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May 28, 2006
Uninspired
In a way, I'm glad that running-blogs.com has been having technical difficulties, because I've felt wholly uninspired to write. This week has been mightily exhausting from a running persepctive. I don't know why it's so danged painful to get back up to 50 miles a week. I feel like a weak little schmuck just shuffling my way through runs with tired, flat legs, huffing and puffing much more than I should be.
This week was 52 miles, including a 12 mile long(er) run, a 10K race run as a workout, 7 runs in 6 days, 1 road bike ride, and 1 day of rest. It's humbling to run stuff that seemed easy 6 weeks ago, and to have it feel so difficult now.
The 10K race was entertaining and somewhat ridiculous. The town's streets were literally flooded ankle-deep and it was pouring rain the whole time. The temperature hovered a few degrees above freezing during the race. I got so cold, even while racing, that I had to ask an acquaintance to untie my shoelaces at the end because my hands were frozen. I climbed in my car, shed off all my clothes, and sat in front of the heater blue-lipped and in a full-body shiver for a while. I ran pathetically, but that was to be expected after contining to ramp up my miles and feeling like tired poo all week. My goal was to run at half-marathon pace, but I didn't even sustain that. Part of it was Noah's flood with all the water and debris in the streets, but most of it was my lack of fitness. Somehow, though, I still managed to win, but I think that was because the weather was so foul that most people were still curled up warm in bed.
This entry is engulfed by self-degredation of one kind or another. Though this week was a little disappointing, I'm not going to sweat it at all. I'm going to gut it out this feeling of fatigue because it's bound to feel easier in a few more weeks.
Posted by Meghan at 12:33 PM | Comments (5)
May 22, 2006
Dear Mother Nature,
You may not know this, but when I am working, my life is very busy. Here is my daily schedule, barring any overtime for emergencies:
12am-6am. Working
6am- (hopefully) 2pm. Sleeping
2pm-2:30pm. Eating and drinking coffee
2:30pm-5pm. Any number of activities including running, hiking, biking, homework, chores around the house, socializing, etc.
5pm-6pm. Cooking and getting ready to work
6pm-12am. Working
You see? My life is truly simplified during my work weeks. And, do you also notice that the window in which I can run and/or otherwise workout is pretty limited, that 2:30pm-5pm window? So, I was wondering if you could refrain from doing that afternoon thunderstorm deluge thing you love to do in the summertime during my little window of opportunity? Not that I mind the rain, that feels kind of nice, but the lightning! Well, I live kind of high up there on the hill and don't much like to be all among the lightning and stuff.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Meghan
I got unmercifully caught in a thunderstorm today! I hate lightning. Hate it. With a passion. It stems back to a close encounter I had with lightning on a mountain called Crown Mountain in Texas years ago. I woke up at 2 pm and surmised that weather was coming, so I would wait to run. But the weather lingered and I lingered, and finally barrelled out there at a break in the action. And I still got caught in the weather. I just ran right through it, with the lightning and all. I was wigging out and my dog was wigging out and, in general, it wasn't a pleasant situation. But, alas, I ran 6 miles and avoided serving as Mother Nature's electrical conductor. I really wish I could make a deal with her, though.
Posted by Meghan at 7:29 PM | Comments (1)
May 21, 2006
A Somewhat Organized Outpouring of Random Thoughts
As promised, this entry will touch upon topics such as my backpacking trip and a silly racing decision I made, among a long list of other things that are pouring forth from my brain.
1) Escaping into Yellowstone's backcountry for an overnight was plausibly a required activity for my sanity and general well-being. I was sinking into a case of general lethargy, malaise, and "I only want to do what I want to do" fuzz, and it buoyed me back up again.
When one goes out hiking with one or more other people, the group must decide whether a hike will be a destination hike or a discovery hike prior to departing. The distinction is simple, a destination hike is when you're hiking (generally a longer distance) for the purpose of getting to a place (ie: a lake, a cabin, a peak) and a discovery hike is when the journey (generally a shorter distance) and all the things you see along the way (ie: wildflowers, butterflies, unknown tree species) is the focus of the trip. My friend and I decided that this was to be a short discovery hike to an overnight campsite.
