Complexity of Moving On

When I wrote yesterday, I mentioned a conversation with a nursing colleague from West Virginia University in which she indicated that she thought my idea of blogging/journaling out my issues was clever.  Today, I had a meeting with a colleague from the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing.  He had known that I was running the Boston Marathon.  After another colleague I had not seen since April 15 came to say hello, my colleague commented on how much he felt bad about not asking about the race.  When I mentioned my blogging, he reminded me that he had begun as a clinical nurse working for the Department of Veterans Affairs and that he had worked with many veterans who suffered from post traumatic stress disorder.  In our roles as evidence-based researchers, he pointed out that there is actually good evidence that journaling (I’m not sure whether it included both privately and publicly in a blog form) could help with post traumatic stress issues.  That is good news for me.  Perhaps my 26 petals into the wind idea will work.

Yet, I have to say that the news of the past day has also illustrated to me just how complex emotions and feelings around a negative event can be.  The news this morning indicated that the two accused on causing the explosions at the Boston Marathon had actually been planning to attack the July 4 celebration in Boston.  However, it appears that when the two who were accused realized that they had all the materials and could assemble the bomb early and they saw the preparations for the Boston Marathon they decided that would be a good target.

When I started the process of writing 26 essays, I thought that all I had to overcome was what I was feeling and what I knew on the day I began.  I had not anticipated the fact that more news would come out.  And that as more news came out, my brain, my heart, and my soul would have to process and figure out what to do with this information.  I thought that I could be rational about putting the stresses, strains, and heartfelt pains of April 15 behind me as rationally as I would make a career decision or a decision about the next project to take on at work.  I had not completely realized that emotions are not something that can be dealt with as rationally as other choices in life. 

Why do I find the new news that the Boston Marathon may not have been the original target of the bombers disturbing?  Well, it comes along with desiring things to be rational.  As just noted, I hoped that my emotional pain could be dealt with rationally.  But it cannot.  From the first moment that the bombing was revealed on April 15, I hoped that the explosions could be explained rationally, but they cannot.

Why would rationality make me feel more comfortable?  I am not sure.  I can always ask why anyone would bomb the Oklahoma City federal building.  To me it makes no sense.  But at least there was a clear target.  I can ask why anyone would take the even more hideous action of crashing airplanes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.  There seemed to be a purpose.  It was not a good purpose.  There would be no good purpose.  But at least I can understand the target and the motivation—even if a wholeheartedly disagree with both. 

In contrast, we have the events of April 15.  Two men who didn’t seem to have much of a plan other than to cause havoc.  Two men who may have had a plan but who changed the plan on a whim.  Two men who appear to have struck out at whatever was the nearest big event that just happened to come along.  That is something that I truly cannot comprehend and that for some reason bothers me more.  At least when there was a clear target, I can understand how I might avoid being present at a target.  But when individuals choose simply to strike out in what seems like a completely random way there is no way to avoid it.  There is no where to run (no pun intended) or hide.  There is simply a need to accept the fact that there is always a risk. 

This actually bring me to an important concept from economics.  The difference between risk and uncertainty.  Risk is something that is known.  Something that is understand.  There is a risk of dying when running a marathon due to a cardiac event.  That risk is not well defined but there has been some research.  I can look up the figures.  I can understand it.  I can describe it.  I can communicate it to others. 

But the unpredictability of the possibility of a terror attack at a race is true uncertainty. Even if I disagreed vehemently with some of the policies Donald Rumsfeld advocated when he was in the Bush Administration, I liked one thing he said.  It was something to the effect of distinguishing between the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns. Or that sometimes a person doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. 

I know the risk of dying from running a marathon.  I don’t know if it will happen to me.  But I understand what I don’t know.  Contrast that with the possibility of a terror attack.  I have no idea of what the risk is.  I have no way of defining that risk any more accurately.  I suppose I could say that I know that I don’t know the risk.  But I don’t even know where the risk would come from.

Running a marathon—I control the risk of death from running a marathon.  Terror incident during the marathon—no control.  Terror incidents in general in seemingly random places.  No control. 

I don’t insist on having control over everything in life.  But I do like to have some appreciation for how much control I lack.  In this case, I simply have no way to conceptualize the lack of control. 

