THANK YOU!
As of today, your donations have helped me complete 78% of my fundraising goal! I am truly and deeply grateful. I just have a few hundred dollars more to raise!
To be honest, I did not think I was going to get this far. I had deep-seated doubts about this whole thing. Starting out, I was sure I would have either quit or gotten injured (knock on wood!) or both by this point. However, I'm totally psyched for the marathon, and cannot believe it when I tell people how far my longest run was on the weekend.
Thank you thank you thank you for supporting me so much.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Running Low on Ideas...Pun Intended.
Since starting the blog, a nagging little pesky thought has nestled itself in the lower right hand corner of my cerebellum (specific, I know, but that's where all the nasty little pesky ideas live) and since the nature of such thoughts is to whisper in your ear, snicker snidely, and then hide in the depths of your brainwaves, all the while frustrating you to no end, I'm going to blow its cover, so to speak.
I am running out of things to write about running. Granted, I could bore you with more training issues, mileage-crunching numbers, and the woes of the recent right ankle-gone-wrong, but I'm having trouble making it interesting. So, for lack of better drafting, here's a scrolling news clip:
Sarah recently completed a long, grueling 18-mile run in San Francisco on the 25th...It lasted for four hours...Cramping ensued, remedied by extensive stretching and a delicious peanut butter-and-honey sandwich...Her right ankle has flared up due to a recent fall during an indoor climb at the rock gym...Icing and Advil doing their part to ease the stress of running...red ottoman living under her desk at work to ensure elevation during the day...Sunday morning Bikram Yoga class in Palo Alto evoked profuse sweat and intensely balanced coordination under the watchful eye of ex-Marine-turned-yogi Johnny of Yoga Source...Spontaneous foot rub in the middle of class surprised Sarah and now she is unfortunately addicted to the sensation...
That's about all the news from the past two weeks, to be quite honest. Most of my time lately has been hogged by the ongoing rehearsal process for Three Sisters at The Pear Ave Theatre. I love being back in the acting arena; delving into a fictional 19th century household of botched relationship does wonders for quelling the nasty pesky thoughts, but in between running around at work, running around the track, running around on stage, and tripping into bed at night, I've been running low on running blog inspiration.
So, welcome to the end product of the nasty pesky thought exposed. Now that it's completely revealed, hopefully the ensuing posts will be a little more inspired...or not.
In any case, this is all you're going to get this evening, folks. Check back tomorrow for the latest update. Perhaps I'll send in a foreign correspondent....
I am running out of things to write about running. Granted, I could bore you with more training issues, mileage-crunching numbers, and the woes of the recent right ankle-gone-wrong, but I'm having trouble making it interesting. So, for lack of better drafting, here's a scrolling news clip:
Sarah recently completed a long, grueling 18-mile run in San Francisco on the 25th...It lasted for four hours...Cramping ensued, remedied by extensive stretching and a delicious peanut butter-and-honey sandwich...Her right ankle has flared up due to a recent fall during an indoor climb at the rock gym...Icing and Advil doing their part to ease the stress of running...red ottoman living under her desk at work to ensure elevation during the day...Sunday morning Bikram Yoga class in Palo Alto evoked profuse sweat and intensely balanced coordination under the watchful eye of ex-Marine-turned-yogi Johnny of Yoga Source...Spontaneous foot rub in the middle of class surprised Sarah and now she is unfortunately addicted to the sensation...
That's about all the news from the past two weeks, to be quite honest. Most of my time lately has been hogged by the ongoing rehearsal process for Three Sisters at The Pear Ave Theatre. I love being back in the acting arena; delving into a fictional 19th century household of botched relationship does wonders for quelling the nasty pesky thoughts, but in between running around at work, running around the track, running around on stage, and tripping into bed at night, I've been running low on running blog inspiration.
So, welcome to the end product of the nasty pesky thought exposed. Now that it's completely revealed, hopefully the ensuing posts will be a little more inspired...or not.