We hiked about 4.5-ish miles into the Hellroaring Creek drainage, and then walked upstream to a wide, green meadow at the confluence of a smaller creek called Coyote Creek with Hellroaring Creek. Along the way, we stopped to watch some bison graze (That's not too interesting, they don't do much!) and we saw lots of wildflowers. The lupines are just now sprouting, so it'll be a few weeks before the hillsides are covered with this quintessential mountain flower. The other interesting thing we found was a 6-point winter kill elk. My more knowledgeable hiking companion said this was likely a wolf pack kill. All that was left was its skeleton and antlers, and, though some might find it kind of gross to look at, I was intrigued. The antlers in particular were awesome.
Both Hellroaring and Coyote Creeks were running hard, fast, and loud with snowmelt water, such that the sounds of the water drowned out any other natural noises in the meadow where we camped. I didn't mind, though, as the power of nature evidenced by these creeks was impressive. The weather was outstanding, probably around 75 degrees and sunny both days. I question whether it was colder than 45 degrees overnight, it felt almost too warm while snuggled into my sleeping bag!
Since the distance was short, we decided to bring several things to make this trip luxurious, such as good food, good wine, and a good book. Before we left, we had made pesto sauce and froze it into a ziplock to bring, and we had toasted some pine nuts to bring as well. We each brought a book, so that we could lay next to the creek, reading and relaxing.
We arrived to our campsite mid-afternoon and set up camp. In bear country, they say that your camp should form a triangle. You should set up your tent on one corner of the triangle, cook on another corner, hang your food in a tree on the last corner, and each side of the triangle should be 100 yards long. This took a bit of organizing, and I felt like I needed a math expert to help me figure it out. Kidding, but concentration was required.
The rest of the day was spent in total, uninterrupted relaxation. We basked on some rocks overlooking the creek, explored up and down the smaller Coyote Creek, talked, explored the nooks and crannies of the meadow, and sat quietly watching the world go by (You know, the natural world, hawks in the air, sticks and branches in the water, that sort of stuff.). Eventually, we settled onto the rocks above the creek, ate cheese tortellini with pesto sauce and pine nuts, drank wine, and had dried fruit for dessert. The evening light lasted so long, we could see easily until after 10 pm!
In the morning, the meadow's grass was cool and slightly damp with dew and it felt so good to lay in it when the sun came over the hill! Sometimes, when I let my dog out in the morning, she gets down and rolls in the grass in my yard. I always thought it was silly, but now I understand why she does it. We climbed up onto our token rock pile again for tea and breakfast, more simple, but still great fare. I felt like a queen!
The hike out was a bit more arduous, climbing up some switchbacks out of the Hellroaring Creek drainage. But the distance was short and our packs were lighter and we were at the trailhead way too fast. I didn't want to be back in the frontcountry and back to my regular life so soon! However, this peaceful, albeit brief, respite was exactly what I needed to find calmness, motivation, and a feeling of normalcy, things that had been eluding me.
2) My original goal race for the spring was a half marathon on the first weekend in June. I had even talked a far away friend into traveling to my general geographic area to race this and to just hang out for the weekend. Well, I'm not in shape for racing a half, but my friend is still coming to race and hang out that weekend. Fine, fine, I'll go. However, let me state here that I'm not going to race it (and you all better hold me to that statement), I'm going to "fun run" it. No stupid decisions at the toe-the-line moment or when I see women take off, no racing.
