I'm two days into my fourth week of training, and I'm realizing that I am looking forward to running more and more every day. Don't get me wrong, I'm nowhere near loving it yet, but I have two and a half more months to get there. I am experiencing a touch of the elusive "runner's high" that so many people talk about. Someone was telling me a few weeks ago that the runner's high is similar (but not the same) to an orgasm. I asked if that's why I've been getting a strange case of the chills/cold sweats halfway during my runs. She said that I'm probably experiencing my own kind of beginner's runner's high. I was so proud of that.
Which is why it's so surprising how easy it is to fall out of a routine, no matter how much you enjoy it. Last Tuesday evening I went running with Elyssa. It was only the second time I had been running outside, but the first time was at the running loop by her apartment, which is relatively flat ground. Tuesday night, we went running through a neighborhood on the beach towards the boardwalk and back again. All in all, it was about three and a half miles of not necessarily rugged terrain, but uneven terrain at best.
I'm sure everyone knows by now what a shoddy athlete I am, and because I'm such a piss-poor runner, I obviously don't know how to stretch properly. Because even though I DID stretch, I swear it!, I obviously didn't stretch enough, because the shin splints I experienced the next day made me hope and pray for an epidural-free birthing process instead.
Not only that, but my Superwoman-wannabe self thought that cross-training by playing tennis that evening would be the PERFECT remedy for my injury. Adding insult to injury - literally - was the unexpected one mile walk to the tennis court, a two hour "game", and the still-unexpected one mile walk back from the tennis court. Ouch.
Needless to say, Thursday's intense bouts of pain precluded me from my anticipated run that evening. In fact, Friday's intense bouts of pain did, too. Now, there's absolutely no reason that I couldn't have just gotten right back on the horse Saturday, but Friday EVENING'S debauchery left me couch-ridden for the majority of the day and early evening. Sunday saw me grabbing coffee with Diva in South Beach in the afternoon. Again, I had every intention of running that evening, but socializing (something I've done so little of since I started training) won out once again.
So that brings me to Monday. Right? Wrong. I was ready to run. No more pain in my legs, no more hangover, no more opportunities to hang out with cute new man specimens. What's more, I was looking forward to it. Tropical Storm Fay had other plans. Between yesterday and today, I've been cooped up in one building or another, avoiding the storm and most unfortunately NOT running.
Which brings me back to my original point: I've missed running. It's only been a few days, but I've noticed in those few days that running has been my pro bono therapist. Besides my physical injuries of the past week, my personal life has been a whirlwind of bullshit sprinkled with crap. Being stuck in between two semi-feuding friends, ending a pseudo-relationship that did nothing but cause me aggravation, and wrestling with a whole other set of mucked up feelings for someone else... all those things go away when I run. The only thing I concentrate on while I'm out there is breathing enough to stay alive and not stepping on that small rock coming up ahead. Making sure I put one foot in front of the other and that I judge the upcoming curve in the road correctly so I don't run off the side (I would do something like that).
I miss running. I can't wait to go back to running. Tomorrow, I go running.
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