I Ran Forever

As a runner, I have heard of people who run unbelievable distances. A marathon, 100 miles, even more. I have had a desire to run a marathon for a while, but the furthest I've ever run at one time is probably 4 miles. So last night, I was wondering, how far can I go? How far can I run until my body shuts down? I set out running at 8:30ish around the Lunsford trail (which is 1.9 miles), planning to run two laps.

I was feeling great, because I was taking my time and enjoying the run. I came to love the feeling of my feet pounding against the pavement, a pure physical enjoyment that I think most runners overlook while their iPods play in their ears. Oh yeah, that's something I should mention--I don't run with an iPod. I think using an iPod makes running a means to an end, not the end itself. So no music for me, just the sound of cars passing, people talking, and my heart pounding.

After two laps, I wondered, why not another one? So I ran another lap. By this time, I had come into a relationship with the Lunsford trail and its parts. The part on Campus Court I call The Straight-ful Dead, because it is a dead line all the way from the old theater to Ambler. Once you make the right turn, you're on the Ambling Judge, a twisting, short side of the run. You make it to University Park, and you're at the Landslide, the portion that runs all the way to College Drive, past the fountain, past the Bible and Business buildings, and past the WPAC. It gets its name from the mound of stacked but disorganized rocks at the beginning, but also because it contains the only hill on the run. I unkindly nicknamed this portion "The Bitch," because it plays mind games with you. You think you're almost done when you finish the Landslide, but no, you still have a long way to go. Thus, the Bitch. The next portion I haven't named yet, namely because I haven't come up with an appropriate, witty nickname. It's the part that runs by all the girl's dorms. This part is probably the easiest part of the run.

Anyway, back to yesterday. So I ran three laps, totally to roughly 6 miles, and I was feeling surprisingly strong. However, I experiencing pain in an awkward place because I had worn boxers, not spandex. So when I ran by Mabee, I dashed into my room, changed clothes, grabbed a quick spoonful of peanut butter and hit the road again. The peanut butter was important because the only other thing I had eaten all day was a sausage, egg, and cheese bagel from "Einstein's Bros.", and a caramel macchiato at 2pm. In hindsight, it probably would have been a good idea to eat something, but I didn't plan this running free for all, so I just had to deal with it.

While I was running, I would see people that I had seen on the earlier laps. For example, there was a group of three, a girl and two guys, who ran basically as long as I did. There was several couples who walked for a portion of my run, and there were a handful of loners, chugging along like I was. During the later laps, I wished I could see someone I knew, someone to cheer me on. I understood the importance of cheering people on the sidelines of marathons. It fuels in a way that food and Gatorade just can't.

On the fourth lap, the pain started. I began to feel slight discomfort in my knees, both on the insides and outsides. Also, I had hunger pains. But I kept going. I think it was at the end of this lap that I saw a guy in my Core class named Dylan who was preparing to run. I offered to run with him, until he took off at a blazing speed, propelled by his iPod, then I decided to let him go. No, it must have been the end of the 3rd lap. Oh well, not very important.

Lap 5 was alright, lap 6 less than, and on lap 7 I reached my breaking point. On the last three laps I found that the balls of my feet hurt so much that I couldn't run on the pavement anymore. I found comfort in the grass, but I made sure to watch my step because I knew if I stepped into a hole or even a sharp incline, I'd break something because my body was so fragile. I had to intentionally bend my legs so I wasn't standing straight up. And I found that relaxing my arms and letting them hang lower than normal saves energy.

So after 7 laps (roughly 13.3) miles, I called it quits. I was proud of myself, to say the least. However, the entire time I was running, I was asking God what He wanted to show me. That sounds weird, but let me explain. I'm reading "Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger" by Ronald Sider for Bible, and he talks frequently about prosperous people who think they achieved affluence on their own, without giving praise to God. I assumed that I could run this far for some purpose (although it is still unknown to me). So I made sure to recognize that I was running not on my own power, but for some purpose that is bigger than me.

Something else I realized, and probably the most important, was that when I run, I don't feel lonely. It was strange. I tried to bring up the most lonely thoughts I could think of, and nothing worked. It was as if I couldn't focus on the pain because my body was going through physical pain at the same time, and the physical pain trumped the emotional and mental pain. This revelation will probably be the one thing that brings me back to running. Whenever I feel utterly alone or sad, I'll just strap into my Vibram's and head out.

I took a half mile cool down walk and found that my knees hurt more when I wasn't running than when I was. And this was only the beginning of the pain. I went into the dorm and showered without much pain. Then I drove to Taco Bueno and got food, but I couldn't eat it. The moment I swallowed the first bite of the chicken quesadilla, a violent unsettling arose in my stomach. So I parked in a fury and ran into the restaurant's restroom. After ten minutes of pain, I emerged and drove back home, feeling as though I would pass out the entire way.

I made it up the stairs and into my room, but the food was no longer appetizing. So I told Mihir he could have it and flopped into bed. Looking back, the comfort I found that night in bed makes me more grateful for a bed than I ever have been. I was asleep within five minutes, when the stomach pains subsided slightly. The pain caused me to flash-back to the basketball camp when I decided to fast. However, I didn't regret this experience.

I woke up at four in the morning, feeling completely rested. Then I realized it was four in the morning and I couldn't do anything or go anywhere, so I heated up what was left of the quesadilla in the microwave. I took it out into the hall, walked around and wondered if I was really the only person awake, and then, when I had finished, headed back to bed.

As for today, going down stairs hurts pretty badly. But this running experience, this seeing how far I could go until I broke down, was worth any pain I endured. I learned about myself. I call this run the "Atlas Shrugged" run in my mind, because in the summer after my junior year, I decided to read that book for summer reading because it had over 1,000 pages. What reading that book did for me is that now, I measure every other book length against it, and it makes it seem short. I know I can read almost any other book because I've read one longer than it before. It's the same with this run. I will now be able to run up to 14 miles because I've done it before. It was worth it.