More Progress

On this day between Good Friday and Easter, I completed a good nine-mile run, the farthest I have gone in six months, and capping off a 22-mile week at that.  I have to admit that it was a little daunting to see Anthony this morning, however, fresh from his marathon last weekend, telling me that he had done pretty well until "the wheels came off at Mile 24."  Hah!  Those were good days when Mile 22 was a point one reached in a single run rather than the total for the entire week!  Best not to dwell on past glories right now.

Still, I am pleased with this progress.  A beautiful Spring morning, surrounded by friends, the sun ducking behind scattered morning clouds coquettishly, and the great high chorus of birds all around us practicing their Easter anthems from the just-flowering trees.  "It's all a common glory," as Emily Dickinson said. 

Another page ambitiously dog-eared in the book of my recovery!

Spring Has Sprung

What glorious weather for my first Spring run in Highlands!  It began flurrying off and on yesterday afternoon, and this morning we awoke to conditions typical of this changeable plateau:  31 degrees, a sharp wind out of the north, and a half-inch of snow on the ground (and on our deck, where I moved through my Tai Chi moves gingerly on the slick boards).  Highlands is always a surprise!  I had to dig under a little pile of warmer-weather gear to find my tights again and toboggan and gloves.

Of course, it was Monday so Big Bearpen beckoned, and the road was perfectly dry all the way up.  As I began to climb, what seemed like an effort at first became easier, and I found myself warming up fast, unzipping my vest and enjoying the fresh coat of snow along the road.  The wind died down and birdsong chimed through the still morning air.  With absolutely no moisture in the atmosphere, the vistas on the way up were simply glorious.  And when I reached the very summit, I came around the corner and found myself in full, warm sunlight, which seemed like a special reward for the struggle uphill, a taste of grace and mercy at the end of a journey.  I stopped as I always do and stretched, looking far off to distant southern horizon.  And I was thankful to be climbing mountains once again.

"Struggling and suffering are the essence of a life worth living.

If you’re not pushing yourself beyond the comfort zone,

if you’re not demanding more from yourself—

expanding and learning as you go—

you're choosing a numb existence." - Dean Karnazes

Uphill Battle

More progress was made in my "comeback" this week!  That's the word my sister used when writing me an encouraging e-mail, and I suppose it is more accurate than any other.  (I briefly considered during this period of Presidential primaries using the phrase "Make Richard Great Again.")  Pain lessens with each run, and distance increases; as I tell my running buddies, now I'm merely fat and out of shape.

On Monday, I ran up Big Bearpen Mountain, my old standby workout for building strength which I have extolled in this blog in the past.  The climb is relentless but manageable, and the views are always spectacular from the summit.  Although I walked it once or twice over the winter, my running logs tell me that this was the first time I ran to the summit in exactly six months (September 14 - March 14).  And today I completed a long run of eight miles and seem none the worse for the wear.  That is the farthest distance I have run since September 28.  So, jump-started by the series of races over the past few races, I now intend to concentrate on building strength and distance, a good base of mileage for the coming spring and summer.  And avoiding further injury.

But it is not easy!  Running four miles feels like eight miles at the end of the day, and running eight miles today felt like a 16-miler from my marathon-training days.  It reminds me of a phrase I heard in a recent movie (The Lady in the Van):  "In life, going downhill is an uphill job."  That's a little glib, but it does give a perspective (a slant, as it were) on the job of growing old and on the continuing effort to stay fit as I near my 70s.  I look to my fellow running friends in their 70s and 80s as inspiration these days!

  

Peace and Plenty and Epictetus

We used to vacation in a beautiful little house at the Outer Banks called "Peace and Plenty."  That house is no longer there, but we thought it was a wonderful name and in some ways we have adopted it for our own little house here in Highlands. 

I have thought about that phrase often.  We all know what peace is:  freedom from warfare and discord, tranquility of mind.  I demonstrated for "Peace" way back in the 1960s when this country was at war in Vietnam.  But what is plenty?  I wrote a poem in 2002 while I was staying in Peace and Plenty, after visiting the Elizabeth II, which is a ship anchored in Manteo modeled after the kind of vessel that brought our forefathers to Roanoke Island more than 400 years ago:

Is this a ship or a boat?  So squat and fragile.

Webbed, with rigging and furled sails,

Rocking gently at marsh's edge.

What madness to set out with such scarcity,

Barrels of watery beer - four quarts a day -

Dried cod and soggy biscuits,

And instruments so crude they scarcely worked,

Pegs in compass-boards, and astrolabes

That stole the sight.  Did they not know better?

