I just can't call myself a runner. To me, that's someone who runs marathons, or half marathons, or gets that "runners high" while they're in the act of it. These people are fit, taught, happy, and energetic. And accordingly, many, many of them are super duper annoying. However, I do run for exercise. Again, I'm not a runner, but it's become something that is part of who I am. And frankly, it's carried me through one of the tougher times of my adult life. I feel like I owe it some blog time. Maybe as a thank you, maybe as a reminder if I ever fall off the wagon completely how much it once meant to me. For whatever reason, this is my non-runners story.
In between then and now, my left foot got the best of me, and I had to have surgery to fix a shredded tibial tendon (though in the process, I actually got an arch for the first time in my life - yay!). Recovery from the surgery was rough though, and it took almost a year to get back to my routine. But once I did, I was happy again and decided to try and push myself to actually setting a goal and tracking progress. It was a relatively small goal actually, a 5k - 3.1 miles - and I got there, albeit slowly, averaging about 35-40 minutes to do it. Really, not a great time, but the point was I could do it and that was enough. Well, sort of. I had to admit, I was secretly jealous of my friends that were actual runners. Seeing them post pictures of their races on Facebook made me want to be them. And of course, they looked great. Did I mention the fit, taught, happy thing? I'd been psyching myself up to do an official race, any race would do. in the fall of 2013 I finally signed up for a Thanksgiving Day Turkey Trot. Race day came and....I chickened out, or is that turkey'd out, because it was so cold and I didn't know what to expect. And frankly, for unrelated reasons I was in a pretty bad mental state at the time too, so the whole thing just made me retreat in to my little corner. But hey, I'd made it to registration - that had to count for something.
2014 became my year. It was a year of transition for me in many ways, and I was forging new, uncharted territory in a lot of my life. Seemed like the time was right to try a race again. I decided one that wasn't a "real" race was the way to go, and that I'd do it with someone fun so that if I couldn't run it, I'd have fun anyway. Enter, the Run or Dye race. It. Was. AWESOME! I had a ball, got all sorts of colorful with the dye packs, and had a ton of laughs with my niece Heather who I forced to do it with me, and most importantly, I ran the whole thing. I didn't time myself, I didn't care, but it definitely got me motivated to try more.
I wanted to see if I could do 1 race a month until the weather got rough, which would have given me 5 or so. By the end of 2014 I'd done nine. Me, nine races. Nope, still wasn't fast, but I kept at it, and I did improve, eventually finishing in under 30 minutes which, too, was awesome. On my own, I was running longer distances too. The feeling of accomplishment was tremendous, I was surprised by delighted by the kudos and support by friends and family, was bonding with long lost friends who I reconnected through some of the race events, and had to admit, my clothes were fitting better without a whole lot of modification to my diet. SCORE! Bottom line, running gave me a lot of positivity at a time that otherwise might have been very dark. It saved me last year, and if I never run again I'll be forever grateful I did it.
 |
| My favorite race of 2014 - The "Run First, Wine Later" in New Hope, PA. 5k in 29:04 followed by a wine and food festival at the finish line. What's bad about that? |
Blogfully yours,
Julie
