That One Night in the East of Town

I find my best ideas in the frigid air, inhale them; only for the inevitable dissipation when my breathing calms, as the chemicals fade. If I could write while running, about running, then perhaps my words could better find the circumference of the moment. There would be words for the hours spent stomping through snow, across town, around abandoned railroad tracks and industrial rubble, former mills and automobile husks. The smell of wood burning in the yard there. The man smoking on the sidewalk, whose cigarette I can briefly taste, in passing. The dog that chases me on the other side of its fence, blissfully for a few seconds. The totality of the experience is indeed a patchwork tapestry, a whole that is anything but. Moments, stitched by steps, unwoven when the footfalls cease, until there is again just fabric, waiting for the next day's thread.

Reaching

It's difficult to wrap words around a year that was, and impossible to project that forward. I'll say that this was a good year, though, and that I expect the next one will be as well.

I won a half marathon, full marathon, and 50 miler. And that, having known myself for my entire life, is just absurd. I won't give you the whole "former unathletic chubby kid" narrative, because you've heard it before. And I guess that's a good thing. We should be glad that people getting in shape borders on cliche, even as quite a few more could stand to do so.

And while those things are true, and I hold in my mind the memory of those races, I can't say I really derive any satisfaction from those moments. I was elated - and exhausted - and the end of each; but ecstasy fades, and you need new highs, higher highs, reaching for a brass ring that is always just outside your grasp.

Or, you know, not.

2013, in terms of running, was about validation, for me. To be blunt: I needed to know that I didn't suck at this, and perhaps more to the point, I needed other people to know it too. I needed the fast guys to talk to me as something of an equal, to hear pre-race whispers that I was the guy to beat.

Is this ego? To some extent, yes. But it's more a lack of one. That is, someone who has confidence in themselves and their abilities doesn't really need much in the way of external validation. They do what they do, and they enjoy it.

I'm getting there. Probably won't ever make it all the way, and to some extent, I'm ok with that. I have my ambitions, and I'd rather they not be extinguished. I want to run a fast spring marathon - which is to say, faster than the guys I run with have. Petty, maybe. But there it is. And I'd like to win some races, run faster times, etc. So, in short, I still want the same things I wanted last year.

But there's a difference, which doesn't really show in terms of my training or racing. It's much less quantifiable than those things, wholly unnoticeable if you're not in my head. And, well, here I am, and welcome in. The difference is the focus, which is more on the process than the outcomes. That is, while I'm running more and harder, and racing better, that's all just sort of incidental to the point, which is that I really enjoy my daily indulgence of miles. It is a lot, usually. Double digits pretty much every day. Oftentimes pretty hard, too. But I haven't dreaded a run in a long time, no matter how gnarly, and I certainly haven't regretted one. Put another way, it's the reaching that's become the goal, not the ring.

The goal then, such as it is, for 2014, is to keep that up. Process-positive focus and consistency is the way forward, not berating one's self over a perceived need to be perpetually better. Which is not to say that "better" won't happen, or that I don't want it to happen.... just that, yeah, I said this was hard to get words around.

There are some conflicting notions at work here, and that's difficult to express in a comfortable way. It's difficult because we want to make sense, to craft cogent arguments. When that fails, the delete key beckons. We don't want to seem so transparently contradictory, even as being so is innately and necessarily human.

So all of that said, 2014, huh? Let's be chill about it.

Low

The sky this morning was a robin's egg blue, pastel with whimsical white wisps drifting across. A quiet aesthetic until an SUV nearly runs a light and hits me - and I mean me, not my car this time, because I'm running, as I do. We exchange pleasant fuck yous and exasperated looks and then are on our respective ways, cheerily again. Someday, I'll learn that shouting profanity at people in large vehicles is not a wise life choice. Someday, though, was not today.

Perhaps I was tired? That would be an out, of sorts, an excuse that, if I didn't know my tendency towards juvenile language under any circumstances, I might take. (Didn't I get a degree in English? Don't I proofread things for a living? Shouldn't my vocabulary be so extensive that "fuck" is phased out? Nope.)

But I was out late last night - shocking! - at a bar - shockinger! - drinking water - as expected! There was a rather awful sludge metal band playing in one room, and a chubby white guy with ass-length dreadlocks playing early 90's rap, for the most part, in the adjacent room. When the band stopped playing, a swarm of denim jackets invaded the rap room; the DJ responded to the influx of PBR and cigarettes with Lil' Jon. The response was rampant enthusiasm, somehow. I didn't know that my life wouldn't be complete without seeing some guy with a Goatwhore patch on his (sleeveless, with red-painted metal spikes on the shoulder) denim jacket "get crunk", but now I can't imagine life otherwise.

Soon after, I went to bed. Then, I got up and went to work, on very little sleep. Then I ran. Then I almost became roadkill. So now we're caught up. But, I'm out of things to say, because my jogging exploits are far less interesting than a crew of would be Motorhead roadies dancing furiously and wholly without irony to "Get Low".

So thanks for that, Lawrence. Thanks for your lovely denizens and townie bars.

Eight and Rising

http://www.ultrarunning.com/headlines/ultrarunning-news/fejes-and-lickteig-named-8-ultrarunners-of-the-year/

The closest thing to a local ultra-star we've got, if Omaha counts as "local". I'm saying it does, since two of her wins this year were in Lawrence and Kansas City. (I won the marathon in Lawrence, when she won the 50. Her min/mile pace was 4 seconds faster than mine. So, yeah. I should probably mail her my mug too. This is the part where I'd make an excuse about a wrong turn, except she took one too. Nevermind.)

