The Awesomeness Chronicles: The Morning Run

He's saying "You can do it!"

As part of sharing the Journey to Awesomeness, I think that its fair for me to share excerpts from my life that highlight my view from the road. As such, I will from time to time share some of my direct experiences that have taught me lessons about awesomeness. This is the first of what will be The Awesomeness Chronicles.  We’ll call this one, The Morning Run. The following story took place a little while back, so travel with me… [I wish I had one of those flashback, hypno-spirals right now]

I can say that it started at around 11:30 last night.  It wasn’t full-blown yet, but doubt had begun to wash over my thoughts.  I laid in the bed thinking, I don’t know, as I imagined getting up the next morning. I went on to sleep.

“Daddy, can I have some water?”

I rolled over and grabbed a cup of water from my nightstand.  I went to the bathroom, rinsed it out and refilled it. I plodded to my sons’ bedroom and reached my arm up to the top bunk.  My son gulped down the water.  I looked at the bottom bunk to see that my youngest son was awake as well.  I turned the TV off, cursing myself for thinking that they would fall asleep with Animal Planet playing. No more TV, I must be retarded.  I flopped back into the bed and strained to make out the time. It was 4:45.  The doubt had grown.  I was not getting up at 6:00 to run.

Last week, I started an 8-week running program to get back into shape.  I was beginning to feel like I was 30.  I determined that I needed to discipline myself, that I was missing out on life because I was accustomed to taking the path of least resistance.  I would whip my body into shape and direct my life follow suit.

The first week of the program is designed to go like this:

Monday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Tuesday: Walk 30 min.

Wednesday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Thursday: Walk 30 min.

Friday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Saturday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Sunday: Rest.

Simple right?

It actually went like this:

Monday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Tuesday: Oversleep.

Wednesday: Run 1 min. Walk 2 min. repeat 10x

Thursday: Oversleep

Friday: Oversleep; Postpone until evening; Go get a gyro instead.

Saturday: Forget it.

Sunday: Rest.

So this morning I woke up at 6:03. I took a deep breath and got out of the bed at 6:05 and fumbled around for my running clothes.  At around 4:48, I had come up with a great plan to slack off.  I figured that I might as well start over and repeat week 1.  And since I had already earned credit for actually running on Monday and Wednesday, I don’t have to get up at 6:00 and run today.  I can pick up on Wednesday.  That was my plan all the way up until 6:04.  But I realized that I would be defeating the whole purpose and once again resigning myself to the path of least resistance. 

I stepped outside into the cool morning air.  The abundance of trees from the neighboring forest preserve keeps the air fresh, and I appreciated it.  I decided that I would just move on to the week 2 regimen.  Monday’s workout calls for me to Run 2 min. and walk 1 min, repeating 10 times.  What’s the big deal?  After 2-minute run #2, I understood the big deal.  I was paying for slacking off.  I decided to revert to week 1. I would have to start over and do it right – no oversleeping, no missing days, and no gyro blow-offs. 

I admit after two 2-minute runs, having decided to redo week 1, I came up with another slacker plan.  Since I had already run for 4 minutes, I could technically resume at 1 minute run #5.  I’m retarded, this is retarded to even be doing, I’m living a lazy retarded life.  So after beating myself for 1 minute and 34 seconds, I picked back up with 1 minute run #3.  There is no credit. I pushed the top-right button on the Armitron that I had bought for this express purpose.  After one minute the alarm would sound, telling me that I could walk again.  With each successive 1-minute run, the time between my button push and the alarm’s beeeeep-----beep-beep------ beep-beep grew longer. 

It was 6:34:26.  Run # 7 would start in 34 seconds.  My walk breaks seemed to grow shorter as my runs got longer. But the time wasn’t changing. Perspective is a heckuva thing.  At 6:35:30, when it felt like I had been running for 2 minutes, the seagulls began to caw.  To me it sounded like coarse, mocking laughter. There were two of them, like they were sharing a joke about me as I ambled through the parking lot, trying to get to 6:36. In my mind, Shut up…turned into…Go on and laugh, I'll make it.  The seagulls shut up.

At the end of Run #9 the seagulls started to laugh again.  I had watched the clock count down this time, anxiously – almost desperately, waiting for the alarm’s beeeeep-----beep-beep------ beep-beep.  I was joyful but apprehensive as I began to approach Run #10.  I resolved that I would run this last one as hard as I possibly could.  But what if I didn’t have it in me?  What if I gave the seagulls something really funny to laugh at? Forget it, run hard.  I started my stride then pushed the top-right button on the Armitron that I had bought for this express purpose.  I ran hard.  And as I ran, I heard a new bird.  Now, I’m not an ornithologist, nor am I even an Eagle, Wolf, or Squirrel Scout, so I can’t tell you what kind of bird it was.  In my mind, however, it was one of the noble birds; an eagle or a hawk.  This noble bird’s call sounded like a cheer of encouragement. I ran harder.  I ran for what felt like 10 seconds, and felt my stride start to break. The noble bird cheered again and I regained my step.  After what felt like 15 seconds, the alarm’s beeeeep-----beep-beep------ beep-beep completely caught me off guard.