while we 
thought we couldn't wait to be done with it, we are finding that it 
just doesn't feel right not to go out for our Tuesday noon hour run 
tomorrow.  Doesn't feel right to not have the next goal in mind, and to 
lose the purposefulness of our efforts.  Barb and Tanya and I were all 
running addicts in the past, and now we have fallen off the wagon and 
are addicted all over again.

Julie