My fucking calves. My fucking life. My fucking needs. Hal Higdon, welcome into my world.
I can't walk very pain free right now. And when I get out of bed, this is dramatic, but today, I nearly crumbled after that first foot hit the ground because I recently decided to undertake Hal Higdon's Advanced II Training program that will lead me into the LA Marathon on May 25th. It means that on top of the grueling classes I already teach...and the grueling classes I already take, I'm going to be running 4-5 extra sessions a week. I went for a run yesterday afternoon, an easy 4 miler, and in my mind, it felt like the exertion equivalent of brushing my teeth...because it has to, because in terms of relativity, I simply have no room in my mind to spend even a drop of my stretched discipline during the weekday runs when I know the long ones are waiting for me on the weekends.
It's early here on Thursday night. Really, quite early and I want to go to bed so I can wake up in the 5's...and for no real reason but because I have work to do...so much work to do. My Thursday has been utterly exhausted. I stayed up late last night, too many bouts of loveless sex and have been feeling the after-affects all day long, weighing on the soul...forcing me to confront myself, my past...my future, because I was born with extreme sensitivity. Sometimes, I wish I could just be...anything but constantly in my head...all the time. All the fucking time. With age and understanding, I'm finding that it (my mind, my place in the world) keeps brightening...or darkening, depending on your point of view, depending on which side of the fence you stand.
Me and Durban are working on this book and I have to say, it is utterly fulfilling, an absolute cure to the post K&V empty space that had me sinking. And I'm getting up every day and I don't run with my headphones anymore because the evolution of my mind thinks of them as a distraction...me keeping me from myself. In the arenas of creative and physical exertion, I'm as content as I've ever been. This is growth.
It's the 19th of February and I'm 27 years old. Next year, on the 19th of February, I'll be 28 years old. In one year, everything that exists in this world will have changed. Everything. And I won't know this person I am now, other than to know that I'll hold up well...that all through time, I'll know one thing for sure - that as I evolve, and I do everyday - I will always hold up.
Things are loose. I have all these anchors right now, these wonderful, colorful, hopeful anchors, crippling anchors. And they're out and falling and falling and as their slack is endlessly unwinding, I'm just coasting along. Because when the ocean is too deep...and sometimes it can be, there's little choice but to drift...and coast...and drift...
I hit a point recently where I stopped worrying when they'll catch or if they'll catch. I'm just letting them do their thing. And eventually, maybe I'll forget about whether or not they're drifting. And eventually, I'll forget about whether or not they're there. And eventually, eventually I'll just be...
Laughing at the thought of people Google searching "Hal Higdon Marathon Training Programs" and winding up here.
