running: the dawn

“I think there is no better way to invite a human being to view their body differently than by inviting them to be an athlete, by revering one’s body as an instrument rather than just an ornament. It’s a really great way to reorient how you see your body so you can see it as this incredible, awe-inspiring machine that you need to fuel well in order for it to function.”
~Alanis Morissette

Near the end of my high school career I started to feel and think negatively about how I looked.  I was never severely overweight, but I was heavier than I wanted to be and I was always discovering things about my figure that I wished were different.  From the width of my arms to the circumference of my waist.  I would spend time looking at others to see what I should look like or what I could be like if I really tried.

I don’t think I was out of hand, but I do know I wasn’t happy with me.

Then I started running.

No, I didn’t loose weight immediately or in any obvious way.  I wasn’t all of a sudden a different shape or size.  But I do remember how I felt after I finished my first six mile run.  You see, before then, I’d only ever run 3 miles at a time, and I never really enjoyed it much.  I felt like running was more of an obligation.  I should run, so I would.  Then one day I woke up and approached my run from a different perspective.  I asked my self what could I do.  What am I capable of?  So I decided to see if I could keep running for 45 minutes.  It was terrifying.  I set out on a bike path and didn’t let myself turn back towards home until I was 25 minutes away.  I ran really slowly.  But I did it!  Then a few days later, I wondered to myself if I could run for an hour.  And I did that too!  Finally I decided to see what would happen if I tried to run six miles.  Oh the joy!  I couldn’t believe that I had run six whole miles!  Without stopping!  In that moment, I realized something that changed the way I see myself.  I realized that my body is capable of so much more than I give it credit for.  Most of the running challenges I faced that day were not from physical limitations.  My legs carried me through the miles, my lunges supplied the oxygen I needed, my heart took care of the distribution of blood.  Everything worked together the way it was designed.  I was too interested in the way everything looked, rather than how it performed.

I hadn’t ever run a long distance, not be cause I wasn’t capable, but because I didn’t think I could.  I didn’t trust my body.  I didn’t trust myself.

I feel so differently now.  I am in awe of what the human body is capable of.  I don’t spend time wishing the my body looked different because I’m so proud of what it can accomplish.  I haven’t stopped my negativity all together.  Sometimes I see other women who are naturally slim and envy how easy it must be for them to find shorts to fit (I hate trying to find shorts for summer, I’ve all but given up trying to wear them).  Then I remind myself that even though my legs don’t always fit into the latest, slimmest trend, they see me through the miles.  They are sturdy and dependable and deserve my appreciation rather than my criticism.

I got the above quote in my inbox the other day.  I have subscribed to daily inspirational quotes from Runner’s World.  Sometimes they are cheesy and sometimes it a world-class marathoner that I have a difficult time relating to.  But that quote from Alanis Morissette struck a chord with me.  “Yes!  That’s exactly what happened to me!” I thought to myself.  I hope that I continue to view my body as an “awe-inspiring machine” and take care of it as it continues to take care of me.

I am tired of running the same routes. I was getting ready to go on my run this afternoon and something inside of me started to violently protest. I couldn’t make up my mind about where I was going to run. Since I live in such a small town there are very few side walks, no bike paths, and no trails, hence my running is confined to the streets. Keeping that in mind, I really don’t like to run where there is going to be very much traffic. This is for two reasons: 1) traffic + running in the streets make it much less safe (don’t worry, I run into traffic and the cars are very generous) and 2) I don’t like to run “publicly”. Now I know that unless I get a treadmill and exclusively run in my basement, there is no way I can run without people seeing it. I just don’t like the idea of running through the middle of town and everyone noticing, “oh hey, I know her…look at her run!”

Therefore, as I’m carefully planning out my routes, I intentionally head out of town on the quietest streets I can find. And by “streets” I mean street. Usually most of my runs start out running through a quiet cemetery situated on the edge of a river. This is always the favorite part of my run. There is rarely any traffic and the river is beautiful. From there I take a back road by some larger houses (most of them for sale surprise surprise…) and end up over by the bypass. Depending on my distance goals I either turn around at this point or keep on running and I’m out of town.

Today, however, I felt like there was a toddler inside me throwing a temper tantrum. I wanted something different, something surprising. I whipped out my computer and tried my best to find a “map it” route that I could get on board with. Alas, it is not meant to be. Off towards the cemetery I go….

I love information.  I love to ask questions and figure out how and why something works.    I enjoy finding cause-effect relationship and identifying emerging patterns.  This side of my personality really enjoys my job.  There is so much information that I can tap into in my classroom.  There’s the homework assignments that tell me if students are motivated and understand, the questions that the students ask (or don’t), the blank stares, the dialogue.  All of that information is collected, processed, and feeds into helping me become a more efficient teacher.

As this season of training continues, I can feel the thirst for information about my running increasing.  I want to know about my mile splits and my heart rate and the elevation of my runs.  I want to see how the different elements play into the efficiency of my runs.

Now, granted, I do have a nike+ system that does let me track my distances and my average pace.  However, I feel like I’m ready to take it to the next level and get some more in-depth data.

