Running has been my everyday companion. Running has been something I could always count on, like an old friend. Running was in my life before I became a lawyer, before Jude, before J.P. and Joe and before bits and pieces of my mom's memory began to steal away like regulars quietly leaving a bar, one by one, before closing time.
Often time, I planned my schedule around running. Go to bed early, so I can get up at 5:30 a.m. and go for a run. Eat light at dinner, get the kids to bed so I can go for a run. Take my running clothes to St. Patrick on Sunday morning, so I can run home. Get the boys down for a nap on Saturday afternoon, so I get a run in. Run early on the morning of my birthday, then meet Jude and the boys for breakfast at Bongo Java (one of my favorite birthday memories).
The desire to run or, more accurately, the need to run has been as constant as my heartbeat. Ever present.
Running has been something I'm good at, if that makes sense. After putting in the weekly mileage for more than two decades - admittedly less so since Joe was born almost five years ago - going out and running three or four miles at an brisk pace has been like a walk in the park for me. Effortless. Miles and miles, stacked up like bricks until I had built my personal Great Wall of Miles.
Now, it seems, the Wall is in danger of crumbling. When I broke my left big toe two months ago, the doctors told me to take four to six weeks off. To be safe and to avoid reinjuring my toe or placing my future running ability in jeopardy, I took the full six weeks off. I thought that was the best thing to do.
I ran last night for, I guess, the third or fourth time since I was injured. It's the first time I ran three miles. The good news is my toe felt fine. No soreness, no lingering problems. Range of motion isn't what it was and I don't know if that will come back, but still, I can run. The bad news is running three miles was hard. Harder than it's been in 20 + years. I wan't running particularly fast, either, probably an 8:45 pace. Easy in the old days but a struggle for sure now.
When I broke my toe and got the news that I couldn't run for four to six weeks, I thought I would take the time off to let my body heal. Not just my toe, but my entire body. I also thought I had built up enough of a base of mileage over the years - my Great Wall of Miles - that picking up where I left off and running three, four or five miles would be easy. What I didn't anticipate is that for the first time in, well, forever, running would hard and would require effort.
What I really didn't anticipate is that I would have to start all over again. My Great Wall of Miles, it seems, has crumbled and fallen into a state of disrepair. It occurs to me that over the years the Wall, such as it were, has been a bulwark against feelings of anxiety, stress, sadness and depression. As I've written in this space before, I've run through tears caused by a failed marriage, the death of a close friend's teenage daughter and my mom's deteriorating mental and physical. I've composed wedding toasts and eulogies during runs. Most of all, I've run to clear my mind, to give me some "head space," so to speak.
What scares me the most, I think, is that my desire to run seems to have ebbed. The rational side of my brain realizes that knowing a routine run is going to be harder leaves me discouraged and more inclined to stop by Edley's and have a beer or two after work or after the boys are in bed, as opposed to clearing the deck for night run. I've got to fight through that, though, and start rebuilding the Wall again - my Wall - because I need it in my life.
I will do it. I have to.
A runner, in happier times.
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