What have you done for me today, legs?
Prettiest day of the week. It was 14 degrees when I got up but the weather guessers had forecast a sunny, warm and mostly wind-free day, so I had high hopes. I wanted to take advantage of the forecast 50 degree temps and get in a good workout.
As I pushed off it was still pretty cold -- 20 degrees -- but the sun was already feeling warm and the wind was nowhere to be found. It was very pretty and a morning filled with promise.
I wasn't feeling it though. I didn't have a lot of energy and I wasn't filled with my favorite sense of zest. I was therefore more than a little pissed. Why can't I have the zest and energy all the time? Yesterday I felt great.
But that was yesterday. It was lovely but today is not yesterday. Today I have to deal with today.
The first mile was creaky and hard. I couldn't catch a rhythm. My legs felt weak and tired and my joints felt creaky and rusty. I ran like a special olympian, not that there's anything wrong with that. But where was the easy grace, the fluid motion, the boundless energy?
That was yesterday. I pressed on.
Smokebong hill was torture. I pressed on. I had some business at the hospital and I pulled up there at roughly the 2.5 mile mark. That gave me a five-minute breather. Business concluded, I lurched back into an imitation of a running man.
I went the long way and came to the underpass steps from the west. I was feeling better in the sense that I was moving better. I still felt tired and weak but I persevered. As I ran steps I kept planning on quitting, then kept recycling the ongoing lie of "just one more." I hit a good stride between flights 50 and 100. The last 50 went much better than I could have hoped, really, given that my legs felt like spaghetti.
It was a good way to wind up the workout, pushing and proving that tiredness and spaghettification notwithstanding, I can still dig deep and find more juice in the tank. It might seem stupid or even counterproductive, but I don't think it is. Suck it up and drive on is easy to say, but harder to do. The doing is the important bit.
I know for a fact that pressing on is important and that it's on hard, shitty, gutchecking days like today that I make substantial and lasting progress.
I did a couple of blocks of cool-down and called it good. I was rather surprised to find that I'd done six miles altogether.
For all my whining and complaining, I realize that there are countless folks who might give anything to be able to run like the crippled wind just one more time.
I am blessed.
And here's a psychotic stream-of-semiconsciousness post-workout ramble. I do not know why.
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