In any case, this is all you're going to get this evening, folks. Check back tomorrow for the latest update. Perhaps I'll send in a foreign correspondent....
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
High Tide
This past weekend was a 16-mile trot about the San Francisco Bay Trail. We started at the Oracle parking lot in Redwood City at 6:30am, and wound our way up to San Mateo, through Seal Point Park, returning back from whence we came nearly three and a half hours later.
A few things struck me on this run. One, I go running for three-plus hours these days. Two, you can think a lot of thoughts during a three-plus hour run. Three, while thinking those thoughts, the scenery seems to mysteriously change around you so that when you look up every so often, you never seem to be completely oriented on the trail. You start swiveling your head to and fro, searching for a recognizable bush or telephone pole (which all look vaguely familiar, because they all look vaguely the same), and reassure yourself that since you don't recognize anything in particular from the view that is ten feet behind or in front of you, you must have been running for at least another mile since resurfacing from your deep thoughts. (Usually however, you've only run a mere 200 yards.)
It goes on like that for three hours: you drift out to your sea of thoughts, paddling about in your memories of the week, recalling your frustrations with silly people, and reeling in the moments when you embarrassed yourself during the day. Then you look back to shore and realize you've no idea how far you've drifted.
And running along the Bay Trail is the most literal experience of this sea-of-thoughts metaphor.
When I started out at 6:30, the sky was overcast, there was a slight breeze in the air, and the trail was unpopulated - save for the occasional dreary-eyed morning cyclist. The view was peaceful - the terrain relatively flat, with a winding pavement along the marsh edge. The marsh is composed of wet, slick, textured muck. It looks as if someone took a gigantic melon-scooper and removed some muck for a giant muck-fruit salad. Beyond that pleasant view is the bay, and you can see the water at low tide, lapping at the edges of the marsh, as if exiled from a place it once inhabited. If it weren't for the tall green grass and the moist texture of the marsh, you would think we were in drought season. A few muck-loving birds, statuesque, sprinkle the landscape with their profiles.
While running through this scene, sculling through the chore list in my head, I looked up every so often to watch the gradual shift in the bay. Slowly, but surely, the shoreline shifted. In places where I expected to see marshy mud pies and lanky grass, I only saw sandy beach and pooling bay tide. How suddenly the view had changed, and I felt that I had somehow missed it. How did that happen? In fact, during the last two miles of the run, I was convinced that global warming had tightened its stranglehold and elevated the water levels to new heights within a matter of forty minutes, the mucky terrain no longer visible further inland.
Watching the scenery, I drifted even further out to la-la-land. Then, the really random thoughts started flowing in...
At low tide, the bay looks pretty beat up and sorrowful, and as you run, feeling your muscles tighten up and wondering how you will ever make it back to the start, you begin to empathize with that mucky terrain, because in the beginning stages of your training seasons, you feel exactly like muck after an hour of relentless forward motion. And then high tide comes in, quietly and unassuming. The water covers everything, and you no longer see the marshy roots or the desolate, dank misery that was the beginning of the running...and you start to feel somewhat comfortable and energized. Not by much, because your feet haven't stopped moving, but a little bit.
The reason you become so energized is that you didn't realize there could be a high tide. The starting stages are no longer visible, and from that point, there's a new scene: everything looks effortless, expansive, and fluid. It looks pretty nice, actually, and it's somewhat peaceful. You become that high tide, creeping up on the shore, conquering it little by little. and that's quite an energizing thought.
And even if you hit low tide again, you can see the marks of high tide, the heights you reached on that expansive shore, and you know it's possible to get there again....
I finished the run with this thought in mind, and sat down to stretch out my now fluid-like legs, and I thought to myself, "I just paralleled my running experience to a Nicholas Sparks novel. Three plus hours of running will make you crazy."
