Fighting disheartenment

Getting out for runs this week. 

So, I started this post a few days ago and decided not to publish it, feeling that people have already read enough about the Boston attacks from the running community. But I have to admit that this did affect my mood this week, and it's been helpful to hash out the emotions. 

I was one of those sentient children who occasionally became deeply affected by world events. Some of my oldest memories are framed by news images I saw on a television screen. I was 6 years old when the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster happened. My first grade teacher screened the live coverage in the background of whatever else we were doing that day. I remember distraction among my classmates, but my teacher was watching the news intently, and I also couldn't take my eyes off the screen. She remarked that it was a "sad day for America," but I remember my predominant emotion was fear.

Looking back, this visceral fear had less to do with scary images of burning debris falling from the sky, and more to do with the budding understanding that the potential for bad things surrounded me and everyone else, everywhere. No one had total control of a situation. From an early age I believed that safety was fleeting, and so I never felt safe. This fostered a growing entrapment in my own subtle fears, until one day I woke up in a cold sweat at age 22 and decided I needed to get a handle on this creeping anxiety — not by avoiding fear, but by confronting it.

So this week. Everyone has their own reactions to the predominant events of this week. Like many of my peers, I spent Monday morning tracking a few friends and family members in the Boston Marathon. I was particularly excited about my Aunt Marcia, who was a role model for me when I was growing up. She was my "Ironman aunt" that I'd brag about to friends long before I even remotely considered myself an athlete, and she was good at touting empowering sentiments to my cousins and me. For several years, she battled through a dark period of her life from which she recently emerged, and found comfort and renewed strength when she took up running again.

Last September, after reading one of my books for the first time, she sent me a thoughtful e-mail that I cherish: "There have been many, many days where I have been so empty and I have — not just thought but KNOWN — that there was no way I could go on. Yet, somehow, someway, I pull something from that innermost part of me and I just keep going. I don't know where that comes from and you did a beautiful job of describing it. When people tell me I'm crazy or how determined I am or what a bad-ass I am, I just smile and say "I can't help it, it's in my genes." Well, damn girl, I was and continue to be right. I am proud to swim in that gene pool with you and proud to call you family."

When she qualified for and went to Boston, I was excited for her. I checked her progress on the Web only minutes before I learned of the explosions. I knew she hadn't finished yet. I knew she was probably close or right there when the blasts happened. And I let that childlike sense of helpless fear creep back in. What if?

My aunt is among the lucky ones. She finished faster than she has ever finished a marathon, about ten minutes before the first bomb went off. She and a friend made their way beyond the impact zone — but still close enough to witness much of the chaos. Her friend who was waiting for her at finish line remarked, "Her training and speed may have saved us all. We started making our way to the recovery area after she passed by, and we got four blocks away from the blast zone."

Ten more minutes ... Monday's marathon is filled with hundreds of similar stories. With such a reduced degree of separation, it's difficult not to feel personally impacted by these bombings, even though I was not there and no one I know was physically harmed. At the same time, it's a reminder that catastrophes and senseless violence happen with astonishing regularity around the world. I've grown into one of those news junkie adults, so I encounter disturbing stories and images nearly every day. And I do ask myself why I should feel so much more shaken by the marathon attacks than I do about bombings in Iraq, or violence in Africa, or even the fertilizer plant explosion in Texas. They all strike at the heart of my childhood fear — that things can go bad for everyone, everywhere. Just as there's no way for us to completely shield ourselves from evil and disasters, there's no way to completely shield ourselves from this fear.

So I've been feeling a bit down ever since. Another act of terrorism — another act of senseless violence, and more calls to limit freedoms in the name of "security," which would be an illusion at best and oppressive at worst. There have been suggestions that cities should reduce or cancel big marathon events, or that runners should avoid congregating in large groups — even though it's highly unlikely that the attacks had anything to do with "running." Meanwhile, we're doing little more than fleeing from shadows.

But then I consider how I'd feel if my aunt wasn't one of those who returned safely. There are never definitive answers, which is why it's easy to feel so helpless or scared. But I'm reminded why it's important to refuse to give in to fear, no matter how big or small, in all aspects of life. And even though I know the attacks were directed at a high-profile event rather than runners specifically, I'm heartened by the meme my aunt posted shortly after she returned: "If you're trying to defeat the human spirit, marathoners are the wrong group to target." 