This realization makes me appreciate how complex it will be to move past the events of April 15.  Twenty-six essays will help.  They may or may not move me completely past the events.  Only time will tell.

Hills and Analytics

Last night, I left my office at 4 and drove to Morgantown, West Virginia, to lecture at the West Virginia University School of Nursing today.  It was a very nice lecture with great questions and afterwards I had a quick lunch with the former Dean of the school who asked me how the idea of the writing to work out my stresses came to me.  Other than I have always written and it has helped me to work out my stresses over time, I didn’t know what to answer.  I suppose the 26 essays for a 26 mile race could be called cute or clever (the latter being her word for it) but I can’t imagine that I am the only one who has taken to writing a lot in some format.  All my format does it provide some coherence and gives me a sense of when I will reach my goal.

As the days go on we get more news.  The surviving brother accused of the bombing sent a text of “LOL” to his friend when his friend texted the accused that he looked like the suspect in the picture.  Apparently the young man had even bragged about knowing how to build a bomb.  And his friends tried to help to protect him.  All of this leads me to believe even more that the young man who my friends and I just thought was acting like a real jerk on April 15 at about 3 in the afternoon at the government center stop on the green line of the T may truly have been the surviving accused.  How many people out there would joke about such a thing?

But setting that aside, a drive from Baltimore to Morgantown is characterized by one very important feature.  There are lots of hills.  Now, the hills between Baltimore and Morgantown are bigger when you get closer to Morgantown. And if we were to think about them as hills on a race we could think of them as rolling hills rather than the mostly downhill first half of Boston and the four distinct uphills of the second half. 

Combine the analytic nature of what the investigators are finding about the continuing flow of evidence in Boston with the thinking about hills, and what do I get to write about today?  An analysis of my race.  How the hills affected me?  And how the hills brought on the unexpected.  How hills have repeatedly brought on the unexpected for me.  Yet how similar my last three races have been.  While this theme is only weakly linked to the negative events of the day that I am trying to toss aside like petals plucked from a flower, even simple reflection on the positive aspect of running the race itself will help me to take one step closer to putting the negatives behind me as well.

With that in mind, let’s look at what I ran—based on my Garmin watch.  One note before I start—the Gamrin tells me I ran 26.4 miles.  Perhaps I added a bit by running from side to side to get water at the different water stops.  I won’t ponder this too much because if my average pace was correct and I had just run 26.2, I would have qualified for Boston again next year.   Not that I have any thought of doing it again next year, it would simply have been nice to know that if I wanted to I could.

Setting that aside and focusing on how long it took me to get from the start to the finish regardless of how many miles I ran to get there it is interesting to note that my last three marathon finish times were all within 91 seconds of each other.  I ran 3:15:45 at the NCR Trail Marathon in 2011.  I ran a 3:14:25 at the Lower Potomac River Marathon in 2012.  And I ran a 3:15:56 at the Boston Marathon in 2013.  And that Boston run was with a lot more base but only 4 weeks that I ran between 40 and 50 miles and just 2 weeks when I ran more than 50 miles since the first of the year.  That was all I could manage and the runs were high quality, which was the focus on the training.  I can’t say how I would have done if I had run more miles.  And it doesn’t matter as I didn’t.  The training is done.  The race is done.  I ran exactly what I trained to run.

I can also look at splits and compare them.  The NCR trail marathon began just a bit faster than the Boston Marathon.  But I was able to run the NCR trail marathon much more consistently hanging around 7:20 until the last six miles.  And even the last six miles were held under 8 until the last 2 when we had to run uphill.  Of the three races to compare, the NCR Trail marathon actually had the slowest time at 20 miles, but I hung in well until the very end.

Lower Potomac also started a bit faster than Boston.  In fact, the time remained faster until the conclusion of mile 16.  I’d say I overdid it at mile 16 in Boston as I ran a 7:02.  But I don’t think it was really all that bad as I continued to run and even pulled a 7:10 at mile 22 in Boston (fastest mile 22 by far) but then closed with three miles at 8+.  What helped in contrast at Lower Potomac was the flatness at the end.