3) I haven't bantered much recently about school. Yesterday I turned in my horribly belated last assignments of the semester. They were due 2 weeks ago. I haven't heard from my professors lately, so I hope that they'll still grade them. With the completion of these assignments and this semester, thus finishes my poor decision to work full time and go to graduate school full time. While I've known that this was a bad decision for 2 years now, I followed through with it (My Dad always said, and I have no idea where this comes from, "If you're going to be a clam digger, be a good one." I think it means that, in whatever random thing you decide to do, make sure you do your best at it.). Completing this semester also means that I've finished all the classes I need for a Master's degree. Now, the remaining work is a thesis, which is a large project in itself, but at least it won't be full time schoolwork. I feel like I should be more excited about this juncture in my graduate school career, but mostly I feel only relief.
4) My running. I'm desperately trying to acclimatize to the sudden onslaught of heat. Here at 6300 feet, the temperatures have crept steadily to 80 degrees for the last week. Below me, where I usually do workouts and long runs, temperatures are in the upper 80s. I've got to get used to that again. I felt like I was melting when I ran 8 miles today at 88 degrees. Aside from the weather, my running is starting to get back to where it was. After a 2.5-ish week hiatus from any decent mileage, I wrapped up a low 40s mileage week this week (and some decent cross-training), and I'm hoping I'll see 50 again next week with a longer run and a workout (and some more decent cross-training). Then, I'll feel like a runner again.
5) Other people's running. I have to decide in the next few weeks whether I'm going to coach high school cross country again. I'm having a hard time making this decision. I'm pretty sure that I'll do it, even though it's difficult to do while working 12 hour shifts in emergency services, but oh well. It's just too much fun. And the kids are great. And they are fine runners. And, and, and.
Ok, that's it, novella of random thoughts finis.
Posted by Meghan at 3:08 PM | Comments (2)
May 20, 2006
Bricking It
'Tis the season for cross-training. It's so beautiful here in Yellowstone National Park that I think one would have to duct tape me to my couch to get me to stay inside. Today it was a gorgeous 80 or so degrees. I can't ask for anything more.
In the early afternoon, I road biked to Swan Lake Flats from my house. It's all a windy, curvy, decent grade uphill, through a series of places with funny names like the Lower and Upper Terraces (These are hot springs and their associated delicate calcium carbonate terraces featured in a rainbow of colors.), the Hoodoos (The Hoodoos is a huge boulder field below a big cliff. The road winds through the boulder field and it's all surreal and kind of creepy in there.), the Golden Gate (Here, the road is attached to a cliff face, I'm not really sure how, it's kind of a bridge, and it crawls through a golden rocked canyon complete with a waterfall.), to Swan Lake Flats (Appropriately named for a lake often populated by nesting swans in the summer.). On the way out, uphill and into a pretty staunch headwind, was a challenge in keeping oneself just under that redlining threshold and right at that feeling where you're giving it about all you've got. On the way down, with the wind, was like some sort of adrenaline junkie's heaven. Near the bottom, where the downhill is less steep, there's a sign that tells you how fast you're going, and it read 42 mph when I went by (The car in front of me read 36 mph going by the same sign.). I wonder how fast I was going up in the steeper stuff. This ride was about 65 minutes long, and I can't recall the mileage.
Then, after a bit of a break, I went for a run, making this afternoon an unintentional brick workout. I kind of liken running after road biking to trying to cool down after a short, fast race. Your legs are all jelly-like and you know they're moving under you, but you can't particularly feel them. And you don't have much control over them, so you can't get them to do much else other than to move forward at a moderate pace. I ran 5 miles.
And now, I go to work. 12 hours of night shifting it. The park is busy, full of tourists who make my job hectic, exciting, and exhausting. The summer season is assuredly here, from both a play and work perspective. And I'm thrilled.
Tomorrow: a review of my first backpacking trip of the summer in Yellowstone, and the details of the somewhat idiotic racing decision that I've made.
Posted by Meghan at 4:59 PM | Comments (1)
May 18, 2006
Sad Day
I know I said I would try to focus this blog back to running and adventuring in Yellowstone National Park, which is its main purpose, but I'm taking a minute digression here.
It's a sad day today, as today would have been my Dad's 61st birthday. For some reason, this is hitting me pretty hard. There are other things that have been really sad as well, so I'm not sure why I'm reacting this way.
