TheBanyanTree: this running year

[Jena Norton]

I feel substandard! You amaze me!

Jena

Sent from my iPad, so blame auto correct for weird words.

> On Dec 31, 2013, at 2:29 PM, "Teague,  Julie Anna" <jateague at indiana.edu> wrote:
> 
> I ran five miles on January 1, 2013, and just finished with 5.5 miles today, December 31, for a year total of 952 miles.
> 
> Through rain, sleet, snow, wind, brutal heat, frigid cold,
>    and some days that were perfect beyond belief.
> In the company of my best running buddies
>    and all alone with my own thoughts, the sound of my heart
>    in my ears and the thunk of one pair of running shoes.
> In the deep silence of a dirt trail in the woods
>    and through city streets lined with yelling supporters and rock bands
> With headlamps in the pre-dawn dark of early morning
>    and the scary black-hole dark of midnight,
>    and with shades in the bright sun of noon or the diamond whiteout of snow
> 
> I have run.  Some of the best parts of my life happen while I'm running.  I've laughed, cried, talked problems, books, kids, current events, and once learned news of a friend that sucked the breath out of my lungs and threatened to stop my beating heart.
> 
> I have run with my whole heart.  I have made my peace with the days when the run is hard, when it sucks to be running, when I want to quit. Today it's like this.  Tomorrow it won't be.  And saved up the joy of the days I felt like I was a deer in the woods, that my legs were beautiful, muscled machines, that I could run forever. Today it's like this.  Tomorrow it won't be.
> 
> I mark the miles in the small, falling apart notebook I keep on my desk that contains a scribble for every run since August, 2009.  I hang the clanking medals from hooks in my bedroom.  I flatten and stack the many race numbers. I pile the endless pairs of dirty, broken shoes in the garage.  These running years. They slip and slide and flow on by and I feel deeply grateful, passionately alive, vibrantly healthy, and continually inspired by the experience of it all.
> 
> Julie
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>