My body knew how to handle the mostly flat NCR Trail marathon but didn’t know what to do with that final uphill.  My body made the most of the flat ending of Lower Potomac to open the door to Boston in the first place.  In Boston, my body didn’t know what to make of the first 13 miles downhill and just had nothing left to give to try to pull those last three miles back down.  Through mile 20 was my fastest ever.  So I was doing something right in terms of the slower start and then picking up just as I had discussed with my main running mentor.  What was most interesting was that in the mile that included Heartbreak  Hill I still ran an 8:04 and managed to run a very respectable mile after that.  It was simply that I reached a point at which I really couldn’t get going “fast” again.  I realize that I know many individuals who would be hard pressed to run one 8:11 mile—let alone close out a marathon with that being the slowest mile.  But it was not fast for me.

If I had it to do over again—I don’t know that I would have done anything differently—except to find a way to dig a little deeper at the conclusion.   And if I ever do get a chance to do it again, the whole goal will be to reach the last five miles and put myself back up against the test.  Looking at the last three marathons the path to 20 and what I ran at 20 was highly variable.  The paths through the last 10K were also highly variable with one slowing down but not too much—one being somewhat slow and then really slow—and one being a mix of up and down in the last six. 

Just as I didn’t know what the hills would bring that day—either while I ran them or in the aftermath—and I did not know what the hills would bring today—other than a great opportunity to present my word—I look ahead to new challenges.  Understanding them somewhat in advance.  Being on the lookout for completely unanticipated events along the way.   Making the most of every opportunity and every challenge that presents itself.  And praying to God and for St. Sebastian’s intercession that the dreams and opportunities that motivate the journeys through the challenges will not ever be swept away from me like they were for so many on April 15.  

Everything was in a Fog

It seems like I have gone on for days relating aspects of my tattoo to the events in Boston on April 15, 2013.  Obviously, I never intended to get a tattoo that would have so many symbols that would lead me to keep the events of that fateful day front and center in my thinking and in my life. However, that is what I am left with, and there is at least one more aspect of the tattoo that can be tied into the events of a bit more than two weeks ago.

When Emily was starting on my tatto she had a pencil drawing that was very detailed and very crisp and clear.  Everything didn't necessarily obviously go together but everything was drawn extremely neatly and fit together in the image quite nicely.

However, as she did the outline and began to think about how to fill in the parts of the image that were around the two humans in the tattoo and in the light, she decided to add some mysterious fog.  Mysterious fog was her terminology.  I could not make this up.  So on my tattoo in the part of the scene that is behind St. Sebastian and Irene and in front of the buildings that are in the background, there is some fog.  It does not distort any of the front images but it shows up well in the "light" and helps to remind people that things are not always the way they look and that sometimes we have to look very carefully before we can drawn any conclusions.

What is the link between fog and the events of April 15?  Well, it goes back to being just outside city hall.  Much like many other things from April 15, there will be positives that I ean focus on and negatives as well.   The positive (well, mostly positive) experience that I associate with City Hall was the free runners' dinner.  Multiple types of pasta and meet. Much bread.  Good beverages.  Salad and dressing.  And when all was said and done a nice goody bag.  

While the dinner was excellent and it was very nice to have had a second straight dinner with Rob and Christian, there were also downsides even to the dinner. It was very chilly and the wind was whipping around fiercely.  We survived dinner, but it was not as care free as we would have hoped it could be.

If that had been my only memory of city hall and government center, then I would not have foggy memories of the City Hall area but only positive ones.  But I have another memory of city hall.

The fog comes mostly from one comment made by a kid in his late teens exiting the station at government center at the same time we did when we leave the T's green line after the explosions.  We had to leave the train as it had only been planned to go to government center.  Upon our arrival we were forced to ground level and the number of emergency vehicles with sirens blaring that passed by us was quite amazing.  We were just in a tizzy trying to figure out how to get back to the hotel without walking the whole way.  We figured a cab would work and not be too expensive for any one of us as there were three of us.  But it took a while to find a cab since there were a bunch of other people looking for cabs and city hall was not crowded that day since it was Patriot's Day and a holiday after all.

In any case, as we were walking away from the exit of the subway station, we heard a kid who said, "Run, run".  That was crystal clear.  The three of us together thought it was just some kid being a complete jerk.  This was especially true since there were friends with him who gave a nervous laugh.  

However, it was what came after that that truly made my head spin and the memory become foggy. I swear that the kid said, "Oh no.  Don't bother it is over."  Even if he did not use exactly those words, the three of us in our merry band from Baltimore agreed that it was a very strange thing for anyone to say.  We just figured the kid was being even more of a jerk than any of the three of us could have imagined.

