Tag Archives: marathon

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NEW DAY 222: It’s an ice day for a run

It’s not the most glamorous way to blog, but I’m propped up on a pile of pillows topped with heating pad #1 resting against my lower back while heating pad #2 hugs my neck and shoulders. Shoveling 10+ inches of snow from a driveway that seems to magically expand with each Herculean scoop can apparently have this effect. I’ve only gotten about 30% of the snow cleared after 75 laborious minutes today, and there’s more of it on the way tomorrow! God rest my s(h)oul(ders).

As much as I’m very much not loving doing this exhausting chore in sub-freezing temperatures, I’m finding motivation from a surprising source. It’s not because I’m the only one who can do it. It’s not because I’m coming up with clever rewards for myself for making progress. (I’m not, but damn, that probably would have been smart.) It’s not even because of my supreme abhorrence for feeling trapped, which I quite literally am so long as my car has no means of egress from this house.

It’s… because I need to run.
Not want.
Not feel like.
Need.

Yup. My running addiction is officially so serious that it is now the driver for me to dig out untold cubic feet of heavy snow for hours. I am compelled to exert myself physically by the promise of more intense exercise.

^I saw this on Instagram the other day and instinctively screen grabbed it. As unhinged as the sentence that preceded the above image sounds, it’s true — and it’s because running has saved my sanity this past year. That’s not an overstatement, an exaggeration, a hyperbole, or a dramatization; it’s a fact. I owe everything that finally started going right last summer, to running.

Excavating the snow between me and the nearest treadmill is going to take a lot of time (and heating pads and Advil) across a stretch of 2-3 days, but I’m not the least bit deterred. I’m too eager to get back to the gym to resume my training sessions. Who knew that could even be a thing?!

I’ve been reluctant to claim the title “runner” for myself; runners are lean and fit and proper athletes. The half-marathon I’m participating in selected exclusively people who meet that description as their official ambassadors for their race events, so this is not a definition I’ve invented; it’s societal. Runners look the part.

But you know what? Runners are also chonky and awkwardly built and accident-prone messes with bum ankles. They are tentative and unskilled and constantly sore. They are learning and graceless and quick to sweat. They are hopeful and resilient and tough self-coaches who are stronger than they look.

I read somewhere that if you run, you can call yourself a runner.

I’m a runner.

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NEW DAY 71: I’ve been thinking…


The past 3 days of 75 Hard have proven far more difficult than expected thanks to some very uncomfortable menstrual complications. In an effort to recast my misery into some form of positives to focus on, I’ve landed in potentially dangerous territory.

Here’s what happened.

I reminded myself how lucky the timing was with my hybrid work schedule, so that my peak suffering days have been wfh and, fortunately, not onsite.

This triggered the memory of the fortuitous timing of how I landed the job in the first place. If not for the exercise and weight loss starting when they did, I wouldn’t have had the confidence — or anything interview-appropriate to wear — while moving through the hiring process. If not for the precipitating chaos that led me to snap into action, I never would have started. If not for… I mean, just how far back do I take this?

It got me stuck in a loop of replaying key moments from the past few months and examining the importance of when they happened. What if the timing had been slightly different? What if just one of the things that led to another, hadn’t happened at all? Where would I be today? How would I be?

And while in this dubiously philosophical pseudo-meditation, a lightning bolt struck: what if I trained for the next city half marathon?

Uh…

Here I am, only 19 days through 75 Hard, and entertaining the possibility of running 13.1 miles just 8 months from now. Ummm, excuse me, me! I would like a word!

That word: HUH?! 😲

One of my coworkers mentioned the other day that she signed up for the halfer on a whim after her doctor told her to get more exercise. Most people would start taking causal walks; this absolute legend decided that the appropriate response was to go from never having run a single mile, to conditioning herself to run half a marathon’s worth in less than a year. And evidently, this airborne insanity has infected me.

But will I actually do it?

Honestly… I might.

Rationality says to make it through the rest of the current challenge I’m just barely 1/4 through before leaping off the next cliff.

Dubiously philosophical pseudo-meditation says that this seed was planted at this time for a reason, and I might as well start training even if I don’t want to take the step of registering for the event right away. After all, I have two guaranteed dedicated workouts a day for at least the next 56 days. Why not incorporate training into those slots?

I’ve found several feasible training programs ranging from 12 weeks to 20 weeks to 6 months. If I started training in September, that would give me 8 full months to coach myself up to half-marathon shape — and be a longer term goal that would have the additional benefit of keeping me focused on movement during the winter months.

There’s a good chance this is happening. Stay tuned.