Danni's diet run

I reflected in my last post about hunger for adventure and the way it drives my life, and then settled into a rather uneventful week at home. Like all things in life, even adventure needs balance, an ebb and flow. April is generally a quiet month, and it's a good time to hunker down, do income-generating work, finish taxes, organize, spring clean, buy new furniture, scrape the winter mud off bikes, schedule appointments, take the car in for service ... and of course the mundane list goes on. Life maintenance, my friends call it. The stuff that is required to continue having adventures.

And of course there is training. Training is a less mundane and arguably less important component of future adventuring. But it is important. I feel like I put some great deposits in my fitness bank during the winter, and then I went ahead and withdrew everything in Alaska. It was worth it, but I returned to California with tired jelly legs and little maintained running fitness. My big summer adventures will require me to be comfortable and confident on my feet, and I feel like I need to rebuild my base. I filled the week with moderate-distance trail runs under the mantra of "time on my feet, get used to the heat" ... with the hope that my legs will eventually HTFU, my stomach will get back on line with this warm-weather nonsense, and then I can do a short build of the relative speed I'll need to finish the Quicksilver 50-miler, which has a 12-hour cutoff and is four weeks away (May 11). It seems to be working so far.

One actual fun thing that happened this week is my friend Danni visited on Friday and Saturday. She was in San Francisco for work and was able to swing an extra day with us before she had to jet back to Montana. Three weeks ago, Danni completed the White Mountains 100 — a hundred miles of sled-dragging in the fierce cold and snow of Fairbanks, Alaska — and then chased that adventure with a week of endurance gluttony and sloth (her words) in Mexico. She then decided to complete the trifecta with a three-week, extreme low-carb diet (she tells me she's just trying to quickly trim down to her fighting weight so she can keep up with fast hiking partners during summer backpacking trips.) Danni's diet is ridiculous, really, for someone whose weight loss needs are questionable at best; it includes a mere 50 grams of carbohydrates a day and stipulates that it's not a good idea to exercise at all while adhering to its strict nutrition plan. Despite this dire warning, Danni thought it would be interesting and fun (her words) to try a twelve-mile trail run with minimal glycogen in her muscles and no carbs for fuel (she did buy a Builder Bar to break open in case of extreme bonk.) I do love the way Danni thinks.

Beat put together a loop on our home mountain that included nearly 3,000 feet of climbing on steep pitches interspersed with long, rolling descents. Danni was excited to try out her new Anton Krupicka signature race vest and Lululemon shorts that she picked up in San Fran — and as all runners and cyclists know, any run or ride infused with new gear automatically becomes at least 15 percent more fun. I was interested to see how Danni did with the "bonk run." I've actually always wanted to try one of these in training, to test my own capabilities to burn fat as fuel. But so far I've been too scared (and also admittedly adverse to fasts of any sort.)

In short, she did great. She said her muscles felt empty and she had an overall low level of energy, but her energy level did remain steady during the run and she was able to maintain a consistent pace. We speculated that her long-distance endurance base is probably what boosted her through the run; few people would endure, let along tolerate, such a long effort on so little glycogen. Danni's experiment does bring up interesting considerations about fueling during long runs. My stomach is prone to turning sour — plus carrying food is a pain — so I'm intrigued by the notion of training my body to burn fat during a long endurance event. But I do prefer high-level energy to low-level energy, and I'd rather finish my adventures rather than flare out in a glorious bonk. So I'll probably stick to carbs for the time being.

This week was my first in quite a long while with zero biking. Sad, in many ways, but I was in a time crunch for much of the week that left me less time for going outside, and also committed to rebuilding my running base. Gotta get those feet in shape somehow. I feel good about my progress. During today's run with Beat, I felt gooey and sluggish and couldn't hold his pace without feeling pukey, so I shadowed behind and lamented my slowness. But after we wrapped up twelve miles on what is a tough trail route for me, I looked at my watch and saw it took two hours and nine minutes, which is not all that bad. Deposits in the fitness bank for a rich future of adventuring.

Monday: 6.2 miles, 983 feet of climbing
Tuesday: 0
Wednesday: 9.6 miles, 2,455 feet of climbing
Thursday: 8.1 miles, 1,592 feet of climbing
Friday: 7.0 miles, 1,213 feet of climbing
Saturday: 12.0 miles, 2,990 feet of climbing
Sunday: 11.9 miles, 2,229 feet of climbing
Total: 54.8 miles, 11,462 feet of climbing

Is there enough?

