Half the marathon, all the fun

As late as Saturday evening, I still didn’t feel certain that I could run 13 uninterrupted miles, even though it was less than twelve hours until the start time of the first half-marathon for which I’d ever registered.

I was fairly confident. I’d set my sights on a half-marathon back in November, and for the past eight months, I’d been doing weekly runs of 10-12 miles, along with daily runs of about 2-4 miles. I was within spitting distance of that 13.1-mile mark; I just had never actually done the entire distance.

“The problem,” I told my friend Nicole, herself a distance runner who only recently started competing in half-marathons, “is that when I finish these ten- or eleven-mile runs, I always feel okay. But I never feel like, ‘Gee, I really feel like going another mile or two. Or three.’ I’m just really glad it’s done.”

Nicole assured me I needn’t worry. “You just take your longest comfortable distance,” she told me. “Then you add another mile for the confidence that wearing a race bib gives you, and another mile on top of that for the boost from the spectators.” If she was right, that would put be right up close to the 13.1-mile mark, and knowing it was an oceanside course made me think that by 12.5 miles, I’d be able to see the finish line. Surely once I could see it, I could reach it.

All of this sounded plausible to me. Sure, I could probably run 13.1 miles. Probably. But I couldn’t possibly know for sure until I tried.

So on Sunday morning, I tried, and I’m very happy to say I succeeded. I didn’t run it fast or particularly skillfully. In fact, out of a field of 2,189 runners, I came in 2,007. “I prefer to think of it as 182 runners still behind me when I finished,” I told my sister.

But even as I said it, I knew that was the wrong attitude. It shouldn’t matter that there were nearly 200 people who ran the course slower than I did. It shouldn’t even matter that there was anyone who ran the course slower than I did. It should matter only that I finished.

And even that, as I often remind myself, doesn’t matter all that much in the greater picture. Running may be good for you physically, but it’s also, to some degree, frivolous. I’ve maintained a daily running streak of more than 2,500 days – next month I’ll hit the seven-year mark – but as I often say when people congratulate me for that, there are far more worthwhile things I could try to do every day.

Yet even frivolity may have its purpose. I’ve run only about a half-dozen races in my life – a mix of 5k’s, 10k’s, and five-milers until Sunday's longer route – and one thing each race has in common is that once it begins, I feel a sense of liberation from all other cares. For the duration of the time I’m running, I give myself permission to think only about the run. Not work assignments; not family issues; not national or international political conflict. Just putting one foot in front of another, that most primal of actions.

Sunday was no exception; it just lasted longer. For more than two hours – okay, I’ll admit it: two hours and 39 minutes – running was all that mattered. Yes, that’s frivolous, but it’s also healing. The rest was waiting for me. I had plenty of opportunities on Monday to catch up on work and family and national headlines. Sunday morning, it was just me and the race course. And the blue sky and the sun. And the cheering spectators. And the sparkling ocean. And all the oxygen I needed, in the air around me every time I breathed in.

As the race ended, I almost wished I wasn’t quite at the finish line yet. Miles 9 through 12 had become a little bit arduous, but the final mile melted away. I almost felt like I hadn’t savored it quite enough before it ended.

Frivolous. Yes, that’s true. But also magnificent. And I was so very happy to have reached this personal goal.

The difficulty of measuring importance

It’s hard to gauge the importance of some events.

I spent a lot of time over the past month working on the annual spring faculty-staff luncheon at our school, which took place yesterday. It was my third year as volunteer co-chair for this event, but it hasn’t gotten any easier over time – just more familiar. Every year, the job involves weeks of sending out emails asking parents to contribute food, beverages, paper goods or money to the event and reminding them of what an important way this is to show our appreciation to our school’s very deserving professionals.

The event went beautifully yesterday. More than one hundred families prepared dishes or donated other items, and the 150 faculty and staff members who filed through the buffet line and then sat down to eat amidst decorations and flowers that transformed the school lunchroom all seemed delighted. Dozens of the teachers, aides, administrators and support staff who attended thanked my co-chair and me for our work in coordinating the event.

All of this makes me really happy. I like that this annual event makes the teachers and staff feel appreciated by the parents – they deserve that feeling. And in spite of the weeks of sending emails, organizing plans, purchasing paper products and decorations, and preparing my own contributions to the luncheon, I always enjoy working with the other volunteers. In the end, we always have fun.

And yet as tired as I was when it was over, I couldn’t help feeling a little sheepish that the big event taking up so much of my time and energy had been planning a luncheon. I thought of other women my age whose typical work days consist of performing heart transplants, captaining fishing boats, advocating for children in court. Those all seem like fine justifications for being tired at the end of the day. Hosting a luncheon seems a little trivial given the time and energy that went into it.

It’s one of those things that’s difficult to judge: is it frivolous that I spent so much time on this, or is it just a matter of how everyone does good in their own way? My work day will probably never consist of lifesaving medical procedures or legal advocacy for the needy. If I can throw a luncheon that makes a fairly large number of deserving teachers and staff feel appreciated, isn’t that a reasonable justification for the time it consumed?

I’m not sure. I was happy to do it, though I’m even happier now that it’s over for another year. I just can’t quite decide. Does the sense of benevolence and goodwill that this event generated outweigh the intrinsic implication of frivolity?

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to draw that line in the sand. But just thinking about it reminds me of an interview I did earlier this spring. I had the opportunity to write an article on Peggy McKibben, whose son is internationally acclaimed environmentalist Bill McKibben. At the end, she referred to the fact that people the world over have learned about climate change threats and other significant issues from Bill – through his books or his articles or hearing him speak or participation in a project his foundation organized. But, she said, her other son is a second grade teacher In Maine, and he holds a lot of influence over his small group of seven-year-old followers as well. Who knows which of the two men really has the greater impact?, she asked rhetorically. And she’s right. There’s no way of measuring one’s potential impact or ability to do good.

My luncheon won’t change the world, not even a little bit. But the guests had fun attending it and the volunteers felt good about hosting it. Frivolous? Maybe. But it generated good feelings all around, and that’s something the importance of which I simply do not know how to gauge.