Things I Learned While I was NOT Running

These past two weeks have been a difficult period of time for me.  I have not been able to do any real work, other than puttering around the house, so I have watched in frustration as Martha has done the heavy lifting while cleaning out the garden shed, hauling trash to the landfill, and even gamely turning the soil in the garden beds by hand.  I have not been able to go to the gym or walk, so exercise has been limited (gingerly) to my morning Tai Chi.  And, worst of all, I have not been able to run.  Yes, this is the longest period that I have gone without running in nearly four decades, and now I know what it is like to be NOT running.

I met on Thursday with the surgeon who will be repairing my hernia, Dr. Robles, and liked him very much.  I had hoped unrealistically that he would schedule the surgery for the following morning, but it will not be until the Monday after Mother's Day, May 13.  But at least I have a date circled on the calendar now after which, according to the doctor, I may resume walking almost the next day.   He also assured me that all the abdominal exercises I do, including planks and sit-ups every morning, has had no effect on preventing a hernia. "It's just wear and tear," he said with a slight accent. "It's like losing your hair."  That made me feel somewhat better. An injury that is not my fault is something I don't think I have ever experienced.

"I have a friend who is a marathon runner," he told me.  "I tell him, running is for dogs, not for men!"  As for the timetable for resuming this questionable activity that is the foundation of my fitness, the anchor in my life - the very subject, after all, of this blog - that will depend upon the progress I make after surgery.  I can hardly wait.

These days of limited exertion are reminding me of the many reasons why I am a runner.  First and foremost, I seem to have little or no energy these days.  Non-runners fail to understand that running energizes the body, which is designed to be in motion, rather than the opposite.  When I was working long days in my demanding career, that afternoon run at 4:30 p.m. is what kept me going through the long evening board meetings.  "Is this the way most 70-year-old men feel?" I asked last week.

Another thing I have to be careful about is what I eat.  Our friend Jim Askew, who passed away almost a year ago, once famously said when interviewed by the Asheville Citizen-Times after a race we had both run, "I run so I can eat!"  And that is very true.  The calories burned while running are almost as important as the elevated metabolism that keeps those calories cooking all day long; during training for a marathon or half-marathon, they burn away like a lump of butter on a hot griddle.  Fortunately my weight has remained constant.  Martha, too, who has a big race coming up tomorrow morning, has been disciplined about what we both are eating.

And then there is the frustration of not being able to do that hard physical work that I enjoy so much:  turning the garden, mowing the lawn, mixing mortar, building and clearing and lifting.  Martha has been a great help in this, not only in taking the initiative but in dissuading me from doing more than I should.  I am thankful that she is fit enough to be able to this work.  I had to call upon my friend Dale, who retired from his job with the Town a year ago, to mow the knee-high grass, however, which might have clogged our mower.  "Be sure and tell him you have a hernia," Martha said, "So he won't think you just don't want to do it!"  I did, and he thought that was as funny as I did.

And why is it that I have taken every opportunity to drive the Mini up to Town, preferably with the top down, and often two or three times a day this week?  Friday, I partially opened the top on the way up the Walhalla Road and watched in awe as a very big bird, owl or hawk, silently winged its way overhead, going around the same curves I was driving, 20 feet overhead.  I have been missing the out-of-doors, the sunshine and the wind in my face and the sensation of the road unwinding under my feet . . . or my wheels.

It is a beautiful time of year, though, perhaps the most beautiful other than in fall when the leaves are all on fire with color; the world is suddenly so green, every variation of green, and the flowers are blooming everywhere.  We have been able to eat dinner at our little table on the deck most nights.  So that is a great balm for me in this frustrating time of inactivity.  Martha has planted herbs and flowers all around, and we have already begun to use the shiny, pungent basil leaves in pasta sauces.

Among our friends and neighbors, we know so many who are struggling with injuries and illness far more serious than a mere hernia.  They have not only undergone multiple surgeries, but have felt that withering onslaught of radiation and chemotherapy and the fatigue it causes.  They struggle, some of them, with hopeless diagnoses.  So I am keeping this all in perspective.  "Gratitude." I wrote that single word on our little blackboard in the kitchen last week.  I am grateful for our good health and for this good life and for the lessons that this little bump in the road are teaching me.  

This morning it was Martha's turn to write on the blackboard, and this is what she wrote.