So that is where the whole thing gets foggy to me.  When we saw pictures of the accused on Thursday it occurred to me that the picture looked an awful lot like the kid who had yelled to "run".  Had the person known something?  Had he been involved.  At the time, we didn’t stop him because we really yl

Will I ever know for sure if I was on the train, or in the train station, or even on the plaza with the accused bomber?  Probably not.  Not unless someone as part of the investigation puts together more or less a play by play of the kid’s actions and makes it available to the public.  That alone would be fairly disquieting.  And enough to put my mind in a fog about the trip away from the green line that afternoon and the post race experience generally.

It it also foggy to know whether we should have done anything else at the time.  In the end, I suppose we really did not have enough information to do anything more than to wonder just how much of a jerk the kid was.  If it was the accused bomber, then that tells me just how hard it can be to take action sometimes.  And how hard to even know whether to take action.

I did at least send an email to the FBI.  It turned out that the events of April 18-19 were beginning just as I sent the email, so it probably didn't make any difference.

It just left me even more uncertain.  Why did it matter where the guy was relative to me as long as I did not get injured?  And could I have done anything even if I had know?  Certainly nothing to change any of the relevant outcomes.

I don't have any idea what I thought the accused bomber being in the same space as me would have done for me.  He would not remember me any more than anyone else on the train. I was not a threat.  

It just leaves my memory of the day (particularly the area around city hall) in more of a fog than I ever would have imagined on a sunny and cool Monday morning.

I do have to admit to a huge sense of relief when it was announced that he was caught.  Even though I was not in direct danger, I just achieved satisfaction from knowing that is appeared that the authorities had things under control.  The sense of uncertainty leads to a fogginess that I found intolerable and distracting for at least the first week. 

Light--Bright and Sterile or Warm and Glowing

This is the thirteenth entry in my Beyond Boylston writing cycle (12 truly after Boylston and one about my bib number that was written before I had the opportunity to run down Boylston street but that has an important connection to my running the Boston Marathon and moving past the experience nonetheless.  Thus, it is half way.  Half way through a race I sometimes think of it as being able to see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.  Although I tend to use that metaphor mostly when the race is an out and back type of loop which the Boston Marathon definitely is not.

But light is also one of the key remaining elements in the tattoo that Emily created last year.  Specifically, the modern St. Sebastian is chained to a lamppost under a light at nine at night.  In almost all of the medieval and renaissance artwork depicting St. Sebastian he is tied to a tree in a loin cloth and full of arrows.  In my tattoo he has just two arrows and he is in the modern equivalent of being tied to a tree.

What does the light do?  On the one hand we could interpret the light as drawing attention to the one who has been shot with arrows.  If we think about punishment throughout the ages, sometimes the punishment is hidden so that no one knows exactly what is going on.  At other times the punishment is clear and out in the open--under the lights so to speak--to draw attention to what is going on.  To make an example of what is going on.  Jesus having to carry the cross to where he was crucified. The crucifixion being carried out in a place where so many could see.  St. Sebastian depicted as being shot by archers and left to die in a place where he would be noticed.  All of these are a negative use of something I usually think of in a positive way.

No matter what the true motivation of the two men who stand accused of the bombing at the Boston Marathon they chose the finish line on the beautiful sunshiny day to draw attention.  So, once again, I feel torn by the symbol that is represented in my tattoo and a symbol that I associate with the marathon experience.  People trying to draw attention to a very negative outcome.

However, the light in my tattoo was also helpful for Irene to find St. Sebastian to rescue him.  And while there may be negative interpretations of a light being shined to draw attention to a negative, the most association with light in my mind is with a positive.  Specifically, I think of light as a symbol of hope.  A symbol of goodness.  Perhaps there is an important distinction between a bright white sterile light that is only intended to show a harsh reality and the warm glow of a light intended to guide, to warm, and to provide hopefulness.

The Boston Marathon should be a sign of hopefulness.  It captures the human spirit trying to achieve a goal.  It is the end of a time of striving for so many.  Striving before the race to qualify and to get there and striving on the day of the race to go from Hopkinton to Boylston Street.