It was really sad to get that first staticky, almost unreadable, panicked phone call from my mother in Ecuador. It was really sad when the reality of my Dad's death sunk in beyond a superficial, still intangible level. It was really sad to sit down with my mentally disabled brother to tell him what had happened in a way that he could understand. It was really sad to see my typically amazingly strong mother significantly reduced by a horribly traumatic experience. It was really sad to see the hundreds and hundreds of family and friends that my Dad touched feeling so affected by his death. It was really sad when I helped bear my Dad's flag-draped casket to its grave.
For some reason, today is equally sad.
I have a lot to write about, running and adventure-related. I went on a backpacking trip in Yellowstone, which was marvelous. I've been running well, and that's equally marvelous. I think I'll save all that stuff for another day, though.
Posted by Meghan at 9:32 AM | Comments (3)
May 15, 2006
Griz!
Perhaps I haven't mentioned a particular friend that I hike with here in Yellowstone. He has a goal of hiking all of the park's 1000+ miles of trail in a short time frame. We're talking every single little mile of trail. He's also an outstanding endurance athlete, running half marathons and other longer distance races like I would nonchalantly take an evening walk around the block. So, putting these 2 interests together, he designs crazy Yellowstone hikes. Every hike is at least 20 miles long, regardless of terrain and remoteness. Last year, we did a most crazy single day hike in which we traversed an entire mountain range in 1 day. The details are still clouded by the exhaustion I felt, but I recall several mountain passes, beginning our hike at dawn and ending at dark (on a long summer day in July), and eating a huge amount of pizza afterwards. In any case, hiking with him always brings hikes into the category of epic.
On yesterday's hike, which easily makes it into the epic category for several reasons, I saw my first griz of the year! Okay, admittedly, it was about a 1/2 mile away, but it was a grizzly! It was foraging on a green, sagebrush hillside on one side of a creek called Slough Creek. Happily, I was on the other side of the creek. It was a big male, and you could see it knock aside and pull up big bushes as if brushing a fly away. We had seen its tracks dried in mud, meandering up and down the trail for a good bit. We knew it was good griz habitat. We hiked out and back on this trail, and the griz eluded us until we were on our way back. What a treat!
Yesterday's hike begain as a 19 mile out-and-back hike (I was a little suspect before we went out because the distance seemed short by my friend's standards. This should have been my first clue.) along a trail called the Slough Creek Trail in Yellowstone. Slough Creek is actually a pretty wide creek whose headwaters are a decent distance outside of Yellowstone National Park. The creek meanders slowly through a wide canyon, flanked on both sides by tall mountains. At this time of year, one can still see feet and feet of snowpack on those mountains. Slough Creek and its associated wide canyon is a paradise for wildlife, hikers, fishermen, and mosquitoes. Luckily, it's too early for both the fisherman and mosquitoes, so we shared this wilderness only with wildlife.
It was supposed to be an easy, flat, fast 19 miles, and it was. The 9.5-ish miles out to our turnaround point went quick, we were there in no time. I hadn't packed a ton of water or food, because I know that we always hike steadily when we're out together, and this 19 miles would fly by. As we sat in the shade of our destination cabin eating lunch, my hiking partner encouraged us to push on another 3 miles to the park's boundary with the Gallatin National Forest. I said sure, why not? This extra 6 miles roundtrip, though it added 6 more miles on fatiguing legs, proved fruitful as we spotted a young male moose along the way. He was standing in Slough Creek grazing on greenery. When he directed his attention to us, you could see his tiny velvety nubs of antlers just beginning to grow. He's probably just a year old now.
In 25 miles of hiking, the animals spotted were abundant: 2 bald eagles, several sandhill crane pairs, 1 coyote (Notably, the coyote was chasing around 2 sandhill cranes, presumably trying to get to their nest. We watched the huge sandhill cranes successfully chase off the coyote.), 1 moose, many bison and elk, 1 grizzly, 1 osprey, and zillions of groud squirrels (These are the same kinds of ground squirrels that caused me earlier duress while trying to sleep. Their vocalizations are ridiculous. We observed some interesting behavior in the squirrels we saw in this area. One watch guard for a particular area of squirrel holes climbs up into the top of a sagebrush, stands on its back legs, and keeps watch. I took some pretty funny pictures of squirrels in sagebrush, I was amused!), among other things I might be forgetting.
