Wishful Thinking...: Resurfacing

Oh hello.

So this is my blog! Clearly, I had forgotten how to get to this website.

Could also be that I've been working far more than any reasonably sane person should and my mind and my life have been too filled with database-marketing-membership-orchestra-conference- orchestra-database-i-love-flying-on-planes-membership-conference-lmao-must-do-work-now-must-do-work-always for me to remember that I have actually done some fun stuff over the last 3 months and that you people might want to know about it.

Or something like that.

Let's start at the beginning, and by beginning I mean today, because that's the farthest back i can be counted on to reliably remember these days. This morning, Eric and I participated in our first half marathon! (I can't truthfully say we ran this race--but more on that later). All signs pointed to "No, you dumbos, no one should run that far. Go back to bed" but we are stubborn and slightly idiotic individuals so we proceeded with abandon and very little caution.

The preface: Last weekend, my left knee decided it had had enough with this running business (THE RELAY, and the many, many miles of running it required, was a mere two weeks ago, but that deserves its own time slot. Stay tuned). Madame Left Knee closed up shop on mile 9 of our last training run- excellent timing, week before our big race, left knee! Thanks for nothing, lady! Not to be deterred, I diligently limped around wearing my AWESOME black knee brace every day last week (looks great with sundresses!) and spent my evenings in my hotel room alone with my trusty ice pack. (Oh yeah. I was in DC last week for work. Never a dull moment around here.)

The ice and the great fashion statement helped to a degree, but I can safely say that a physician would not have cleared me to run today. Luckily for me, there are no physicians around here!

If a busted knee wasn't enough of an indication that maybe today wasn't our day for a half marathon, the warnings just kept on coming...First, yesterday the weathermen predicted a Severe Cold Warning (Ah, Californians. What are you gonna do?) for the entire Bay Area, complete with downpours, hail, and lightning for Sunday morning. Perfection!

Alas, we woke up to wet pavement but dry skies at 4 am this morning, and stumbled to our sweet wheels for the day, a rented Zipcar parked a few blocks from our house. But, lo and behold, it was double-parked and impossible to get out of its parking space. Brilliant! Did we turn right around? No way! Luckily, Zipcar has 24-hour customer service, and they found us a different car just another few blocks away. This car was in a fancy garage in an office building that was very clearly locked. Nice. Luckily (again) there was a jolly security guard who was more than happy to lead us to our new, easily accessible Zipcar.

Except there was one small problem. Surprise, surpise.

When we drove through the gate to exit, the giant metal garage door loomed in front of us. Completely. Un-movingly. Closed. Awesome.

Since this was a top-of-the-line garage someone came quickly to our rescue and told us that (obviously) you just had to drive within about 1 foot of the giant closed metal garage door and it would open. Obviously.

At last, we were free, ready make an easy getaway across the bridge and be to Lodi in time to pretend to stretch and to scarf a few pre-race pancakes. Wrong again! (There is a very clear pattern here, no?). Today was Bay to Breakers, San Francisco's annual clothing optional 10K run/excuse to drink heavily in public before 9 am. For us, on this fine day, this meant that every street leading to the Bay Bridge was blocked off. After talking to a few race volunteers who either a) didn't speak English, b) were still sleeping, or c) thought we were Martians, someone finally gave us an escape route and we got across the bridge.

Are you exhausted yet? If so, remember that this was all before 6 am and then you feel free to feel even more exhausted and, also, bad for us. We had a fairly uneventful drive to Lodi, until we realized that Google had taken us to the middle of the Woodbridge vineyards, instead of the actual winery, where the race was to begin promptly at 7 am. This was at about 6:45, and, turns out, Woodbridge is kind of a big winery.

We made it to the actual location with mere moments to spare and had to park a good half mile away, and, in case you were wondering, an extra walk is GREAT when you're about to "run" 13 miles on a busted knee. Against all odds, we managed to check in and get our numbers and goodie bags about 2 seconds before the race started. I furiously used an entire roll of athletic tape in a fairly fruitless effort to stabilize my knee while Eric ran back to the car to drop of our stuff and fill his pockets with our as yet uneaten pancakes.

Aaaannnnnd then we missed the start of the race.

Needless to say, at this point, I was getting the message loud and clear: This was not supposed to be happening. And, yet, here I was, all the way in Lodi, one leg covered in tape and the other held together with a tendon strap named McDavid, and you can bet I was running that race, despite the tears of frustration and disappointment that had inevitably started to fall.

A few things you should know about me (and you probably all do): I've come to strongly identify myself with physical fitness, I don't like to quit anything, and I definitely don't like to let myself down. So, even though I was already terribly disappointed that this was not at all how I had imagined things to be, I had to do this race.

Fortunately, there was also a 5K race this morning, so we started with them (we'll call it a 15 minute penalty for ignoring all the ominous signs) and only got a couple of strange looks when we blew past the 5K mark and started running our own private half-marathon. As one of the EMT's on duty said, "If you guys want to win, you're going to have to hurry." Touché, man.

My knee held up fairly well for the first half of the race and, and with a mixture of running and walking, we did actually catch up to some of the other half-marathoners. (Does it count as a roadkill if you pass people who are intentionally walking the race? I'm thinking yes, so, in that case, we racked up a good 45 roadkills today. Score!) At about Mile 8, though, my knee was tired of being a good sport.

Although this made me incredibly sad, I simply could not run anymore. It was not only painful, it may have been impossible at that point, so I waved the (off)white flag and decided to walk the rest of the way. Eric stuck with me and we finished in around 2 hours and 45 minutes, in approximately 300th place, which was not even last! Fine, fine work, I say. (Eric was second to last in his age group, but we can blame that one entirely on me. We won't put that in the record books).

Clearly, today was not the victorious accomplishment I envisioned when I registered us for this race, but I have to keep reminding myself that moving one's self 13.1 miles, whether at a sprint, a jog, a walk, or a crawl, is still something to be proud of. To help me remember, I have been wearing my medal all day. For real. It's cool, you guys!

The moment we crossed the finish line, the skies opened up and the big rain finally came. We snapped some pictures during a momentary dry spell and then sought refuge in a Lodi winery before heading to Stockton for Michael's Pizza. Because if there's ever a time you deserve pizza dipped liberally in the world's best ranch dressing, it's after a half-marathon, you know what I'm saying?

And now we're back, curled up with the sweet kitty and my favorite ice pack, drinking celebratory scotch/Champagne.