She's got a Pearl Izumi sponsorship now, and is targeting some higher profile races with much stronger competition. Still, she hasn't lost an ultra yet, and I think her's is a name to watch, in the years to come. Also, just sayin', we talked once, in real life, post-race. Something about almost stepping on a copperhead. Basically makes me a running celebrity by proxy.

Lentils

Lentils and red beans are an odd mix with blueberries, but since I was going to eat all three, why not together? Apart from the usual manner of reasons: taste, texture, normality, etc. Apart from those things, for which I had no concern, there was no remaining reason. None, at least, that superceded my primary directive in all food preparations - brevity. That is, putting everything I'm going to eat in a bowl, all at once, and downing it, with no regard for culinary or aesthetic sensibilities.

Pleasant? At times. Efficient? Very.

In this case, not wholly unpleasant, but yes, quite efficient.

I ate the whole mess cold, because, yes, heating it would take a minute or so, which was about how long I planned on spending eating, so certainly I couldn't double my food-attentive period with an equal amount of time spent cooking, or rather, heating things that had already been cooked, or did not need cooking at all. I did so and looked out at the snow, and my footsteps in the driveway. They appeared to be those of a much taller man - or at least, someone with very large feet - owing to the fact that I tried to step in the same foot holes every time, but usually missed by a little.

Satisfying, though, in the way that food tends to be, post-decent effort. In this case, 3 easy, 3 rather hard, 3 easy. Cheating, slightly, in using my a treadmill at my gym. Then, while there, doing some cursory strength work, and turning down the chance to mangle myself with a 200-lb ball of concrete, which was being hoisted by several much larger individuals. They chided me for not running longer. I chided them for not lifting heavier. And so it goes.

Cold lentils and treadmill miles, and really, I'm quite pleased with it all. Simple things, right?

Whitener Christmas

Walking in the basement of my office, I pass the coffee machine, that is nothing like what you're picturing while reading that. This is not a pot, or a small scale brewer of any kind, but rather, a massive thing, the size and dimensions of a soda dispensing machine. It produces something that is alleged to be coffee, for nominal change, at the push of several buttons.

You can get coffee. This is straightforward.

Or, you can get it with "whitener". Not cream. Not non-dairy creamer, even, with unspecified ingredients. No, whitener. Use your imagination. I dare not.

If that sounds appealing, but you'd really rather have it as a frothy mess, you can get a latte, or something called that, which is "whipped" with whitener.

Walking by, there is a wet floor sign. A mess underneath, brown, tan perhaps, coffee which had been whitened, yes, I think. Had been? Was? Is? What is it now? Coffee still? I kneel and prod at it. Look around and, when I confirm that I'm alone, I sniff. Taffy. Coffee taffy? To the touch and smell. Almost. But not quite. Not quite because there is no reference point for this. But wet? No. That much is clear. And so I can only conclude that this whitener is also a solidifier.

I won't be trying it.

Balance

At a group run the other night, discussing my training, such as it is. That being, for the most part, as much and as long as I care to go. No soreness ever, really. Durability is perhaps not the best talent, if you're choosing one, but it does count for a lot. One is rarely without a hobby, at least. I was slightly hurt at this time last year, however, a "stress reaction" in my left foot. Probably three times since, I have managed to get some smidge of soreness there, including last week, after my icy trail race. Nothing major, and it's gone now. I didn't - and don't - think that this indicates any long-term structural damage. Why?

Because of an episode in an alley, leaping down from a curb. My foot was still tender, on that night, and so I pushed off with my left foot, and landed on my right. I nearly tripped over myself, after all of a two-foot journey. I spent the rest of that run, and the rest of this week's runs, intentionally landing on my right foot. Not because my left hurts - it doesn't - but simply to note how awkward it feels. And it does feel awkward. There are a numerous little dips, turns, and technical sections at the Clinton Lake trails, where I frequently run. And I've noticed now, having tried to do the opposite, that I habitually "plant" on my left foot. That is, anytime there is a harsh landing to be had, either on or amongst rocks, or stopping my momentum at the bottom of the hill, I assign my left foot the task. Landing on the right, in such situations, feels horribly awkward.

What I'm working towards, and beginning to incorporate already, is a more agnostic approach. Ideally, I'd run through and over obstacles, paying as little mind to them as possible, altering my stride not at all. Neither chopping nor loping, aiming to artificially place my left foot as the stabilizer, so that I can then push off with my right. As much as possible, run over things as I would if it were a sidewalk, a road, a smooth dirt path. Land organically, without forced or unbalanced stress.

I'm quite happy to have discovered this. Not merely because I think it ought to improve my running, on technical trail, or keep my left foot free of the intermittent soreness that seems to find it. It's just fascinating, really. Fascinating the movement patterns our body chooses, decides are most efficient. Which, as I found leaping from that curb, is not often wrong. But "most efficient at the moment" is not optimally efficient. Of course, given the choice, we'd all have the latter. Fascinating, also, because this was unknown to me for quite some time, for hundreds of thousands of steps. We think, often, of imbalances in running in terms of weak muscles. But I wonder, how many are like this? Lapses in coordination, movement patterns which have worn a rut? For me, and for others, these must exist. How many of them do we see, but fail to observe? As I said, fascinating.