Triplets
I’ve been running every year in smaller or larger ways for, oh, 30 years now? I think I’m gearing up for this year to be one of the longer intervals. This Fall, I may stick on a full length, 26.2 mile marathon. My training will ultimately decide, but that’s where my mind is.
I seem to want to run a marathon every 7 years. I ran my first in 2009 and my next 2 in 2016. It’s 2023 when I’m writing this, and yeah, I’m 47 now, but I think it sounds fun. I’ve heard a similar mindset applied to the labor of a child. You do it, it’s super painful, sort of traumatic for your body but enough time passes between and people (those who LIKE having children) say, hmm, I think I want to do that again!
Isn’t it a blessing we can’t remember pain? We can describe it, sure, but we don’t feel it twice in our memory when we do … so, yeah, 7 years later and another marathon sounds fun to me.
During a marathon, the hardest part isn’t what you’d expect. After all that discipline and training, after all the miles run … after struggling to find parking, the most difficult part of a marathon has NOTHING to do with anything going on physically. The hardest part is the mental battle you wage within yourself, those last 5 miles. (If you’re OCD, like me, it’s even worse. Pro-tip: Think of a recipe for dinner later, switch your obsession up.)
I’m blogging about this because it is very similar to where I am with my writing. Right now, I’m doing 3 books, all at the same time. These books each present a full length novel as well as 3 separate “chapter” books. So 3x4=12 books - add to that formatting eBooks for each and you get a whopping 24 books total. Granted, I only had to write 3 full length novels to get here (no biggie, right?) but prepping and putting out 24 like this … well … it’s that last 5 miles of the marathon for me. It’s a mental battle, one I’ve never faced before and honestly, hope to never face again.
It’s just me, one guy, out there, hoofing it down the asphalt street. I’ve put in all the work, I’ve run just about the entire race, yet, here I am, challenging myself with every step. It would be so easy to stop and walk those three paces to the side, get out of everyone’s way and let the nice white golf cart take me to the end of the race.
This may be the metaphorical dehydration talking but I’m not stopping. I’m going to finish. I’m going to give birth to these triplets. (Then, I’m going to have some great penne pasta with an arugula/garlic scape pesto sauce, some tempeh sautéed in beer batter, topped with cherry tomatoes, blanched broccoli flowerets and garden chive.)