It was a long 25 miles, no doubt. Additionally, it was also a warm and sunny day. About 5 miles from the end, out of food and rationing my water, I began to suffer a little low blood sugar moment. I layed down in the shade to rest for a few minutes. When I opened my eyes, my friend was holding out a Pop Tart for me to eat. I know what Pop Tarts are, but I've never eaten one. This Pop Tart was cinnamon-flavored and so sweet with sugar. My friend ate one, too, and those simple sugars went to work quickly. We hiked those last 5 miles very quickly, and the next thing I knew, we were back at the trailhead.
I'm always stiff and sore after these hikes in places that running never makes me sore. I gimp around a bit, and run only easy miles the following day. What amazes me is that my friend will do 2 of these crazy hikes in 1 weekend, back-to-back! I guess it's good that he has a plethora of hiking partners, so that when he wears one out on one day, he has another person to hike with the next day. It sure humbles me!
And so, I'll be reduced to a few slow, stiff miles of shuffling/jogging today, and I know I'll wait until the cool of the evening to go out. I applied sunscreen prolifically yesterday, but apparently I missed 3 key spots, an area on the back of my neck, the edge of 1 shoulder, as well as the backs of my knees. I need no more sun today, so I can nurse these sunburned spots!
This morning's wildlife spotting: A mother black bear and her single cub. This is a different set of bears than those I mentioned earlier this week. The mother black bear is small and probably young. Her cub is very light colored, almost a cinnamon color. This is interesting because there is a huge, male black bear who lives in this general area who's known both for his cinnamon color and his frequent appearance with many, many female black bears. Every year, there are always several cinnamon-colored cubs around, and we humans certainly know who their father is! This sow and cub were walking around in a shady, wooded area, and they were almost fully camouflaged. Only once in a while could I spot the cub's light-colored fur flash in and out of the sun. Mother bear was almost playing with her cub, swatting at it playfully when the baby bear grabbed her. They looked like they were having fun!
Tomorrow: An overnight into the backcountry, I think. The weather continues to promise another set of beautiful days. Though we'll be carrying overnight packs, the distance is shorter, so I don't expect to be reduced to exhaustion. Just a nice overnight trip into a beautiful backcountry area.
And a final note, Corrado and Jeff wrote really nice comments on my last entry, so I just wanted to shout out a big thank you! So, THANK YOU!
Posted by Meghan at 1:00 PM | Comments (3)
May 13, 2006
This Entry is about Running
Lest I scare away my small but faithful reading audience, I'll conclude for the meantime my ramblings about my recent entry into half-orphandom, and return to writing about running. I can't promise I won't digress (or progress?) towards those topics again, though, as it's difficult to avoid thinking about that which is now central to my life.
With reference to running, I'm massively out of shape. I spent about 12 days at sea level. In that time, I rarely exercised. I experienced tremendous mental stress. I didn't eat enough. I averaged about 4 to 5 hours of sleep each night. I spent all of my time managing logisitcs and taking care of those around me. In short, I took poor care of myself while trying to do my best for others. Now it's time to focus on all of the things that make me feel healthy.
Yesterday, I ran 6 miles yesterday on a beautiful, sunny afternoon. The temperature was over 70 degrees and the breeze was nil. I ran on the black cinders of the Gardiner railroad bed trail. It felt hot. This was my first attempt since I've been running again to run something more than an easy run. I did 1.5 miles easy, 3 miles steady, and 1.5 miles easy. 3 miles of steady running up here at elevation, in a little heat? Good lord, I thought I would die! But I got through it, shaky-legged and all.
