I don't run much. By much, I mean ever. My pop used to joke (when comparing me to my slimmer and more fleet-footed brother) that I wasn't built to run far, just ten yards and through a brick wall. He's right, too. I'm pudgy at best, but with broad bulky shoulders, a huge squarish head, and tiny little legs. Exactly the wrong size and shape to run anywhere at all. Add to this the fact that my football playing days are a good eight years behind me now, and I'm up to a pack a day of Marlboro Blend No. 27s, and you've got a textbook example of someone who shouldn't be anywhere near an 8k "race" at 9 in the morning on Thanksgiving day.
Obviously I wouldn't be telling you this story if that wasn't exactly where I found myself on Thursday, in a huddled mass of people under the morning sun preparing to run around the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. The Remix was with me, of course, since she instigated this whole thing, bright eyed and flush with the prospect of pounding 4.9 miles of pavement before lunchtime.
We somehow managed to park a solid mile away from the registration area, which meant I was already tired and ready for a cigarette by the time I got to the table. I went to the huge bulletin boards to find our numbers, and was surprised to find my name unironically placed amongst the others, as if I belonged. We stood in line for a good ten minutes, listening to people younger and spryer than I compare past times and issue challenges. This is something I never liked about the runners I've known in the past--with the exception of the Remix, and a couple other friends who managed to both run and not talk about running at every break in the conversation, most people I know who own a pair of running shoes feel the need to discuss it with you at every interval. One of my college buddies married a "runner," who will still tell you about the absolute rush of hitting the street at 5am on a December morning as she pops twinkies in her mouth like tic tacs. Ok, we get it. You ran a marathon once. You're the size of a Volkswagen now, isn't it time to let it go already?
I was dismayed to discover that the entry fee for this event included the cost of renting a tiny piece of plastic which through some sort of advanced ESP technology will enable the organizers to publish online exactly how out of shape I am for all the world to see. Apparently the humiliation of trying to run is not enough, they have to time me, too. I tied my little plastic tattle-tale to my shoe and stood cracking my knuckles while I watched the people around me contort themselves into all sorts of positions in the interests of stretching.
The people watching was great, though. Middle-aged men with expensive Nike and adidas track jackets and spandex pants; soccer moms in ear-warmers, faces set in their best imitation of grim determination; parents with strollers, trying desperately to explain to their kids why it will be fun to get pushed over a bumpy trail for an hour when they could be on a swingset somewhere. Directly in front of us was a man dressed like a giant turkey. Directly behind, a teenaged girl wearing what could only be a spandex tent. In the middle of all of this, here I am in an ISU t-shirt and ancient blue basketball shorts with paint stains, trying to look like I have some idea what the hell I'm doing.
The Remix is an angel. Once the starter's horn sounded, she trotted patiently along beside me at a much slower pace than she'd have set for herself. At first, I did my best to be funny and self-deprecating, making the people around me chuckle as I'm inclined to do anytime there's more than three people around to potentially form an audience. That was while I was still able to talk. By the first hill, I was breathing like a wounded water buffalo. By the end of the first mile, I had to take my first walking break. As my lungs pounded against my ribs, I tried to urge the Remix on without me, if only to spare myself some embarassment. She wouldn't go, at least not until I'd walked half of the second mile and did not look to be gaining any steam. I made one last push with her coaching, another 3 or 4 tenths of a mile, and finally gave up. She took off, bobbing and weaving through the racewalkers as she struggled to catch up with the pack.
I took my time the rest of the course, jogging and walking intermittently, determined to finish but not quite enough to find some untapped reservoir of athletic ability. An old man with a limp gritted his teeth as he worked his way by me on the left. A gay man and a tiny terrier pranced by me on the other side. I'm convinced that the kids in strollers were laughing as they blew by. Even the racewalkers looked sympathetic as their ferocious pacing outstripped my unique run-stumble-walk-run-pray for death strategy.
I might have finished even worse, but for the added motivation of my new training partner. Around the turn of the fourth mile as I plodded on in a sort of shuffling half-jog, a tiny blue haired old lady overtook me and then left me in her dust. That was too much. I ran the last 8 tenths of a mile as fast as I could manage, determined not to be run into the ground by anyone's grandma. When I crossed the finish line, unable to breathe, talk, or think, the Remix greeted me with a banana and a glass of water, beaming at me in the sun while a curmudgeonly race volunteer cut the timer off my shoe. I'm proud I finished, and according to my plastic friend, in about an hour and fifteen minutes. Could be worse. Could be much worse, actually. The remix and I started our trek back to the car. I'm glad you came, she said. It's fun doing this stuff with you. Limping to the car, feeling smug just for finishing the damn race, my beautiful girlfriend on my arm and oblivious to the array of musclebound gym boys, I couldn't agree more. I'm glad I came too. I love you. And I meant it.
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