A few things struck me on this run. One, I go running for three-plus hours these days. Two, you can think a lot of thoughts during a three-plus hour run. Three, while thinking those thoughts, the scenery seems to mysteriously change around you so that when you look up every so often, you never seem to be completely oriented on the trail. You start swiveling your head to and fro, searching for a recognizable bush or telephone pole (which all look vaguely familiar, because they all look vaguely the same), and reassure yourself that since you don't recognize anything in particular from the view that is ten feet behind or in front of you, you must have been running for at least another mile since resurfacing from your deep thoughts. (Usually however, you've only run a mere 200 yards.)
It goes on like that for three hours: you drift out to your sea of thoughts, paddling about in your memories of the week, recalling your frustrations with silly people, and reeling in the moments when you embarrassed yourself during the day. Then you look back to shore and realize you've no idea how far you've drifted.
And running along the Bay Trail is the most literal experience of this sea-of-thoughts metaphor.
When I started out at 6:30, the sky was overcast, there was a slight breeze in the air, and the trail was unpopulated - save for the occasional dreary-eyed morning cyclist. The view was peaceful - the terrain relatively flat, with a winding pavement along the marsh edge. The marsh is composed of wet, slick, textured muck. It looks as if someone took a gigantic melon-scooper and removed some muck for a giant muck-fruit salad. Beyond that pleasant view is the bay, and you can see the water at low tide, lapping at the edges of the marsh, as if exiled from a place it once inhabited. If it weren't for the tall green grass and the moist texture of the marsh, you would think we were in drought season. A few muck-loving birds, statuesque, sprinkle the landscape with their profiles.
While running through this scene, sculling through the chore list in my head, I looked up every so often to watch the gradual shift in the bay. Slowly, but surely, the shoreline shifted. In places where I expected to see marshy mud pies and lanky grass, I only saw sandy beach and pooling bay tide. How suddenly the view had changed, and I felt that I had somehow missed it. How did that happen? In fact, during the last two miles of the run, I was convinced that global warming had tightened its stranglehold and elevated the water levels to new heights within a matter of forty minutes, the mucky terrain no longer visible further inland.
Watching the scenery, I drifted even further out to la-la-land. Then, the really random thoughts started flowing in...
At low tide, the bay looks pretty beat up and sorrowful, and as you run, feeling your muscles tighten up and wondering how you will ever make it back to the start, you begin to empathize with that mucky terrain, because in the beginning stages of your training seasons, you feel exactly like muck after an hour of relentless forward motion. And then high tide comes in, quietly and unassuming. The water covers everything, and you no longer see the marshy roots or the desolate, dank misery that was the beginning of the running...and you start to feel somewhat comfortable and energized. Not by much, because your feet haven't stopped moving, but a little bit.
The reason you become so energized is that you didn't realize there could be a high tide. The starting stages are no longer visible, and from that point, there's a new scene: everything looks effortless, expansive, and fluid. It looks pretty nice, actually, and it's somewhat peaceful. You become that high tide, creeping up on the shore, conquering it little by little. and that's quite an energizing thought.
And even if you hit low tide again, you can see the marks of high tide, the heights you reached on that expansive shore, and you know it's possible to get there again....
I finished the run with this thought in mind, and sat down to stretch out my now fluid-like legs, and I thought to myself, "I just paralleled my running experience to a Nicholas Sparks novel. Three plus hours of running will make you crazy."
Monday, August 6, 2007
Proof
This weekend was a taper weekend, so I went up to Rancho on Saturday morning to get in a small run (which means, these days, between 5-7 miles...not so long ago, that would in no way seem small) at 7 am.
I've grown up near Rancho San Antonio, so the trails are familiar to me, though I had a new experience this weekend during the downhill portion of the Upper Wildcat trail. Traveling up the back way to Upper Wildcat, via Rogue Valley, entails shuffling along on a high altitude climb for what seems like five miles (though it's probably less than two). It's an amazingly challenging climb - back and forth, zigging and zagging to the peak, at which point you are rewarded with one of the most spectacular views of the Bay Area in the early morning. (I suspect, the view was put there so people won't complain about doing all that work for nothing.)