Beyond that it is amazing to think of how many people are involved.  Not just the 27,000 runners who are registered.  Not just the 20,000+ who actually started the race.  But also the 8,500 volunteers.  At least that is the number that I recall being quoted at some point either at the expo, at the runner's dinner on Sunday night, or at the start of the race.

Why do I associate volunteers with light? Well, we can go back to George H. W. Bush's comment about the thousand points of light.  He was referring to volunteers.  Now, he was probably referring to volunteers going overseas doing missionary work or working with inner city schools or cleaning up the waterways.  

I don't think that George H. W. Bush was referring to volunteers for the Boston Marathon.  Although perhaps he was.  The fact of the matter is that the experience would be something entirely different without that many volunteers.  That is a ratio of approximate one volunteer for every three runners.  In some ways that seems crazy.  But volunteers are needed throughout the entire process.  Setting up the expo.  Guiding runners at the expo.  Handing out bib numbers.  Handing out t-shirts.  Setting up the dinner for racers on Sunday.  Managing the line for the dinner on Sunday.  Handing out food at the dinner.  Dealing with waste disposal at the dinner.  Handing out goodie bags at the end of the dinner.  Cleaning up after dinner.  Making sure racers know where to get on the buses to Hopkinton on Monday.  Guiding racers once at Hopkinton.  Handing out goodies at Hopkinton.  Taking runners' bags and putting them on school buses.  Getting runners to the start.  Handing out water and nutrition along the race course.  Medics.  Greeting runners at the finish line.  Handing out water and blankets and medals and goodie bags.  Handing runners' checked bags back.

Not just one thousand points of light.  But over 8,000 points of light.  Maybe some of them have run it before.  Maybe some of them just like supporting others.  The key is that it is an incredibly demonstration of people helping others to achieve a dream.  To check an important item off the bucket list.  It is the best example of what a positive and warm light can mean with respect to the race.  It is a wonderful example of how positive the experience of the Boston Marathon can be for so many on a day when it is not marred by the ugliness of hate with all the media spotlight that it attracted.

Thus, as I finish the half-way entry, I notice a theme that comes up over and over again.  Almost everything can be used for good or for evil.  To help or to harm.  To guide or to destroy.  Light is no different--as depicted in the artwork of my tattoo that I carry with me forever or as in the reality of the situation in Boston.  It is for each of us to choose how to use each thing in life--for good or evil.  And when someone chooses to use something that is intended for good instead for evil to resist the temptation to wallow.  To struggle with figuring out why.  To struggle to move ahead.  And to answer with a resoundingly positive "yes, I can make it better and use it for good" rather than just letting it go.  

My City's Skyline

On Saturday morning when I ran approximately 14 miles, it included a lap around the lake in Druid Hill Park.  I don't always carry my cell phone with me--I certainly didn't when I ran the Boston Marathon--but, that day, I did.  I don't often stop while I am running--I didn't when I ran in the Boston Marathon--but, that day, I did.  And when I do stop it is not often to take pictures, but, the day, I did.  The pictures included the tower in Druid Hill Park and the city skyline in the background in at least one.

This is just one view of the city skyline.  There are others.  The view in the tattoo on my leg is a view looked west along Lexington Street in the mid-1930's.  It was adapted from a photograph in the book, Baltimore Then and Now that the tattoo artist with whom I worked, Emily Sloman, used to help to develop the tattoo image.

Why is this important?  Running the Boston Marathon gives the runner a chance to see many small towns leading up to Boston and to see some of the skyline in Boston in the final approach to the city. Once on Boylston Street, the runner is actually not there for terribly long and is surrounded by tall buildings approaching the finish line.

The images from April 15 that were on television that will be forever remembered are the images right at the finish line that really don't show any of the skyline at all.  And when people hear the names of businesses from which the security cameras took pictures, people can develop a mental image of the business and shopping area.

Since I have returned to Baltimore, I have run almost exclusively in the city with a few of my runs going into the part of Baltimore county that is closest to my home as I run in a large loop. The key here is that regardless of the choice of course (all in the city or partially in the county) they are all familiar.  And that familiarity gives me comfort.  It is a familiarity that lets me say, here is a course I know.  Here is a course I understand.  Here is a course on which I am intimately familiar with the risks.  And the biggest risk I have on most of the courses is twisting my ankle in a pothole and not any sort of terrorist event.  Running places that I know gives me a sense of security.

