Day Sixteen: Mother May I

Today is the first day of the second half of my first month of running; but who's counting! I realize with some shame that I've begun to depend on others' support to propel me through this process. What started out as a completely independent mission - I literally wouldn't accept help from people who said they'd go running with me - has begun to shift.

I now look at my fb page for feedback, or the comments on this blog, and talk about running in real time, with amazing frequency. I think I heard myself say yesterday, "You should check out my blog!" What? Then I couldn't remember the URL to get to the site, was it "blogspot.hatestorun.com" or "blogger" something? I thought passingly of creating business cards with the address, to give to people who might ask... Oh my gosh! Stop the madness! It's not about the blog, Michelle! This made me wonder if I'm already starting to lose focus... or maybe, it was something more malevolent - self sabotage.

As an example, I have the most lovely, loving, adoring mother on earth - but she sometimes kills me with her kindness. She doesn't mean to be unsupportive but her desire to protect me from literally everything in the world is in such sharp contrast with my need to experience life fully, that most of the time it's better I keep the details of my life to myself. Not to say I'm doing anything particularly wild or interesting, but pretty much anything outside of sleeping (at home) or eating (at home) might be construed as "dangerous" in my mother's world, and produce a strict litany of not so nice warnings, and criticisms, intended to snap me sharply back in line. So, the range of motion is, a bit snug. Somewhere along the way I got tired of guessing what would set her off, scare her, and produce a dynamic where I had to constantly try to make her feel better about my normal activities - like, say, traveling for business; so I just stopped sharing entirely.

I considered telling my mother that I've begun running, but it seemed complicated. You might think, what could she say about a noble effort like this? But this is a woman who has literally never been on a treadmill, thinks driving the trash down to the can at the end of the driveway is an activity, and unfortunately now, walks with a cane - albeit very enthusiastically - as a result of her latest surgery. Nobody would fault my mother for being lazy, or under-active. She is quite active for her age, and always has been, but formal exercise just isn't "for ladies," in her mind. It's boring. It's painful and difficult. Why would you do anything you don't enjoy? (Sounds a little familiar!) She'd rather putter around nipping low branches, or walking her dog Scruffie, both of which are lovely ways to spend time, but neither of which produce any level of athleticism.

Since I don't think she's ever really seen me exercise, if I told her, she would have free range to envision this "exercise" as fantastically as she'd like. When I was growing up, my mother didn't come to watch me play sports at school. I guess it just didn't interest her. And when I had that year in High School when I did the Jane Fonda workout tape two times a day, I did it behind closed doors in the playroom - and she and my dad never knew what was going on in there. I remember feeling great during the Jane Fonda year; but I was afraid if I told them why, I'd have to stop. Shouldn't I be practicing flute, or piano?

So, telling my mom was a little out there, and questionable in terms of how measured it was on my part. It started out OK. Her first response sounded positive... How great that I was doing something that I enjoyed! Um, no - I had to explain to her again, I hate to run. "Yes, well, but you like getting the exercise. It's fun!" Um, no - well, yes and no. I could feel the tension building on both our ends. She wasn't understanding me. I was confusing her... Then came the hardest part to hear, "Well, if it's too hard you can always stop! I mean, please Michelle, don't push yourself!"

Don't push myself! There it was! The anthem I've lived by my entire life when it comes to exercise, coming straight from the most important person in my life. Danger! Warning! Sirens. Lock-down! I clutched my Paragon bag filled with new cold weather running pants tighter to my chest and darted my eyes around the crowded bus I was sitting on. I was about to get loud! I pitied the elderly lady sitting next to me who had until now probably been thinking I seemed like a nice girl.

But I caught myself before I might have exploded into the cell phone - and took the patient route. I just explained it over and over again until at the end she said, "Oh I get it. You hate to run. That's the name of the blog. That's funny!"

My mom's a poet and said she would write a poem about me because she is so proud of me right now. Could there be any nicer reward? She has actually never once written a poem about me - in her entire life - and while she gave up writing for some 30 years, she's back on now, and this is something I encouraged her to do, so the idea that she'd now write about me has a special quality of mutual-appreciation that's very special.

I'm not sure if my mom will read this blog. She's anti-technology with a fervor and would never own a computer, let alone a calculator. Computers are evil. I did mention she might be able to check it out down at the local library... but she sounded hesitant. Then I accidentally gave her the wrong URL address which in some small way might actually have been an act of self-preservation on my part - though completely subconscious, I promise.

Today my challenge was to run without stopping to a specified tree beyond the stretching bridge, and I did it; but it was much harder and felt longer than I'd expected. I also hadn't noticed when I set that goal that the entire route beyond the stretching bridge is on a slight incline. As I maneuvered through it, I picked smaller goals, telling myself I could quit if I made it to this nearer tree, or that nearer traffic light.

When I was almost there I realized the problem wasn't my mind, for once, I simply wasn't getting enough oxygen - as hard as I tried to pull the air in and out - my heart wouldn't circulate it fast enough. I pushed and pushed and dropped my running down to a baby-step jog, and in the end, I made it - but just barely. I'll be running out of town tomorrow morning but when I'm back on Wednesday, I'm gonna try it again and see if I can do it a little bit more gracefully. I did accomplish what I set out to achieve today, though, so I'm just going to have to be happy with that.

Today's quote: "...naw eat no yam...no steam fish....nor no green banana."