Flecks of snow fluttered into my eyes as the front tire spit a stream of grit toward my face. It seemed like a less than dignified way to end a journey that began two months ago under the scorching sun of Salt Lake City's August, and finished on this country road silenced by Upstate New York's October. And yet it hardly seemed real as the autumn storm intensified into a light blizzard — I got on my bike Utah, and pedaled it 3,200 miles, and ended up here ... in New York! I expected — no, scratch that, I knew that this would be the defining journey of my adult life. Someday I would tell my grandkids or my grandnieces and nephews this story, about the time I rode a bicycle across the United States. "Nothing can ever top this," I thought, and I believed it.

It's been nearly ten years since I pedaled from Salt Lake City to Syracuse, New York — that once-in-a-lifetime journey which, I told myself, would satisfy my craving for adventure. I used to believe things like that, genuinely. I convinced myself that this desire which hummed from the deepest core of my consciousness could finally be quelled by one great adventure. Then I could get on with my life — whatever that was. My bicycle tour across the country was a thundering crescendo. I was going to return from New York, take up residence at the newsroom desk that awaited me in Utah, move out of my college commune, and rent my first very own apartment. I was going to do the things adults do — whatever those things were.

Everyone who knows me, knows exactly how that worked out.

"I'm sure even some of my closest friends may find it hard to believe when I say I've always believed that, at some point, one of these experiences will turn out to be "enough." That's not to say, I'd be done with trail running or give up long, multi-day treks. It just means that I won't be driven to find something bigger, harder or "more" than what I've already accomplished. It seems to me that the unbounded pursuit of ever more difficult challenges can only end in a breaking point and I'm not really interested in finding where that is."

— My friend Steve Ansell, reflecting on his recent 350-mile 

journey to McGrath, Alaska, in "Enough" 

On Sunday, I had a chat with Tim Long at the new Elevation Trail podcast about the rhetorical question, "How Far is Enough?" He posted the interview under the title "How Long Distances Lead You Home." The podcast is about an hour long and can be downloaded for on-the-go broadcasting if you are interested in listening. We didn't have time to delve into philosophical concepts of "enough," because I spent too much time describing my own journey toward endeavors that might be perceived as "too much." It all started when I was a teenager, hiking with my dad; he and I would find higher and harder peaks to climb in the Wasatch Mountains. Then it was backpacking, then bicycle touring, and then I found my way into endurance racing via the backdoor of what was then the completely obscure sport of winter cycling. First it was 100 miles, then 350, and then the 2,700-mile Tour Divide. And just when burnout was at an all-time high and "topping" these adventures was becoming more of a logistical problem, I turned to something that's quite difficult for me personally, and thus deeply intriguing — trail running. 

Reading Steve's post prompted me to turn his question of "enough" back on myself. These days, I'm no longer searching for a resolution. I finally concluded that the spirit of adventure is a fundamental component of my identity. For me, adventure is as fundamental — and I might even argue as irrevocable — as eating. And like eating, it's impossible to ever be fully satisfied. I could eat the most epic meal of my life — pounds of sushi, ice cream, a mountainous salad, and all the soda I can guzzle. I'll be full for the rest of the day, and maybe even the next day. But eventually, inevitably, I'm going to be hungry again. And it's not going to take weeks. It won't even be days. One day is all it takes for hunger to creep back in. 

Imagine that somebody invented an implant that gave you all the nutrition you'll need for the rest of your life. You will never have to eat, or feel hungry, ever again. Would you accept this mechanical nutrition device — or would you choose to keep eating? Eating is a huge pain in the ass; it requires a great deal of work, is incredibly easy to overdo, and causes no end of agitation, confusion, and angst. But eating is also one of the joys of life. Each meal carries the promise of something sublime. Would you choose to give it up? Think about it. Given the option, I'd choose to stay hungry. 

Is there a limit to how much I can eat, how much I can do? Of course there is. But just like turning from backpacking to cycling to trail running and points beyond, there are always new opportunities spread across the table. You know what they say about variety — but the spice of life, I believe, lies in those variations that are still untried. Beauty is infinite; as long as I remain hungry, there's no end to the discoveries I can devour. 

 As to the breaking point, Tim Long made a great observation on his own blog:

"I've always looked at life like a rubberband. The further you stretch the pain and suffering, the easier it is to stretch it to that point next time and then you stretch it a little more. Your perception stretches. What was perceived as difficult or maybe even impossible is now ordinary." 

 "What happens when the rubberband snaps?" you may wonder while sipping your tea at your work cubicle, wasting time at work reading this drivel. Death. The metaphor of the snapping rubberband is Death. Up to that point is living full."