I wasn't able to run this time last year. I had hurt my knee. I was stressed out and going through a rough time. All I wanted was to run it out, so maybe I would be too tired to be sad or stressed.
Then, as my knee got better, I impulsively signed up for the marine corps marathon. Training was a bumpy road replete with setbacks and injuries. My life in almost all of 2009 was a roller coaster. I had some highs, and some amazing times, and I hit rock bottom lows and felt like a bottom dweller. I felt separate from myself, confused and off kilter and was trying to get the hang of this nursing thing which seemed to knock me down more than it built me up.
The only time I was truly happy in some stretches of last year was when I was running. My confusion and angst would bubble to the surface and pop, leaving their debris in my wake. Sometimes, I would even cry when I was running and arrive back home, 10+ miles later with nothing left...physically...mentally...emotionally. It was a nice change.
Running a marathon was a goal I'd had since I started running one mile with my dog summer evenings back in middle school. When else was I going to have the time but in grad school (well, maybe not the time, but a flexible enough schedule that would allow me to fit in 3 hour training runs), and when else would an exciting marathon run right by my house? I couldn't wait a year for my knee to get better. The time was then, 2009. This goal meant so much to me, I was impatient to achieve it... and I did.
The days I don't think about that marathon are few and far between. I'm all about looking for literary significance within real life, and the marathon is every thing symbolically and metaphorically to me that it sounds like. Despite my overwhelming sense of imbalance and not knowing, I pulled it together enough to complete that marathon. Every one of those 296 minutes felt heavy with importance (yet tense because I was so close, finally), and when I crossed the line, the pressure was lifted, and above it all I was proud of myself. (Well, to be fair, once I became more certain I wasn't going to drop dead, I knew that this particular rainy season had passed). Things seemed a lot simpler after that.
Now, when I run, I have a sense of relief that the goal has been achieved. I can run and not worry about how far I'm going. Maybe I'll run another, maybe I won't, I'll have to see. Most of all, I love repeating my routes. On occasion I'll step in a spot that must be exactly where I've stepped before, and a flashback overtakes me. I know how I was feeling that very minute I was last running to this beat or on this step and I feel it all over again. Even those tough memories make me smile, because I got through them myself. For every difficult memory, though, there is one of running the marathon; the innervation and excitement I felt when I was running it and the pride and joy I have looking back on it.
Things are different now. Nursing still kicks my butt and on occasion knocks me down, but it's not so one-sided anymore. I'm getting the hang of it, and finding myself surprisingly prepared for what's to come (and deliver my own one-two punch from time to time). I found the me I was missing, and I feel... better. More balanced. I'm truly happy even when I'm not running, and I think running showed me a happiness when I was having trouble finding any. I came out the other end of the tunnel, weathered the storm and I can't imagine having done it any other way than running through.
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