H-O-T Hard!!!

I recently got some pretty harsh feedback on this blog. I knew it was coming. You have to know it's coming when you open yourself up this way. I am fully aware that people are going to have all kinds of reactions to and feelings about this blog. But what this person said particularly got under my skin. He said that this blog wasn't realistic.  He said that running is running and that it isn't all that deep and that there aren't lessons to be learned on every run. Here is one thing I want you to know: This blog is very real. I do not write about a run unless I've actually made it and I do not write about a lesson unless I've actually thought about it ( I won't say learned it, because sometimes it takes me a long time to actually learn the lesson). But here is one thing this guy was right about: not every run has a lesson. Or at least not one to be learned right then. 

Last week's long run was just one of those runs. It was miserable from the actual first step to the last hobble in. Here is the thing about where I live:  It is H-O-T Humid!!!  Which makes running H-O-T Hard!!!  Houston doesn't care that it is September and that Summer is officially over.  Houston is going to keep on being near 100 degrees and near 100% humidity just as long as it feels like. And it felt like I was running in a sauna. I'm not exaggerating when say that with the very first step I realized it was not going to be my run. My feet felt heavy and my mind was not up for it. But I tried. I tried everything. I tried thinking of all of the lessons I has learned up to that run. No good. I tried surrendering to the run in hopes of being an open vessel to a new lesson. No good. I tried every hip hop Pandora station I could find. Even that was no good. This run was just going to plain ol' fashioned suck. And it did. I had to stop twice. TWICE!  I can't tell you the last time I had to stop in the middle of a run, much less twice. To top it off, at one point my mile math went fuzzy and for at least on my mile I kept counting down my last two miles saying things like, "Okay, only 1.95 miles left," and "you can do this. Only 1.7 miles left."  When I got down to 1.25 miles, I realized how off my math was and that I really had 2.25 miles left. I pray this never happens to you. This is like waking up on a Thursday and thinking it's Friday, but times 100 worse and with screaming lungs and exhausted legs. Yup, you guessed it.  This was right about when I took one of those stops. I decided to keep going the next 2.25 miles, but that was the only thing that got me to then end.  It was only because I said so. Nothing deeper than that. 

And the truth is, I have plenty of days that are just like this run. Days that are H-A-R-D. Days where there is zero lesson to be learned. Days that just plain ol' fashioned suck. I've had about a week of them lately and sometimes the only reason I get through those days is because I said so. 

Of course, a week has gone by since that run and I've had some better days now, so I have to add that what I truly believe is that the super hard runs, just like the super hard days, leave me stronger and more prepared for the rest of the run ahead. And in retrospect, that makes them suck a little less. 

The run was so bad, I couldn't even take a picture of my face.