Postcards from a grateful marathoner
Dear Time Clock: I don't care what you say, I ran like the wind.
Dear Gib: You were taken from us almost nine months ago, but I still think about you on my runs. You were a friend and a bright spot in many of my days. You were a great runner, not because you were fast, but because you were out there every day, humbly plodding along because you felt incomplete when you missed a day. You were an inspiration.
Dear Strangers In Passing: I saw you without arms. I stole glances at you, the one without legs. Then I saw you with crutches, a permanent fixture for you. I watched you another time when it looked like you had some form of palsy in your limbs. I don't know any of you, but I almost always take something from your passing. When I ask myself why I run and struggle for an answer, you help me and I think to myself: I run because you can't and because if you could, you would and because you're finding ways you can run.
Dear Hannah: You are a miracle. You have awakened in me feelings I never knew existed. You're my daughter and only child and you make me want to lead a better life. If I can keep running, keep finishing marathons and somehow convey to you how free and full of joy I feel when I'm out there, I can only hope you'll want to find something in your life that affords you a similar feeling.
Dear Uncle Greg: Ever since I was a child, I idealized the lifestyle you and Aunt Pat have led — living on the bay in St. Petersburg, taking your houseboat on long trips, scuba diving. I feel like you and Pat have been so well-suited for each other. When I heard doctors found a horrible, large tumor in your stomach, I was heartbroken for you and Pat. When I heard the tumor vanished after a special new treatment, I was filled with renewed hope. It's stories like yours that motivate me to run on the days when I'd rather sit quietly in my own home and ruminate on my own small problems.
Dear Mom and Dad: I think it all started in Rollingwood Subdivision, that peaceful country atmosphere back in Illinois where we were surrounded by woods, rivers and fields of corn and soybeans. I remember running down lonely stretches of road, smelling the crops in summer or when they were harvested in the fall. I didn't run a lot then and I never competed in high school, though there were a few miserable attempts at competition in grade school. But I think it was the experience of running on my own, for no reason, against no clocks, when I was growing up in Rollingwood that planted in me the seed that has grown into the runner I am today.
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