Run for It

Saturday mornings, I teach. A little ballet, a little violin. Driving to my classes, I always see an inordinate number of runners, walkers and bikers making their way around my hilly town. Oddly, it gives me almost a sense of accomplishment to see them exercising, as if I were benefitting from it. Maybe I feel smug for living in such a health-conscious place. It makes no sense, I know, but admiring the runners on Saturday mornings is as close as I usually come to organized exercise myself. Granted, I have begun to break a sweat getting up off the floor at ballet after stretching. The younger students make observations like, "Your baby is getting really big!" I don't tell them the baby is still the size of a hackey sack.

My dad, I'm sure, is secretly disappointed at my lack of ability to exercise. He raised us on marathons and track meets, but somehow I didn't take to it. My bedroom walls were lined with light-pink ribbons that said "Congratulations, Participant." (My mom swims a mile a day. I still came in dead last in every race when I was on the swim team. Do you see a pattern?) I remember one track meet where I slipped in gravel at the sound of the starting shot. I spent the whole race on my face at the starting line. I was afraid to get up, knowing my dad would probably encourage me to keep going, even though all the other kids were already throwing back cups of water and accepting congratulatory slaps on the back at the finish line. My Dad has proudly saved footage of many races. I would sputter along panting, looking for shapes in the clouds or stopping to pick a dandelion, and my dad would jog alongside me, effortlessly shouldering a video camera the size of our first microwave, documenting my mediocrity for posterity. I admire him for that; I'm sure it was difficult to run that slowly.

Notwithstanding my ineptitude at racing, I did develop a few strategies. During a kids' Fun Run, (Oxymoron? Definitely.) I saw another little girl crying on the curb, her knees bleeding. Seeing my chance to be noble and get out of running at the same time, I stopped to comfort her. As I helped her hobble over the finish line, my strategy was born. After that, I always looked for an injured kid to help. Sometimes I had to resort to helping an overturned potato bug. My dad maybe would have taken that more seriously if we were Hindu, I guess.

Come to think of it, maybe it was my dad that unknowingly forewarned me of the pitfalls of running when he ran a marathon with a sprained ankle. He fell changing a light bulb the night before the race. He bandaged that ankle and proceeded to run 26 miles on it the next day. Even I can still feel the pain. We have pictures of another race where all the kids are wearing garbage bags because of the pouring rain. One race he ran every year was called the Baer Gutsman and it went straight up a mountain and straight back down the other side. See, what is it about this lifestyle that sounds fun? The name Baer Gutsman still gives me a sideache, and I was a spectator.

My sister-in-law Jennie ran nine miles yesterday while I expended my energy walking out to the driveway to buy Kool-Aid from my kids. I think I made that walk eighty or ninety times, but still. Not exactly aerobic. I was glad Jennie did the nine-miler, though. (YOU ROCK!) It made me feel a sense of accomplishment, like maybe I'd better soak my feet and eat a big plate of carbs. To all you runners out there, keep up the good work. Thanks for making me feel so athletic. I think we make a great team. Let's just not do the Baer Gutsman, OK?