Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Marathon Stories, Part Seventeen

I promise, I have almost all the marathon stuff out of my system. (Not quite, though)

But I thought I’d share one or two more stories from the race.

At just beore the aid station at mile 21, this woman/girl/lady was jogging along about 300 feet or so ahead of me, just plopped down on the side of the road and whipped out her cell phone and began to make a call.

By the time I trudged up to her she was talking on the phone:

“I’m done.”
She listens. Someone is asking her if she’s OK, I think.
“No, I’m done with this thing. I’m NOT taking another step.”

By this time a whole bunch of us concerned marathoners were gathered around her, all of us motioning for the “tired runner” van which started trucking toward our little huddled group.

“Are you OK?”

“Yes, I’m fine, thanks, but I’m not going any further, I’m done. NOT ONE MORE STEP.”

I wasn’t sure whether to feel bad for her (she *only* had five miles to go, atfer all) or perversely delighted that she knew when she’d had enough and also knew exactly what to do about it. Just sit right down and wait for a cab (or whatever) to come along and pick her up. I also have to wonder about people who bring cell phones to a marathon. I ran next to a guy who answered his cell and it sounded like he was closing on a house. Something about a carpet allowance.

Second story, which needs a visual and I’ll draw something tomorrow, when I have access to a Wacom tablet at work during lunch.

After the race, I had collected my belongings which I’d dropped of at the start of the race.

One really nice thing about marathons is that the people in charge seem to be highly organized and efficient. So I was given a numbered bag, in which I deposited my warm up clothes and I could coolect them ater the race. I could have also elected to toss the bag by the side of the road within the first five miles and someone would pick it up. Kind of amazing to me, really.

I was limping back to where Re and the kids were waiting for me and I had to stop because of this two foot ledge drop-off thing on the sidewalk. (No, not the gutter, but those were hard to navigate as well). Basically, the park sloped downward, and this ledge was a natural part of the landscape. But because of the pain in my quads (the front part of my thighs), walking down anything was nigh unto impossible. I live in the basement at work, and I’ve been walking down the stairs backwards; otherwise I just grunt and moan with every step down.

The funny thing is that there were THREE of us all standing there at that ledge, looking down and wondering how the hell we could navigate the thing. I looked over and said to the other two runners, “Well, I guess we are stuck here, until either we heal, someone lifts us down or they build a ramp.” We all shuffled over to where the ledge met the rest of the park and made our way down. I was proud because I only grunted once. The other guys grunted way more.

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Holy Crap! Look at all this STUFF down here. It's awesome!

 

Really, I'm glad you made it down here. Almost no one ever comes down here. I'm like in a freaking dungeon down here. I get lonely. But not you. YOU made it all the way to the end of the page. For this I think I've a little crush on you. I don't know, is "love" to strong a word to use in this situation? Well, if it's not "love," then it's very strong "like." I'm totally in like with you for coming down here. You are awesome. Please love me back! I know, I know, I shouldn't be all needy, it's not attractive at all, but you don't know how it is to be stuck down here. Who scrolls all the way to the end of a page anymore these days? Anyway, thanks for shedding some light down here in the depths. I appreciate it. Shoot me an email and I'll send you a dollar, OK?

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