After stretching your glutes and refilling your lungs (which have shrivelled up to tiny sacs of pain) at the peak, you embark on the terrific downhill maze of Upper Wildcat. However, at a regular downhill rate, the scenery changes so quickly in comparison to the initial climb, that you feel like you should stop to take pictures. But for me, it literally became a blur when I found myself being propelled forward at a fantastic rate, thanks to the combined forces of gravity and Shot Blocks. I didn't hold back, and in fact just relaxed while my feet pattered down the trail, faster and faster, and my body fell forward as my legs kicked up behind me. My body started moving in precise harmony, and I watched as the dappled light through the trees started to flicker as I sailed through the woods.
Oddly enough, my legs didn't tire, and my lungs were comfortably airy (due to the quick descent), and after about five full minutes at this speed, I truly felt like I was flying. In fact, the feeling was so supreme, I started laughing as I realized that I had reached that inexplicable sensation some people call "the runner's high".
Granted, I had just expended an intense amount of effort to get to the top of that hill, and now I was going downhill so fast I didn't have a chance to relish the descent...but it didn't seem to matter as I felt so amazingly charged. The rest of the run was somewhat robotic in that my body was working in perfect sync on its own accord for a solid two miles.
And in fact, by the time I finished the run, I felt like I wanted to do it all over again, just to get that supreme rush. Yes, I wanted to climb that wretched hill all over again, that's how great it felt!
The mind-boggling moral to this anecdote is that I have tried to enjoy running for years, thinking that I could only stand it in little bouts. But now, after training for miles on end, I've discovered that I like the long hard runs. Why? Perhaps because I didn't think I'd ever get to that state, that runner's high. But yes, it's true, it exists. I know that now. And like they say, you really can't explain it, you just have to experience it.
I've grown up near Rancho San Antonio, so the trails are familiar to me, though I had a new experience this weekend during the downhill portion of the Upper Wildcat trail. Traveling up the back way to Upper Wildcat, via Rogue Valley, entails shuffling along on a high altitude climb for what seems like five miles (though it's probably less than two). It's an amazingly challenging climb - back and forth, zigging and zagging to the peak, at which point you are rewarded with one of the most spectacular views of the Bay Area in the early morning. (I suspect, the view was put there so people won't complain about doing all that work for nothing.)
After stretching your glutes and refilling your lungs (which have shrivelled up to tiny sacs of pain) at the peak, you embark on the terrific downhill maze of Upper Wildcat. However, at a regular downhill rate, the scenery changes so quickly in comparison to the initial climb, that you feel like you should stop to take pictures. But for me, it literally became a blur when I found myself being propelled forward at a fantastic rate, thanks to the combined forces of gravity and Shot Blocks. I didn't hold back, and in fact just relaxed while my feet pattered down the trail, faster and faster, and my body fell forward as my legs kicked up behind me. My body started moving in precise harmony, and I watched as the dappled light through the trees started to flicker as I sailed through the woods.
Oddly enough, my legs didn't tire, and my lungs were comfortably airy (due to the quick descent), and after about five full minutes at this speed, I truly felt like I was flying. In fact, the feeling was so supreme, I started laughing as I realized that I had reached that inexplicable sensation some people call "the runner's high".
Granted, I had just expended an intense amount of effort to get to the top of that hill, and now I was going downhill so fast I didn't have a chance to relish the descent...but it didn't seem to matter as I felt so amazingly charged. The rest of the run was somewhat robotic in that my body was working in perfect sync on its own accord for a solid two miles.
And in fact, by the time I finished the run, I felt like I wanted to do it all over again, just to get that supreme rush. Yes, I wanted to climb that wretched hill all over again, that's how great it felt!
The mind-boggling moral to this anecdote is that I have tried to enjoy running for years, thinking that I could only stand it in little bouts. But now, after training for miles on end, I've discovered that I like the long hard runs. Why? Perhaps because I didn't think I'd ever get to that state, that runner's high. But yes, it's true, it exists. I know that now. And like they say, you really can't explain it, you just have to experience it.
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