The security comes, at this point, from referring to Baltimore as "my city".  When we moved here back in 1996, I am not sure that I ever envisioned calling Baltimore my city.  I had spent all my years growing up just outside of Philadelphia thinking of Upper Darby as my home town.  I had watched the evolution of the city's skyline.  But when I went to get the tattoo and had my first conversation with Emily, she asked what I wanted for the background.  She asked where my parents were from--thinking perhaps that they may have been first generation immigrants and that we could end up with a European skyline.  I assured her that my parents were not first generation.  She asked where I was from and I thought about a Philadelphia skyline.  It certainly would have been interesting to think about Independence Hall or William Penn atop City Hall in Philadelphia.  But I focused on Baltimore as the city in which my spirituality (which led me to the tattoo in the first place) had matured.  It is "my city" more than any other city.

What I had not realized at the time but is so important to me now is that Baltimore is not only the city in which my spirituality matured, it is also the city in which my running matured.  It is the city with which I identify my running.  Yes, I have raced in Philadelphia and Sydney, Australia.  Yes, I have runs that I remember from workouts in Chicago and San Francisco.  But, ultimately, Baltimore is home.  And the skyline that Emily portrayed in sepia tones is a wonderful reminder of all that the city and my part in it has meant in my life for almost 17 years now.

While the lake in Druid Hill Park is not the only lake in the city (there is also Lake Montelbello which is also a beautiful silver grey just before sunrise), it is the lake that to me is the most interesting.  The shape of the land around the lake allows a runner to feel a sense of accomplishment from running uphill to reach the side of the lake near the tower.  This is totally different from Montebello where the circle around the lake is pretty flat.  Flat in terms of no rise in elevation although most of the course is titled so that the inside is lower than the outside when running around.

Reaching the top of the hill (albeit a small hill) near the tower, as I said, gives a sense of accomplishment.  Combine that with overlooking the downtown skyline and it is really powerful for me.  Obviously, I cannot see the entire city from there, but when I reach that point, I can say, "Here is where I live.  Here is where I am.  Here is the place I call home."  Taking that forward gives me hope and contentment.  Taking that forward makes me feel like life and running is under control.  Taking that forward points the way to feeling whole in a way that was robbed from me for some time after the Boston Marathon.  Despite finishing.  Despite no injuries to myself.  Despite the fact that I know there were over 200 injuries, 3 deaths, and a town locked down for a day at the end of the week of the marathon and those involved were all worse off than I was, I still felt robbed of all the contentment, security, comfort, and hope that I now have regained for the most part.  And part of regaining it is visiting the same places that I have visited before.  Over and over again.  Noticing the little things.  And feeling the sense of healing that the bring.  

More Strong Women--My Training Partners

This is the fourth day on which I will discuss my tattoo with respect to my experience in and around the Boston Marathon.  Yesterday I spoke about the most important strong woman in my life--my wife.  There are many other strong women in my life--personal and professional. However, when it comes to running, one of the most important groups of strong women is the group of women with whom I train.

It is funny that I never really thought of running as a place to meet a lot of women when I was in high school.  But, the simple fact of the matter is that in my circle of running friends (and at least on  Facebook running friends account for one of every six people on my list), women are a majority.  And among the people I run with most often, women are the dominant majority.

In Back on My Feet, Team Christopher's Place supports gentleman in a work training program.  But most of the non-resident runners who come from the community to run with the guys are women.  And while none of the women from Team CP is one of my most frequent training partners, it is definitely the case that much of the team leadership has been female and those women definitely have shared their energy and enthusiasm for running with the entire team to make running a better experience for all concerned.

But it is not only the women in Back on My Feet who have made a difference.  I can count five women in particular who represent important aspects of my training experience.  They represent how running is an egalitarian sport.  Everyone faces the same course.  Everyone faces the same rules.  Everyone faces the same objective--get to the finish line as quickly as possible given the condition you are in.

