Patriot's Day Part 2: Oh yeah, here's the running part

Oh crap. I forgot to mention the running. 

I had a bad day. I went out slow but not slow enough. I hit the wall at mile three, aided by a cloudless sky and warmer than usual temps. I walked a bit, ran a lot, walked some more. Stopped and took photos with my high school friend Michele at mile 10, and chatted for several minutes with her sister Marie who I hadn’t seen in almost four decades. It was awesome!

Ran some more. Stopped at mile 13 to hug every volunteer who would let me near them.  Those hardy souls at the mile of smiles are a huge part of my beloved marathon family. I usually co-captain the mile 13 stop. I had to thank them for being there. 

Kept running, jogging, walking, crawling.  Seemed like the thing to do.

Constant joy. Constant love. Yada yada yada. 

Emotional moment at the turn. Every Boston marathoner knows what turn, the one by the fire station in Newton, the one that signals the start of the hills, the one where the crowds sound like you just personally made a touchdown at the Super Bowl. Overload of love. Overload of joy. Walked a bit. Wiped eyes a bit. Smiled a ton. Pressed lots of power flowers.

And so it continued. 

Downhill past Boston College, saw my dear friend Elaine and her hubby. Elaine was with me at my first Boston, 2001, cheering me on at Cleveland Circle, and before then telling me I could do it during long nights at the gym, both of us on ellipticals chatting about online dating, losing weight, how middle-aged such and such and his buddy whatsit over there are such players for hanging with the college girls, how ellipticals are boring. 

Then let gravity carry me to Cleveland Circle and Coolidge Corner and screaming fans and love love love all we need is love and Gatorade and water and more love and this neat kid doing the whole marathon on crutches. I figure he was about twenty. I stopped and walked next to him while he crutched. He qualified for Boston last year, I forget where, finishing in under three hours. Got hurt a few weeks ago. Stress fracture I think he said. Couldn’t put weight on the foot at all. So no running. But he wasn’t going to miss Boston. Oh no. Not this Boston. Hence, the crutches. 

Me: How do you feel?

Him: Pretty good except for my hand. (Briefly holds up hand, which is excruciatingly taped.)Think I broke it doing this for twenty-four miles. "This" meaning running the marathon. Using crutches.

 

Next I swerve around a swarm of red, white, and blue-bedecked Team Hoyt members who are making running legends Rick and Dick, at the center of the frenzy, honored guests at their runner high love-in. 

I meet up with another friend, a fast runner coming back from a month-long bout of pneumonia, somewhere before Hereford, in the tunnel under Mass Ave. She’s limping, obviously in pain, and is all smiles. We agree that yes, it IS a great day.  

I turn right onto Hereford. I climb that tiny hill. I reach the point where Hereford meets Boylston. I stop.

I take a deep breath. I look to the finish line, the bouncing blue and gold balloon arch, the crowds lining both sides of the road. 

I remember.  

I watch the runners climb Hereford. I study their eyes. I see every raw human emotion you could ever hope to see. I think the Navajo prayer, the one about beauty being all around us. 

The beauty reminds me of the thing I was saving until now, the underlying reason for the joy the gratitude the not postponing. My parents have gone to every Boston I’ve run, except for one and they were away on vacation out of the country so that missed one doesn’t count. 

Three days before the marathon they told me they’d be there, standing where they always stand, a bit past the mile 20 marker at Center Street, but before the hill crests at Hammond. 

I wasn’t expecting this. They are doing better. That is true. But I didn’t expect this. They are weaker than they used to be. It's an hour into Newton, plus there's the race day traffic along with the regular stupid Mass. drivers.

I said no, they shouldn’t. It would wear them out. Who knows what kind of security they’d be dealing with. What kinds of long lines they might get stuck in.

My dad interrupts me. He bellows. “HEY! Enough. I told you. We are going.  We always go. There's nothing left to say.“

Yeah. My parents were there, cheering me on in their pastel golf sweaters and their patterned golf pants and their straw golf hats. How awesome is that? Me, way past fifty years on this earth, and my parents are still cheering me on. I am so lucky. 

That day, I saw them before they saw me so I made absolutely sure that I was running, not walking not crawling. I ran up to them and we hugged, then posed for pictures. I waved to them as I ran off up the hill. I kept peeking back as they started walking toward their car. I couldn't get enough of them.  But too, I was tired. As soon as I knew they couldn't see me any more, I started walking. Their eyesight ain't what it used to be, so thankfully I only had to run a few seconds.

So I'm remembering this and smiling while I'm watching the runners pass me by at the corner of Hereford and Boylston.  At some point during this reflective time it hit me that I was running, not stopping at, the Boston Marathon so I should probably get back on track. 

As I started up, Wrecking Ball, my theme song, came on my shuffle.

Bruce is so awesome. He sings that “Hard times come and hard times go just to come again.” Yup. So true Bruce, so true. 

He sings about the importance of taking your best shot and seeing what you've got, and I always think he's implying that maybe deep within us we've got our own sets of wrecking balls. As I run, I think how mine include joy and gratitude and never ever ever giving up. 

I'm imagining myself as one orange-singlet-clad wrecking ball, as I crush that last point two. I'm obliterating sadness, pulverizing despair, and, as my eyes hit the fans near the finish line, desperately wishing I could make everything all better.

It was pretty raw.

If you go by the clock, Boston Marathon 2014 was my worst race ever. If you go by other things, like lessons learned for example, count it as the best.

 

Here at home, I'm powering up the brain cells, getting juiced for more writing, and hopefully for some publishing too. Lucky for me, I've got some pretty big balls. Yes I do. More to come.