Usually, when you're out of shape, you've been there a while. You know what out of shape feels like, and you've almost forgotten what being in good shape feels like. For me, I know I was very recently in decent shape. I can closely recall how easy and good it all felt. I know I haven't lost that fitness permanently. I'm aware that if I continue to eat well, get long nights of sleep, and run consistently, it will come back as quickly as I lost it.
Sadly, I've now missed 2 races I was planning to run. 2 weeks ago, I was registering for a race when I got the bad news. I'm missing a race today as well, deciding not to go because I don't feel much like a good runner at the moment.
Posted by Meghan at 11:16 AM | Comments (2)
May 12, 2006
Just a Cycle
In the foggy chill of the early morning, before the sun could climb over the eastern mountains, among the dew-dropped green grass, in a heavy silence pierced only by an occasional bird-chirp, I watched a mother black bear and her two brand-new cubs forage and frolic. I happened upon them while out on an early morning drive, and so I pulled over, climbed up on the hood of my truck, sipped coffee from a thermos, and watched the bears' morning unfold. Mother bear was wholly focused on food consumption, her head disappeared into the tall green grass as she fed. She's probably still underweight from her winter hibernation and supporting the needs of her 2 new munchkins. The babies were lost in bear play games. One baby waged a sneak attack on the other, creeping up silently and pouncing from behind. Then the 2 tumbled and rolled in the grass. Next, one ran full speed towards a dead tree and climbed about 20 feet up into it with remarkable skill and fluidity. Through binoculars, the babies' faces were brown and the black fur of the rest of their bodies was so fuzzy you wonder where fuzz stops and body begins.
As I watched the bears on the hillside, I reflected on the last few weeks of my life. A few weeks ago, I saw my first bear of the season, walking sleepily and slowly, as if just awoken from its winter slumber. The last few days have been filled with baby bison. Baby bison are dropping from their mothers everywhere. Once born, they stand and walk immediately, staying with mom, and fearful of predators. Within a few days, they are like little bucking broncos, playing in the fields. These last days have also been filled with flowers, blooming wildflowers everywhere. There are tiny white ones, they and their leaves form an impenetrable carpet over the ground. There were those beautiful purple daisies that close up safely during the hottest part of the day. There were also the dainty, bell-shaped yellow flowers, fluttering carefully in the morning breeze. The tree in front of my house has finally started to bud. The buds are tiny but they glow bright green as the leaves begin to unfurl. What I'm trying to say is that there is new life everywhere around me right now.
The last few weeks of my life, though, have also been surrounded by death. I won't argue here whether I think that my Dad's death was too soon, too unexpected, too sad. What I do know is that it's easy to get lost in such a singularly personal tragedy, and forget that life is just a great big cycle. People, other animals, and plants are born and die every day, births and deaths numbering in the millions, perhaps? Thus, death is as natural as life, and there is great peace to be found in this thought. The baby bears on the hillside this morning, the bucking young bison in the field yesterday, the carpets of white flowers, my Dad's death, all of these things are part of that cycle.
Posted by Meghan at 11:28 AM | Comments (2)
May 11, 2006
My First Marathon
I decided I wanted to run a marathon when I was 18. My mother was strictly against it, "You're still growing! You're going to break yourself in half! You could die!" None of us knew anything about marathoning, including me. However, I knew that I wasn't going to die, though, so I decided to do it. My mother refused to come to the marathon, because she was too scared to watch me run. So, my dad made the 8 hour road trip alone from Minnesota to Illinois to watch me race.
He and I came up with a plan for him to see me 3 times along the course and at the finish line. My dad was never stellar at driving in unfamiliar places and following maps, so I thought it was a distinct possibility that he would get lost and I wouldn't see him along the course at all. I asked him to have 3 things ready for me each time I saw him along the course: 1) chapstick, 2) orange slices, and 3) kleenex (Over the years, we laughed about my item choices because that was back when I refused to wear running shorts with little pockets that could hold things like chapstick, and when I still cared about whether my nose was running when I was racing. By the way, orange slices are still the bomb.).
