Quiet

I'm not really ready to write at this moment.  Last week was rough.  Illness, missed workouts, and worst of all, a very unexpected death of a former running coach.  Sorry that I'm not quite ready to write about it.  It surprised me a lot.  I saw him last week Sunday while running (he was also out running, but we don't run the same pace anymore, but he saw me and said good morning), and then I heard the news of his death Tuesday morning -- less than 48 hours after I'd seen him on the run.  I ended up hearing via email because I was off FB (an effort to avoid Bachelor spoilers).  I woke up crying on Wednesday and of course it's been heavy on my heart all week.  Runners aren't invincible sadly. 

Over the weekend was my favorite 5k of the year.  I had a lot of friends running it.  I didn't run well, but I guess it was good enough for top 10 in my age group (all three AG winners were sub-20s).  And I kept it within my "acceptable for St. Pat's" 2 minute window.  I've done this race for 9 straight years now, and 6 of my times are all within that 2 minute window.  Miles 1 and 2 were pretty steady (but mile 1 had a lot of weaving around people).  I slowed by about 10 seconds on mile 3, but it didn't matter because I was off PR pace anyway.  I missed a PR by about 2 minutes, which is a whole lot for a 5k.  But the race was fun, though like I said, there's been this weight on my heart.  We skipped the parade given that we'd both had such a rough week (hubby was sick as well and ended up being sent to the cardiologist by his primary doc).  After a bit of napping, we went to lunch with one of my all time favorite running buddies who has since moved to California.  He is hilarious and 5 of us went out to lunch and drank and laughed.  It was nice because we were able to share a lot of good memories of our coach, along with catching up -- sometimes it's like he never left.  My local bestie and I have an ongoing pitch to get him to move back (though usually we direct it mostly at his wife). 

I'm trying to get back to normal this week.  Big stuff happening at work (good, making progress on settling a couple problematic cases).  And this week is short -- we are heading out of town Thursday morning early for the Bataan Memorial Death March again.  This is the marathon I ran a few years ago with a military weight pack (40 pounds, years later, I still have the chafing scar on my lower back, I call it my Bataan Tramp Stamp).  This year is the last year they are going to have survivors there to tell their stories (Death March was in 1942), so I knew I had to go back.  Hearing Death March survivors tell their stories first-hand, and getting to ask questions, and more importantly, tell them what their sacrifice meant to me and assure them that I will never forget, is a once-in-a-lifetime (well, now twice for me!) experience.  And I knew my husband had to have the same chance since I went solo last time.  No marathon this time though.  Instead, we are planning to walk/hike the memorial march, which is only 14-15 miles.  Generally speaking, there are lots of young veterans, often amputees, who also do this race, so I am looking forward to also hearing about some of their experiences during the event.  But I'm mostly going to say thank you to these men now in their 90s who went through something I can't even contemplate.