So, that brings me to what I’ve been drooling over online: the beautiful Garmin family of Forerunners.  I’m trying to decide between the top of the line 405 model or the middle of the road 205

Here’s a comparison chart from the Garmin webpage:

(I’ve only included the information that differs between the two watches.)
Routes.  This  is a feature that lets me store frequented routes on the watch and race against my previous times.  Could be fun, but I’m not sure it should be the deciding factor.

Heart Rate Monitor.  This is one that I go back and forth about.  I think it would be nice to get that information.  Also, the one that has the heart rate monitor included heart-rate based calorie consumption.  That means that I could track calories burned and compare the workouts in Jazzercise and/or my “home gym” to my running workouts.

Foot Pod.  The only benefit to this is being able to run indoors or on a treadmill and keep that mileage accounted for with all the other workouts I do.  Currently I don’t have a gym membership of any kind, so I don’t really have the option of running indoors.

Unit-to-unit transfer.  Not sure why I would care about this…I think it also means that I wouldn’t have to plug the unit into my computer, it could just transmit the information wirelessly…or at least I think so.

So, this is what I spend my spare time doing.  Lusting after beautiful running accessories…

So, here it is Tuesday night and I’m feeling really great about my mileage for this week. Sunday, I ran 7 miles. I had a 2-miler scheduled for Monday, but when it came time to enter a distance into my ipod I saw the 5 mile distance and it called to me. Then this morning KT and I ran an easy two-miler.

I must admit, this morning I was not in the running mood or mindset. My alarm went off and I got out of bed physically but continued to fight with the sluggishness that seemed to be clinging to my every pore. KT texted that she was on her way to meet me and even that didn’t kick my preparations into gear. She got there and I had yet to start putting on my shoes, jacket, gloves and/or hat.

Truth be told, I may have been having a mini-pouty-pity-party sitting there in my living room. Today was one of those day when I doubt myself and I focus on the negative words that creep into my brain. It was also the type of day when I feel blessed to have a friend to run with. She got me up out of the puddle of negativity and marched me out the door.

There was lightly falling snow and we were the first ones out on any of the streets, no plow or vehicle of any kind had gone before us. I enjoyed glancing back at the footprints. It was quiet on the streets and completely peaceful. As we ran, we chatted. We swapped stories about our long runs since we weren’t able to do it together. She told me all about her winter camping she did over the weekend (she’s way more hardcore than me!).

Before I realized it my mood was elevated, and we were back at my house the easy breezy two miles behind us.

During the run, I experienced a new snow-related phenomena. The bottom of my shoes under my heel are shaped like a horseshoe with an empty space in the middle. Since we were running on fresh-fallen powder, the snow started collecting in the void. By the end of the run, so much snow had collected and compacted there, it felt like I was running in heels, or running downhill. It was very strange.

At the end of it though, I’m at 14 miles for the week and it’s only Tuesday! Ten miles and I’ll have met my goal for the week!

Over the weekend there were a couple chance encounters of the blog kind. A couple of my friends overheard Mr. Dawn asking me about my blog and were very offended that I hadn’t yet told them about this little venture. I have to admit that I’m a timid blogger. I haven’t been announcing my site from the rooftops, mass emailing my entire contact book, or even voluntarily giving the address to my husband (I made him ask for it).

I’m not sure why this is. I’m not intentionally hiding. At least I want to believe that I’m not. I guess I just feel silly. I was a math major in college, and I’m worried that I’m going to be rejected here in the world that is dominated by right-brained thinking. I know that I’m not going to be eloquent or poetic, so I don’t want to burden people with my ramblings.

This weekend I also had a conversation with my dad and he asked me what the point of my blog is…and since then I’ve been working on putting that into words, so here it goes:

My blog is first of all a place for me to record this training season for my marathon in June. Each time I’ve trained for this distance, it has been such a different experience with different injuries, triumphs and shortcomings. I want to remember it all. While I still have very clear memories of some of the best moments from my other races, I can’t always remember the path I took to get there.  I want  to learn from, not repeat, mistakes.

Another layer to the onion of purpose that is my blog is developing discipline. Running a marathon (or any race for that matter) takes training and training requires discipline. One thing that I know about myself is that I can’t be accountable to just me. I need other people who are going to ask me how the running is going, or how I’m doing with my training schedule. I need to put my goals out there in black and white so that I then will be motivated to see them through.

The last element that I hope to gain through this process is strengthening my literary abilities. When I want to be a better runner I run. Likewise, if I want to be a better writer I need to write. I need to write and then reflect on my words and write some more.

When I was in college, I was asked to write an article to be published. I was working with my mentor on a research project and we were about half way through the process and we just wanted to start synthesizing the material we had collected so far. Writing that little article was one of the most personally painful experiences I can remember. There’s something about choosing words and putting them down on paper that is a really vulnerable task for me. I remember feeling like every time someone edited my article they were criticizing me personally. By the end I didn’t even feel attached to the paper, I felt like the words belonged to someone else and I didn’t even recognize them anymore.

It’s time for me to move on from that experience and stop feeling intimidated by the writing process. So, here I am. No editors, just me. (Which means the spelling my get interesting at times, it’s the only class I ever got a C in…)