I ended up seeing my dad along the course and at the finish line, as we had planned. I still have a vision in my head of my dad standing on the side of the road, holding out my various requests, talking on a big, primitive version of a cell phone to my mother, assuring her that I hadn't yet died, and smiling widely and proudly.
On this course, I experienced crashing-and-burning for the first time, starting out way too fast and shuffling the last several miles. Somewhere around mile 21, my dad had parked himself in a low spot, where he could see me come down one hill and go up the next. As I ran down the hill, I could see both my dad at the bottom and the next hill ahead. I recall thinking that I could not walk up the next hill, even though I wanted to so badly, because I wanted my dad to be proud. I gritted my teeth and smiled at him when I went by, and then continued painfully up the hill.
You should see the finish line picture of me. It's ridiculously funny. I sprinted from the point at which I could see the finish line all the way through. I don't know how far it was, but it felt like an eternity of oxygen deprivation and leg pain. When I finally finished, I felt like death had warmed over me. Apparently, I looked like it, too, judging by the photo. I had wanted to finish fast and strong, so that my dad would be proud.
In the end, he was proud. He also called me out on all of my misjudgements in that race, to help me learn from the experience. He scolded me for running too fast in the beginning miles. He told me he knew how pained I was when I went I went by at mile 21, but how he thought I was tough for gutting it out. He laughed with me about my final anaerobic sprint to the finish, and asked me if I was ever going to do that again in a marathon (I said maybe.). But, he also praised me up and down for finishing and for doing my best, given that I had run a race I knew nothing about.
I won a very silly looking engraved beer pint glass-type thing for finishing first in my age group. At 18, I only had a vague idea of what one would use this glass for, and so the accompanying stuff was much more meaningful to me. Even though it was kind of silly, I saved the glass, but packed it away in a box. In my recent moves, I rediscovered the glass, and put it in a kitchen cabinet. I returned home to Yellowstone yesterday evening. When I got home, I put the glass in the freezer and went out for a short run through a beautiful Yellowstone spring evening. After I finished, I drank a beer out of my frosty pint glass and thought about my dad. This may seem a little strange and counterintuitive to run and drink in straight succession, but I didn't much care. It made me smile about my dad.
Posted by Meghan at 10:45 AM | Comments (7)
May 8, 2006
Thank You
To all of you who responded to my last blog entry, thank you. The outpouring of kindness and thoughtfulness from everyone has been most buoying in this time.
I think I'll be back to blogging. I'm not sure how inspiring or thoughtful my entries will be, but I hope they don't sound as numb and sterile as my brain feels right now. Additionally, I haven't been running much, so there isn't much running to write about, either. Mostly I'm coming back for the routine and the normalcy that it will help bring to my life. In the whole running blog sphere, I write about running and I read other people's accounts of running. This is a fine little hobby that I quite enjoy. Through it, others' writings about running inspire me, writing about my own running is motivating, and interacting with other runners gives me new knowledge about the sport. Further, in my family, my dad was my biggest running supporter, so I think he'd want me to get back to running and blogging. Finally, at the moment, I'm in desperate need of bits of routine and normalcy to thread through my otherwise chaotic life.
Running for me is just one aspect of the adventurous life that I strive to live. Through the sport, I get to run and race in some amazing places and meet some incredible people along the way. Beyond this, it's a personal adventure of sorts as well, setting and striving towards goals. My dad was also a fairly adventurous character, I think he's responsible for at least part of my adventurous spirit. After all, he died on the Galapagos Islands in South America while on his last adventure! I know that my dad would want me to continue to live life as an adventure, in whatever way I see fit.
With that, I think I'll have a mini-adventure and attempt to run through suburban St. Paul, MN, where I am currently at home with my family. This country girl finds city traffic quite intimidating! I'm afraid also that the last 12 days of little to no exercise has left me feeling massively out of shape, so running at all should be an adventure in itself.
Posted by Meghan at 10:40 AM | Comments (8)