Perhaps that is plenty:  not knowing better.

Satisfied with thin gruel, sweet and good

To an empty stomach.  No expectations.

Epictetus was a minimalist, who apparently lived by himself and had few possessions.  He would have made a good sailor 400 years ago, and he certainly would have been appalled at the rampant consumerism we see all around us these days.  He would have enjoyed Lent, I think, this season of self-reflection and self-denial that we Christians find ourselves in two weeks before Easter Sunday.  

“He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, 

but rejoices for those which he has.” 

- Epictetus

Today I am going to learn to want what I already have.  That's plenty for me.

Running Ambassadors

I like to run by myself from time to time, and I also like to run with others.  Both have their advantages.

The solitude of running alone is a welcome escape for many of us.  We can think or pray, we can look around us at the beauty of surely one of the most beautiful places on earth to live and run.  I cannot tell you how many times, especially when I was working in my stressful job years ago, when I went out for a run in one state of mind and returned in a completely different one, restored and refreshed, energized, as if I had indeed been "re-created."  Tension dissolves, and difficult problems seem to resolve themselves.  Surely most runners have experienced this magical feeling, especially when we run alone, and aside from the physical benefits, isn't it really why most of us continue to run?   

At the same time, I love the camaraderie of running with a group, or even with only one or two other runners.  I have had some long and deep conversations with my spouse, or with a close friend over the course of many miles.   And I have greatly enjoyed the laughter and back-and-forth banter, the puns and the jokes, the political humor (never very serious) that spring from running with a larger group.  I vividly remember running down Smallwood Avenue several years ago, separated for some reason from the main group which was running down Harris Drive (one block south), and I could hear loud laughter and talking and shouting, the happy buzz of conversation, only one block away:  the wonderful sound of a group of runners absolutely having fun together.

Our running club is a friendly one with a presence on the internet as well as on the street most mornings.  Many visitors find our website and e-mail me, interested in finding a good route or hooking up with other runners to help with a long run for an upcoming marathon.  Our Saturday morning long run this morning was a good example.  First of all, a young woman had e-mailed me on Friday:  “I found your contact info through the Highlands Runners website. I am in town for a week and wanted to see if there were any areas you could recommend that would be good for running with a jogging stroller. Sidewalks or pathways are ideal so that I can keep the little one safe. Are there any specific areas nearby that you would recommend?”  So of course I told her about the “Patty Cake” route, designed several years ago by Morris Williams for Patty Campbell when her twins (now teen-agers) were in a stroller, and I invited her to run with us the following morning.  Jen turned out to be a charming young woman from Toronto, Canada, and she and her sweet little passenger Charlotte thoroughly enjoyed running with us (she quickly took the lead, stroller and all).   On the second loop, when she passed me, she told me how much she enjoyed meeting all of us and running in such a beautiful place.

Later in the same run, three or four of us met a runner going in the opposite direction and asked him to join us as we often do.  "Come run with us!" I will call out.  (We don't know any strangers out on the road!)  The runner took a U-turn, told us his name was Charles, and ended up running several miles with us.  Turns out we had run in some of the same races, and he and Morris knew some of the same runners in Atlanta.  This afternoon he e-mailed me and said, “Thank you for your hospitality on the run this morning. It is a great group of people. I look forward to running again next time I am in Highlands.”  Visiting runners are invariably interesting and friendly, and I have met a lot of very interesting people out on the road.  It is a rewarding experience to be ambassadors of good will - Running Ambassadors.

Running with Epictetus

I stumbled on this Greek Stoic philosopher recently, and so many of his pearls of wisdom seem to relate to my life in general these days and also to my running over the years.

“If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid.” 

In other words, be prepared for the world's reaction if you want to go your own way.  Want to run a marathon?  Be prepared for people to tell you how terrible that is for your body, how crazy you must be.  Want to keep running when you are in your 60s or 70s?  Be prepared to have people tell you that you will ruin your knees.  Want to buy a Mini Cooper convertible?  How reckless and irresponsible!  How foolish and stupid!

There will always those individuals, some of them well-meaning, many of them friends, who are prepared to tell you how to live your life.

I will always remember this great cartoon from The New Yorker from several years ago that hung in my office at the Town Hall for a long time.  It must have been about that time in my career when, I remember, I was often being told, "We've never done it that way before."

