385 Yards

I love winter, I really do. I think that the changing of the seasons is one of the reasons we love living in Vermont. We have world class autumn foliage which gives way to a winter season that is just long and hard enough to substantiate incredible bragging rights to anyone other than penguins or polar bears. With that said, last Monday I snapped. I'd had enough of the endless need to bundle up in eight layers just to walk to the mailbox. So, I threw caution to the wind and went out for a run in shorts and a tee shirt. In my mind, I was imagining 75° temperatures and flat terrain. Oh wait, it wasn't my imagination; I was in Florida last week. And given the -20° weather I had left behind, and the -20° that I'd surely be returning to, I wanted to squeeze every last drop out of my ability to run in the warmer Although, as I sit down to write this blog, I look back on my Facebook comments and now realize that I never really did lay off of running related posts. I seem to have found one for my first ten-mile route, my first race ever (the GMAA Labor Day 15k), and my first 1/2 marathon (the GMAA Green Mountain Half Marathon). I look forward to the day that I'll be able to post about running 26.2 miles - that's how long a marathon is, which, if you're reading this post you already know. However, I'd like to focus for a moment on the small little decimal 0.2 miles on the end of the number. I recently read an article that referred to a marathon being 26 miles and 385 yards long. As I sat on my flight to Florida, I thought about this 385 yard reference. One might think that it's some sort of cruel joke to run 26 miles and then need to do an extra couple hundred yards on top of that, but I'm thinking the opposite. If I can manage to successfully run the first 26 miles, I plan to thoroughly enjoy those last 385 yards. I hope that with each footfall, I can revel in the thought that I've completed my first marathon. At least that's my current plan, assuming that I can actually complete the first 26 miles. And then, after reminding myself that 385 yards is just the equivalent of 8.92 Boeing 737's, I'll probably post the accomplishment on Facebook! Fondly, Greg