The first of the women I will mention is the one with whom I formed a two-person marathon relay team.  She and I called our team "Who's the Mentor?"  The question in this case reflects the fact that I have served as a professional mentor, she has served as a running mentor, and together we have taken each of these issues into other parts of our lives.  In the weekend before the marathon we shared emails in which I credited her for her ability to share her enthusiasm and bring others to do things and she credited me with helping to motivate her and see her through her academic program and then challenged me to strive for greatness at Boston.  Not greatness in the sense of winning against all others but in the sense of being all that I could do.  I think I rose to that challenge on April 15.  Most days when we train together she runs ahead or at least sounds like she is not working as hard based on her steps and her breathing but there are days when I run ahead.  She is an excellent runner and clearly the better runner of the two of us but she is human.  And the strength with the humanity makes clear just how egalitarian running is.  On any given day either one of us might run ahead--although at the end of the day, she has the better personal best times.  She is a leader.  She has run Boston, but not this year.

The second woman who is a consistent training partner is a fellow employee at Johns Hopkins.  She has times that are just about as good as or better than mine at most distances but she points out that her times have been getting worse while mine have been getting better.  I am not entirely sure about that but it is an interesting juxtaposition.  I usually run ahead on the track.  She easily keeps on the occasional long run.  We have never run a race together.   We ponder whether running a race together might help each of us to get a better time.  She has run Boston, but not this year.  While she did not have all the same inspiring words as my relay partner, it was wonderful to speak with her in my second workout after the marathon.

The third woman who is a frequent training partner is someone with whom I have done many track workouts and with whom I have done some tempo workouts and a few long runs.  We have crossed paths in a couple of races.  I fairly consistently run ahead but she is always close enough to me to keep me going and some of her best race times are very close to mine.  I think she is still figuring out what her ultimate running capacity is.  Maybe she will find out in the next couple of years.  She will run Boston next year.  And I imagine we will have a long conversation about the race as she sorts it out afterwards.  Although I hope that her sorting out is all about the run and not about other events on the day as my sorting out has been this year.  

The fourth woman has not run Boston and may never run Boston.  She represents the other end of my running friends.  Not very slow but not someone I would run next to on most workouts.  I would run ahead.  Yet we are good friends and both runners and each respects where he other is.  Each recognizes how far the other has come since we first met.  Each recognizes how wonderful each running experience is and what the other gains.  Running is egalitarian.  Everyone is welcome.  The key is for each person to run the best he or she can and she always does.  Runners can be friends without even running together in some cases.

The fifth woman I will mention is the one I have run with most often.  In the first year of marathon training I thought I would never keep up.  She ran ahead in most every workout and outran my by 12 minutes and some in the actual marathon.  However, by the next year while she still seemed to have the capacity to run ahead we ended up running near similar times.  She and I have been consistent training partners since the summer of 2011.  That was the second year of participation in the Charm City Run training group.  We were well matched.  After that race, neither one of us has gone back to a formal training group, but we have run together.  At least on weekends when we are both in town, when we don't have another race, when we don't have more important kid activities, and when we are healthy.  This means we certainly don't run every weekend.  But we have shared many miles.  We both enjoy early runs--cooler in the summer, gives each of us the rest of the day for our kids.  And we have each achieved our personal bests while training at least some of the time with the other.  Perhaps one day in the future when we are both healthy and ready to race again, we will race together and push each other-not just for a good run through the streets of Towson, Timonium, Lutherville, and Baltimore or the trails by Loch Raven Reservoir or the NCR Trail--but for each of us to achieve the best we ever have in running.  And while she has run a Boston qualifying time, she puts her kids ahead of going to Boston.  Perhaps some day she will have the joy of a Boston experience as well.  Until then we just continue to support each other in our running endeavors.

Do my training partners have to be female?  Of course not.  The people with whom I run most often just happen to be. I could tell stories about five guys just as easily.  The focus on the women I run with is driven by the tattoo imagery.  And it is a matter of when schedules and needs line up.  It is a matter of who I have met in my running experience, who has needed a training partner, and who has been willing to act as a training partner.  Regardless, these five women are five examples of strong women who have had an influence on my running life.  Each hears about a sliver of my personal life and/or professional life as we converse while we run.  

Each was concerned about my safety on April 15--as were many other people.  And, as someone who made it through April 15 safely, I hope not only to grow my personal and professional relationships and activities to be stronger than ever, but I also hope to continue to strengthen all of my running friendships and to make it clear how much I value them.  Every relationship (personal, professional, and running) should be cherished every day--since I never can predict when they will be taken away or when I will be taken away.