Ha!  I love this cartoon!!!  "You'll be sorry!" 





 

Oskar Blues 4-Mile Run

We had a wonderful weekend, Martha and I - the race went better for both of us than we had expected.  Clear blues skies, high cirrus clouds, and arrival in plenty of time for race-day registration.  From my upcoming newsletter:

Your humble editor and his wife drove over to Brevard to run this little gem of a race.  It has everything going for it:  a relaxed starting time of 11:00 a.m. (which means we did not have to leave Highlands until 8:30 a.m.), a USATF-certified 4-mile course just perfect for a new PR (if you’ve never run a 4-miler), a relatively flat and rural course along the Davidson River (well, there is one little hill in the second mile), chip timing and prompt results, and a free Oskar Blues beer at the finish line.  This was the second year we ran this race, and still not entirely recovered from injury, I was pleased to run a 42:17, with no walking breaks – a far cry from last year’s 38:22, but these days I take victory where I can find it.  And while not making excuses, this race does attract some fast runners despite that little hill; even if I had been in top condition I could not have come close to the first place finisher in my age group, who finished in 24 minutes and some change (that’s 60-69, folks!).  The overall winner crossed the line in a scorching 19:10.

This was Martha’s third race of the year, and hot from first-place finishes four weeks ago in Morehead City and two weeks ago in Fletcher, she was prepared to break 40 minutes if she could.  She ran a strong race, finishing in 39:17, and good enough to take another handsome first-place trophy – yes, that’s three races, three first place trophies.  So proud of her!

 

Martha mounts the podium for 1^st place

Yes, I am proud of her, and we celebrated at Dugan's Pub after the race, ran leisurely errands all day, then had a wonderful Japanese dinner at Sora, our newest favorite restaurant in Brevard.  After dinner we enjoyed The Kitchen Witches as planned.  

Isn't it great when you can run a strong race on a beautiful March day, along a wide river and past little farms, the aroma of hops and malts from a brewery wafting out into the finish area.  It's even better when you can make it into a Race Weekend, take in a good dinner and a theater, and sleep soundly knowing you have done your very best this day. 

Preparing for the Blues

. . . The Oskar Blues Brewery 4-Mile Run, that is.  We ran this race last year and discovered that it had a lot going for it:  a relaxed starting time (11:00 a.m.), a relatively level 4-miles route through rural Brevard, start and finish at a brewery, free beer at the finish line, and a very good food truck serving a hearty lunch at a time of day when it is greatly appreciated.

So today I am resting - "tapering," we runners like to say - before the race, just as I would be if it was a marathon or half-marathon.  Unlike two weeks ago, when I burned brush all afternoon the day before the Frostbite 5-K, I decided that a mere one-mile walk down the road would suffice to keep things loosened up.  This will be, after all, the third of three races spaced two weeks apart so far this year.  My recovery from injury seems to be going well, and at times this week I felt absolutely no pain below that right knee when I was running.  I expect that I will not better last year's time of 38:22 (a PR! - the great thing about racing unusual distances).  But it will be challenging and enjoyable as races always are, and we have decided to stay for dinner, take in a play at the Brevard Little Theater (The Kitchen Witches), and spend the night.

"If only I was in decent race shape," one of my running buddies exclaimed this week when told about our plans.  But what is decent race shape?  Do we ever stand at that perfect pinnacle of fitness at the starting line?  As our local Highlands billionaire Art Williams Jr. famously said (and wrote a book so titled):  "All You Can Do is All You Can Do, But All You Can Do is Enough!"  There is a limit to how much we can prepare yourselves.  After a certain point, on race day, we just have to wing it.

 

I Have Promises to Keep

This afternoon a light, lovely snow materialized, the kind that coats every surface and transforms the world into a winter scene from a Hasui print.  It was in the mid-30s, almost too warm to snow.  I was outside rigging up a way of hanging my new squirrel-proof bird feeder (knocked angrily to the ground the night before and contents gone), and had finally decided to string a long 20-ga. wire from tree to tree-house.  While I was wrapping the wire around the tree, I realized that silent white flakes were drifting down, speckling my vest, gently at first and then absolutely pouring.

All afternoon the snow continued to fall.  Martha cancelled her hair appointment and eased down the Walhalla Road, and just in time according to reports on Facebook.  So we watched from the windows as it piled up, turning that ghostly blue shade as evening came on.

Such a snow as this always reminds me of that enigmatic Frost poem, which at some point in my New England childhood I must have committed to memory.

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.