Really it is unbelievable to me that I have not sat down and blogged about this momentous moment in my life that happened exactly one week ago today! This event was huge to me and had so much compiled in that one moment and I have not had one inspiring moment to sit down and articulate the picture in a blog.
There are two very real reasons for this. First, I had put a lot of things on "hold" until after the race. These "things" had deadlines looming the week or two after the race. As soon as I got home I had to get on these things - and there were many and still are - that I had to devote not only time but all my brain power of creativity that I have. This left not one ounce of inspiration to replay the half marathon in my mind and recreate it online with the word pictures I am used to putting out. Even today I am sandwiching this little blog in a window of time before I head out the door.
The second reason is this:
The day after I got home one of the bloggers, whom has been such an inspiring and entertaining force in my blog reading about running, posted a horrific blog. This blogger is usually hilarious with a touch of raunchy that makes it beyond very realistic truth about running and racing. So this particular blog was a stark contrast and it has stuck with me like glue all week as she updated her news.
Her cousin who is 43, lives in Montana, is a mother of 5 and a math teacher, went for an early morning run on Saturday, (at 6:30 am, just 25 minutes after my wave crossed the start line), and never came back. The police found one of her running shoes on the route she took.
Even as I write this - a cousin of a blogger I don't even know - I am still shook up about it. I can't explain why. Maybe its the little tiny tiny concern every time I go out to run, when I'm looking around to see who's on the path, trying to sense if it's a safe day to be running that day at that place, are there enough people to keep an eye on me, sprinting through slightly isolated areas....maybe it's that kind of stuff that this story I identified with. The fear in the back of all our minds as women whenever we go out alone, shopping or running - just alone as a woman - we can never assume we are safe.
Perhaps it's because she is or was middle-aged and had children waiting at home. Maybe most of all because she was doing what I had been doing for a year - going for an early morning run training for a half marathon. I could cry.
All week I have checked the usually "funny" blog to get heart-wrenching reports that she hasn't been found yet. Yesterday I checked again....she's dead. They haven't released all the details. But she's dead. She went running and didn't and won't come back.
I''m not saying I am stricken with fear and will never run again. I'm not trying to feed fear. I refuse to do that. But I'm just saying it really just hit me and I'm hurt. It's just not right that we can't do something we love and sets us free and makes us healthy without having that little voice always warning us and the possibility there. It's crazy.
So I haven't run all week. I just couldn't. Not physically, just emotionally. I just couldn't run thinking about this woman and what she suffered.
She was a fellow runner.
And that is the ONE THING I can blog about last Saturday. Running and training puts you into a community of people. You definitely become A PART of something bigger than just you and your earbuds. I didn't totally realize it until I read about my running blogger's running cousin. Last week I came home with more than a medal and time (I wasn't happy with). I came home a runner. I came home a runner of 20,000 runners in one race. A runner of millions across the nation. A runner of hundreds of thousands of running women going out for daily runs, experiencing the same freedoms, benefits and thrills that I blog about a lot.
I just gotta sort out and work through how this threw me before I could relish the awesome time I had last week. I just didn't feel right articulating details of an overwhelming race knowing at the same time I was experiencing that wonder she was experiencing other things on her run.
Read about Sherri here. Follow "shutupandrun" here.https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shut-Up-and-Run/289007011347
Dear Carmen,
ReplyDeleteYour blog posts have been a inspiration to me over the past year. Last week I joined a private gym and started working out on the tread mill. I thought I was going to die at the 30 minute mark, but thought "if Carmen can do this, then I can!"....
I am nowhere near at the physical strength I used to be when I was in my 20's. Health wise, I have had 3 unexpected surgeries in the past 15 months. I have healed physically, but emotionally I have the fear of not being able to run again. I am taking it one day at a time, and I will loose the extra 30 pounds I gained from quitting smoking 3 years ago.
Your honesty is inspiring and refreshing, even when you speak of your fears.
Thank you for inspiring me to run again!
Michael Fitcher
Seattle, WA