The title of this post might be misleading for any number of reasons. Today’s run/walk was probably not the last long run I’ll ever do, and frankly there wasn’t all that much running involved.
But I have the much anticipated (at least by me) Crim race next Saturday, and today was my last long training run in preparation for actually accomplishing the ten hot and hilly miles next weekend.
It’s not as though I’ve been training methodically. Or even with a plan. I just tried to run longer once a week than I did the week before. And I tried to get out there one or two other times during the week to do 3 or 4 miles.
And even then it wasn’t really running like I remember from the days when I was young. It was shuffle along for a quarter mile, gasp for air and walk at least part if not all of the next quarter, then pick up the speed and shuffle along again.
And if there was a big uphill, then all bets are off and walking was totally acceptable. Unless I wanted to prove something to myself, in which case I sometimes shuffled to the top just to say I could.
But not generally.
This morning I did my last long run/walk at my favorite park. It’s where I used to run long every weekend, often meeting one or more of my running friends to talk and run together.
Along the familiar route today I’d remember things from previous runs. A running partner with a frozen water supply line here, a couple of dancing cranes there, the spot that Katie rested before we headed back to the car on one of our walks.
And sometime during mile 7 as I was slogging up a little hill to round the flagpole, ensuring my total would be ten miles because I added that ‘little’ out and back at Turtlehead, I remembered that once, many years ago while training alone I had come up this very hill and found a flock of cedar waxwings swarming a tree. I looked up at the tree again, now perhaps twenty years later, and imagined those birds, their little bodies fliting among the branches, the color on their tails. I remembered how I stood there a long time watching them way back then. And I noticed birds flitting among the same trees, though my eyesight is much worse now than it was then, so I thought today’s birds were sparrows.
Until I got closer and heard the little snuffling tweets they made as they flew back and forth.
Could it be? Not possible! But yes, up in the top of the trees was a flock of cedar waxwings, yellow band on their tails the tell-tale sign. I had to laugh out loud, though to be honest, crawling up a hill in mile 7 of a ten mile run is not generally a time I spend a lot of time laughing.
I guess sometimes you can conjure up memories and make them real if you give your mind free reign.
Anyway, I saw lots of things on this run, the pictures here are all taken with my phone, often while I was still moving. They aren’t great photogenically, but they tell you the story of a (very) long run during a grey, foggy morning, at my favorite park.
And I’m very very glad it’s done.
August 16, 2019 at 4:46 pm
I like your photos and your musings. I agree that summer is slipping right through our fingers. I also like your no plan approach to training. Very sensible and simple.
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August 17, 2019 at 5:55 pm
Simple always works best for me.
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August 16, 2019 at 5:32 pm
So wonderful about the Cedar Waxwings! I am so very impressed and awed by your ability to get out and do so many miles!!
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August 17, 2019 at 5:56 pm
The Cedar Waxwings were pretty darn cool.
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August 16, 2019 at 7:46 pm
Trees and shrubs here in the Pacific NW are “turning” early this year. They are so gorgeous.
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August 17, 2019 at 5:57 pm
I always love fall when it arrives, but I’m always dragging my feet in August, not ready for it.
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August 16, 2019 at 9:34 pm
Shuffle, gasp, walk, then do it again. I can’t run anymore b/c of all the hardware in my neck so I envy whatever it takes for you to do that 10-mile run, Dawn. In my running days, a friend and I used to joke that we were gonna take home all the prizes in the 60+ category. Pipe dreams for both of us….
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August 17, 2019 at 5:58 pm
We’ve said that too, checking our time in the old days in the paper results…looking how far down it would take us in age that we’d place at our current pace. LOL. We figured we could qualify for Boston when we were about 85.
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August 17, 2019 at 7:13 pm
we would have seen each other in Boston! 😀
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August 18, 2019 at 7:45 am
Lol!!!
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August 17, 2019 at 7:20 am
I miss being able to run, I’m recuperating though, one day… Until then, I’ll miss the focus and otherly world you enter when you run. It always seemed as though I did the majority of my best thinking when I was out on the trails. Enjoy!!!
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August 17, 2019 at 5:58 pm
Yes, a lot of good thinking happens when I run alone…or good conversation when I have someone with me. Hope you are all rehabbed soon!
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August 17, 2019 at 9:53 am
Ah, yes, the feeling of a long run. I can remember that feeling. It’s a good thing. Congrats and best wishes for a great run next week!
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August 17, 2019 at 6:43 pm
Thank you Shelley! I hope it’s not as hot as it is now…but likely it will be. The race starts at 8, so maybe we can get done before it’s too miserable out. Though one year I remember doing it when the temps were in the 90s and there was 90% humidity. I’m too old for that now.
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August 18, 2019 at 7:58 am
You’re welcome! I hope for you, too, that the weather isn’t as hot. It’s miserable to run in that heat!
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August 17, 2019 at 12:03 pm
Much success on the walk/run next weekend!
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August 17, 2019 at 5:59 pm
Thank you Maggie!
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August 17, 2019 at 12:59 pm
I hope you do great next weekend. I was never a runner a fast walker yes but never a runner.
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August 17, 2019 at 5:59 pm
I’m not really a runner either. And just between you and me I like walking slow. 🙂
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August 17, 2019 at 4:36 pm
I admire your ambition! Best of luck!
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August 17, 2019 at 5:59 pm
Thank you Grammy!
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August 20, 2019 at 6:08 am
A shuffle-run is totally acceptable in my book. The sights you encounter on these trainings make a shuffle-run-walk the perfect pace. If you were cruising along any faster, just think of all the sights you’d miss — we’d miss through your eyes!
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August 20, 2019 at 12:25 pm
I’ve thought that myself. Sometimes when I’m ‘running’ I think I’d rather be on a bike, would be so much easier, but I KNOW I’d miss some pretty stuff on a bike. Just like when I’m shuffling along, sometimes I’m sure I miss stuff I’d see if I were walking…but honestly, shuffling is about the same as walking.
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