A Metaphorical (Half) Marathon

I’m running a marathon.  Well, a half marathon.  No, this is not one of my beloved metaphors.  September 20^th I will literally be running 13.1 miles.  I have never been a runner.  Quite the opposite-I’ve hated running.  Back in high school when we had to run miles and miles with the crew team, I can remember running and waiting for the last person to pass me so I could turn around at whatever point I was at and not finish the whole run (cheating is such a strong word). On an off I have taken up running over the years but never stuck with it long. So, when the gym I go to started a training program for this particular race I was skeptical.

I decided that I would sign up.  People that are runners swear it makes you feel good and I’m all about doing anything that helps in that department these days.  My thought was I would set this as a goal, a concrete, attainable goal.  A goal that I could get up and work towards reaching, every day.  I would do this as an attempt to show myself that I am moving forward after losing Jack. 

I am running a half marathon.  This is not a metaphor.  But it could be…

Getting up early and forcing myself out of bed can be brutal and I often contemplate crawling back into bed, feeling unready to face what is lying ahead. I start slow and feel off balance the first few steps.  It can be incredibly uncomfortable and quite literally takes my breath away.  It hurts something fierce.  I ask myself how I can possibly do this; how will I ever finish?  I have moments where I feel like I may be finding my stride and others where I have to will myself to take just one more step and not stop.  At the end of a day, after I have left everything I’ve got left in my tank out there, I think I just may be able to pull this off after all and I fall asleep exhausted.  Yesterday, I just didn’t have it in me.  I got up with the intention to have a good run but I was just dragging.  I decided to call it quits and go home early.  I beat myself up about it all day, feeling like I haven’t made much progress at all.  But I decided instead to view it this way: It is not going to be easy and it is going to take an insane amount of work but little by little I will get there. 

End metaphor. 

So I, former running hater, have decided to undertake a half marathon.  I will run for my children. I run for Kennedy Egan, to teach her that sometimes really awful things will happen in life and you have to find a way to keep going even when you won’t want to; to teach her to be strong. I run for Jack Holden, to show him I will live on for him and honor him.

Grieving, like running sometimes, isn’t a sprint; it’s a (half) marathon.