A challenge issued, boy against girl in a race around Henry Munro Middle School, and accepted several times during recess. Always the victor, she thrilled coming around the corner to the girls cheering. Thus, begins a story of running, training, and competing.
Spring precipitation chills bare legs and arms as the wind picks up speed. Waiting in nervous anticipation of the sounding shot, eight girls take their staggered, assigned places on the specially designed asphalt surface marked by blocks. Pleased with the outermost assignment, she finishes her preparations. Stretching, jumping, and finding her optimum position, she listens carefully. Usually, one person’s eagerness results in a call while heightening adrenaline reflexes. She concentrates, focusing on self. Finally, all marked, set, and with the blast of the gun, feet exploding her forth after months of training, she feels every tense muscle loosening in response, lost in the minute. Ignoring the onslaught of wind and rain slapping her face, dripping off her shoulders, and the cold splashes assaulting her legs, she builds battling speed. She runs, racing around the 440-yard track to a new record, stopping at the 500-yard mark. A natural, like Secretariat, they said. After three heats, finishing in the blue-ribbon spot, she smiles and accepts congratulations before finding a dry place to rest.
Long enough to consume an orange and dry off slightly, she enjoys the company of her team, cheering on others. Hearing the announcement for the next event, she again strips off her yellow striped, blue Adidas track pants and jacket to report at the starting point. Posturing tension mounts like the heavy, sticky, muggy air. Four heats in the two-lap competition will narrow the field down to eight remaining runners for the final laps when the celebratory shouts proclaim the victor. Steam rises from the black surface as the sun burns off the last traces of the morning rain. Bunched together, almost elbow to elbow, like a herd of wild horses waiting for escape, the runners get to their mark. Training whispers heeding, she finds her preferred spot near the tail end, while others lead. Staying in the middle of the last five, her internal timepiece tracking three-quarters around the first lap signals her body, and her feet respond, moving ahead. At a lap and half closing in on the leading group, she increases speed to optimize goal achievement. The finish line in view, 50 yards away, she maintains her strategic pace for second place. Posting qualifying times in her races to the finals, she sighs satisfactorily.
Standing with seven girls fighting for the winner’s award, she stretches her lean legs and then standing perfectly still, waits. Settling into a comfortable 5th place, she watches those ahead with eagle-like eyes, the hunter after prey. Knowing her best time, the time to beat, and her style of coming from behind, she pays attention, feeling, listening, and instinctively obeying electrical impulses charging through her extremities. The final turn, energy pumping, muscles burning, arms willing the body forward with rubber-like knees, she draws on every ounce of willpower. Crossing the line within a second of the victor, she falls forward with relief, barely managing to keep upright while an official comes to her aid. A great day ending with a personal best second-place finish in the 880-yard race, a first-place regional high school setting record over 440-yard distance, and training to continue as she prepares to represent her school at the Ontario Provincial Track & Field meet.
She loves to run for fun, winning, or placing in the top three, a bonus. When five years of training and vying for excellence become pressure-filled moments, she leaves her running shoes off the track. One day, again and just for fun, with hair tangling in the wind, she will compete against herself. Years come and go, like seasons of her life. Then the day comes unexpectedly, in totally different footwear.
Before she saw the footprints, her feet instinctively setting a quick pace on the new track, she skips training mode and familiar warm-ups. Every athlete knows the importance of routine stretching to prevent injury. Experience and rooted habits include disciplined determination, focus, the ability to force muscle compliance, precise breathing techniques, and end goals. Commanding her body to perform, feeling the rhythmic beating and expansion within the chest wall, she thrills to the intrinsic stimulation. Now, ‘thrill’ no longer applies as an apt description for this competitive race. A little more than forty years ago, consistent preparation showed promise and great results. Struggling to contend with momentum, she seeks a place to balance her stride, get her rhythm under control.
The track wraps itself around a bay with sandy beaches swarming with families, swimmers, boaters, sun worshippers, ducks, and plenty of geese. A network of worn asphalt, boardwalks, gravel pathways, tree-lined trails, and concrete jungle observation points mark the course passing three beaches, marina, boat launch, and wildfowl habitat. Tuning into nature’s symphony, she modifies her pace to match the regularity of lapping water splashing over shoreline rocks. Accessing innate discipline to exercise control upon resistant muscles, she fights screaming urges to stop while a burning sensation makes its way from heel to calf. Daily pushing herself to further distances, she refuses to succumb to loss. Recognizing her lack of conditioning as her mind and body battle, she allows her heart to enter the fray, changing dynamics in her race.
Friday, July 7, 2017 – “Nasty blisters under my bunions.”
Thursday, July 13 – “I stayed in bed until after 4:30 p.m. today. I slept and cried lots. I think things are catching up with me. I avoided all phone calls, except one from my eldest son. I would have answered from any of my children. I miss Alan so very much. I am left alone to experience this pain. I know my Savior has borne my grief. I struggle profoundly with my pain.”
Saturday, July 15 – “I had to get out of the house today!”
Friday, July 28 – “Every muscle from my butt to knees, to heel are so sore. I walked twice today, sat at the beach to read.”
Waterfront hibernating, my Achilles heel, involves lots of walking, swimming, reading, crocheting, and blanketing views of my new track. Reverting to memorable younger days, I play in the sand, dive into waves from passing boats, and teach sandcastle building skills to my grandchildren. Anything and everything to keep my mind and body in sync, and tell my heart to find another sanctuary. Forcing brawn adherence, I continue my circumstance-induced tempo with laboured breaths. Years of training pay off with developed skills, but they do not excite the competitive urge to begin facing my opponent in a race to the finish line in record time, first place, or any place. I cannot see the end, or even around the first bend. It matters not that the gun has fired with no exhibition of explosive speed. One foot figuratively in front of the other produces little to no result, except for the internally contested posturing at the tearily-blurred starting line.
