Small steps...

I am in a state of numbness about running. Unfortunately, my legs are not. It still hurts to bend and stand and lift heavy crates of lettuce, which I have to do a lot at the store. My running partner, C. is not sore, which is fine, but it doesn't change the fact that I am. Why, though?

I want to walk my old running routes-- like the two weeks between cross country and track in college, when I missed it so much I couldn't stay away-- and think about my life and try to understand why seasons change and things die, but I can't. Short walks tire me out. I miss running; I miss races, but I don't want either of them right now. I have this terrific feeling that running is all at once everything and nothing to me. That it still defines me, is almost closer than my name, but still I hate it. Why didn't anyone tell me that a marathon is the slow, torturous version of a truck hitting your whole body?

On Sunday Pat and I sat out side the library on the grass with two bowls of ice cream and a notebook and made a list of pros and cons to help him decide if he should go to grad school (he got accepted the night before the race). Though both lists were a fair size before we called it a day, in the end all we could really see on the 'con' side is the money thing and the family thing. I miss my family, and I don't want to be in debt, but weighing on the other side were massive things like community, vocational direction, and the fact that we will stay in Seattle, which I also love. And its only three years, after all. Not a decade, not a lifetime. After a few moments silence while we both stared off into space, Pat looked at me with a grin shyly forming and asked, "Well, Kristin, what do you think?" I thought for a minute.

"I think I'm going to run another marathon," I said. Which he said he already knew.

So yesterday we caught the 30 to the campus and walked around a little bit after he turned in his intent-to-enroll paperwork. So that's it. Pat's a student again! Which has inspired me to get my own proverbial shit together and start perusing Craigslist for a teaching job. Just a couple months now left of freedom before Pat moves and embarks on a task which could very well send a new wave of stress into our relationship, but I really couldn't be more excited.