Life happens and so do feet, analogous. Changing footwear constantly, leaving footprints in the sand, sinews, intellect, and heart, I race against acceptance, time, universal interventions, apprehensions, and sentiments.
The heart, such a fragile vessel,
A container for wretched pleas.
Pounding against a cage of ribs
Pain flows through the eyes of the soul.
Reaching for memories in time,
Crying out for someone to hold.
Looking for heaven’s sweet comfort
Above billowing clouds beyond.
A bonfire of grief burning strong,
Yields ash from mortality’s loss.
Betwixt the anguished cries, a voice,
“Be still. I cry for you. I know.”
© Vicki Nicholls 2017
Wednesday, August 16 – “The grandchildren, daughters, and I spent some time at the beach. Again, where else would I be? I decided to race an eager grandson to the water and within two steps I felt a snap in my calf. The pain was awful but I hobbled to the water, hoping it was only a cramp -no luck. Rest, ice, compression became my evening.”
A partial tear of the Achilles tendon slows my physical body. Physical therapy, exercise, taping, and time necessary for proper healing should teach me a lesson, but no, not so. Fight or flight, the accelerating impulse electrifies my body’s oxygenating organ, inciting a metaphorical cardiovascular emergency. Stretching, jumping, and finding my optimum position severely limited, I dream under menacing grey skies, buffeted by cool winds until the warmer rain descends.
Sunday, August 27 – On vacation with one of my daughters and her family in Williamsburg, Virginia. “I am feeling very alone and not wanting to believe that Alan is gone from me for the rest of my mortal life. I do not like this, I miss him so much.”
Monday, August 28 – “It is nice here but I don’t want to be here. I am so sad and lonely, missing Alan, that it hurts so bad. I keep trying not to cry.” Hoping my performance shields my loving family from the hurt I hide, exercising all disciplined willpower gleaned from athletic coaching, I succeed and win, enjoying this time and company with a grateful heart.
Wednesday, August 30 – “I stopped to watch some Monarch butterflies. I don’t like feeling lost and alone. I miss Alan. Vacation just is not the same. I found myself wondering how I will do on the cruise ship in October…”
“I just don’t know what I will do or where I will go. I feel so lost. This is a nice place to visit. I am looking forward to the beach in Hampton tomorrow. A lot of walking today-more than I should have done. Two more sleeps and a first time, long, lonely drive to Alberta.”
It is amazing how life’s happenings intertwine giving insight. All my years of running, training, and competing find fruition in my analogy of loss. Every technique, building upon naturally occurring abilities and strategic rivalries, manifests themselves in championship tracks of asphalt or the muscular tissues of body, mind, and heart. Running the race of life has many bends, some easier to manoeuvre while staying between the lines. Like Forrest Gump, I keep running. Sometimes, it looks like walking on well-worn paths. Most often, for me, I see elsewhere, an escape, a dream, a fantasy. Going barefoot or wearing sandals, cowboy boots, moccasins, running shoes, or flats, my pace is mine, no timer ticking. Each day, a new starting line appears, sometimes clearly discernible, other misty-eyed mornings, not so much. Methinks, alone most days. Learning to acknowledge the elbows of others on my contemplative voyage, grateful for their love and friendship, I run to please others and for my pleasure. Most importantly, for my health and healing Achilles, I now feel the wearing patterns of different shoes affecting my footprints, my legacy of love, of hope, of life. “Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
Everyone has their own feet, some shod, some bare, all going somewhere in body, mind, and heart. Our courses, tracks, paths, and trails belong to us individually. Our feet may get out from under us at times, but they are foundational, requiring care that only we can give. Training and competing, especially with self, is found in everyday living.
A valuable lesson I am learning finds credence in a quote from Lee Child’s character, Jack Reacher. “Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in his shoes. Then when you start criticizing him, you’re a mile away and he’s got to run after you in his socks.” (Child, Lee. Gone Tomorrow. Pg. 199) http://www.leechild.com/
When my self-indulgent criticism of scorn and guilt treads ahead for a mile, leaving my broken heart in the shadows behind, sadness, despair, and hopelessness threaten my threadbare feet. The impossible possibility of my heart effectively striding to a pleasing finish, diminishes with each accelerated pace. Hearing a faint cry coming from the shoeless soul, this critic picks up speed, until connective tissues’ reprimand. Painful tendinosis and tears result. Essential healing, with therapeutic aids, has an individualized timetable, and ‘feet’ will take me there. I am learning not to censure myself, wear my shoes in the proper place at the appropriate time, and take care to protect my feet from disease and injury.
A challenge issued and accepted led to many years of enjoyable running. Life’s challenge issued, not readily accepted, brings out inherent traits. This time running is not a race against the clock. The sensation of my hair blowing behind, caught by winds of speed, resulting in tangled tresses, still feels good. Thrilling to cheers turns to private accomplishments. The final finish line, somewhere ahead, no longer a winning, or top placing goal is broken with each day’s end. Sometimes standing tall and out of breath, other nights barely balancing, always gratefully collapsing to my knees where peace and comfort wrap warm arms around my heart and mind, I try to run with life.
How have life’s happenings fostered, created, coached, or trained you for its track?
Have you participated in a sport that provides you with figurative contemplation throughout your life?
Do you run? Why? How?
Life Happens . . . so do Feet, Tents, Father/Daughter Memories, Missing Pieces, Waves, Gingerbread, What am I to do Now, and Choices.
