Everything happens for a reason...

"I'm one of those who believes everything happens for a reason."

That's what my boss said to me today. Its his way of justifying why he got off course in his trail ultra and dropped out, despite being on record pace. He went on to run a sub 3 hour marathon in Portland a few weeks later. It was his fastest marathon in eight years on the 30th anniversary of when he ran his first marathon.

Everything happens for a reason.

I got injured and had to defer my 2009 Royal Victoria Marathon registration to 2010, despite being in the best shape of my life, because next year the race falls on 10/10/10. That's 3 10's. I will run 3:10 at Victoria next year.

Everything happens for a reason.

Sure, I can justify my stupidity however I please. No one is going to doubt me. They all feel sorry for me. The girl that was running so fast, who was looking so fit, its such a tragedy that she got injured. No. Me running with tight calves was not a tragedy. A tragedy is what happened to Jenny Crain two years ago. A tragedy is being an All-American runner, in the prime of your life, trying to qualify for the Olympics and getting hit by a car. A tragedy is being in a coma, living on life support, spending the rest of your life in a wheel chair. A tragedy having severe brain damage and never being the same person again. I have to remember and remain thankful for what I have. Perhaps getting injured now, saved me from a greater injury that lied in my future. Perhaps it was to help give me a greater respect for the sport. Perhaps it was to make me a smarter runner. Perhaps it was to rest my body now so I run even faster in the future.

Everything happens for a reason.

Or does it?

I used to believe that phrase. That's why I ended up in Eugene at the time that I did. That's why I didn't get into grad school. That's why I met the love of my life who lives 2000 miles away from me. Its because I was meant to be a coach not a writer at this time in my life, it was because there was going to be a job opening right when I wanted to move, it was because I was meant to meet the most influential running coaches in the business and learn from them, it was because I was suppose to meet Kelly and finally be cured of the injury that had ailed me for so many months in Wisconsin, it was because Kevin was going to get a job in Oregon.

Or does it?

I may not know the answer for months or perhaps years. This is the hardest part right now, waiting. Waiting for healing. Waiting for answers. Waiting for reasons. And not knowing. I am not a patient person. I have pleaded with God several times. Heal me in time for Victoria. Heal me for my Napa trail marathon. Just heal me!

Everything happens for a reason.

Ok. It will remain my mantra for now. But I'm growing weak. My faith is fading. My energy is draining. I am lacking motivation, positivity, and hope. My injury is minuscule in the scheme of things. There are much bigger catastrophes out there that make me sound like a whining wimp. "A marathon is a very personal thing," I was told this weekend. And its true. When you are running a marathon, its your whole world at the moment, but everyone else's life goes on. I like the image of the marathon going on in the heart of the city, but those driving outside of the city have no idea there's a marathon happening. The image of people upset that they have to take an alternate route to church because streets are blocked off for marathon runners. The silence of the the streets 24 hours before and 24 hours after the gun goes off. My pains are personal. Only I can deal with them. So I'll just keep repeating my mantra.

Royal Victoria Training- T minus 5 weeks

I never thought I'd be where I am now in my training, even in 8 months from now. I figured doing long runs close to 7 min pace, doing easy runs at 8 min pace and doing tempo runs at 6:45 pace was something I would have to work hard for. Not that I'm not working hard. I'm averaging 40-50 miles a week, running one hill workout a week, and one hard long run a week. But when training for Boston a year and a half ago, I was doing 80 miles a week, 2 weekly speed workouts, hills, two-a-days, and a hard long run. I'm not training nearly as hard now as I was then, but I'm training faster. What can I attribute to this? There are a few reasons I have come up with. 1. I'm living in Eugene. I am constantly surrounded by runners and coaches. I have new friends who are elite athletes or coach elite athletes whom I can get tips from and talk to about running. These people are helping me to train smarter. 2. I run in the Nike Free 3.0 and 5.0. This small change alone has made a huge difference in my running. I now run more efficiently. My body loves the responsiveness and I run lighter on my feet. The human body also does not want to get injured while running barefoot, and I feel that the pounds seem to come off more easily and stay off. 3. Hills. Brad Hudson's theory of hill sprints works! The one hill workout I do a week is like a hard weight lifting routine in the gym, without gaining all the extra unnecessary muscle. 4. Massages. I would not be running right now if it wasn't for the weekly massage treatments and the bimonthly tune-ups I get. 5. Getting injured. Being injured for so long helps me to run smarter. I stay away from speed work, allow my body to rest, and listen to my body better.

Since my breakthrough run at Row River and then the 10sec. per mile drop off that time on my 20miler this weekend, I'm constantly getting asked, "what's your goal at Victoria." I originally did not have a goal. I was not going to train hard for this marathon or do any speed work, and keep it around 3:40. But now, 3:20, 3:15, 3:10, and this week 3:06 have all been potential marathon times. If I keep dropping seconds off my long run like I have been doing the past 2 months, I could set myself up for a 3:00 marathon. Do I think a 3:00 marathon is possible? No, not right now, not the way I felt on my 20. But that got me thinking. What could I do to run under 3:15, possibly even under 3:10 without adding speed work or mileage. The answer is cut weight. Simple enough, if I lose 5 pounds, I could run a 3:10 marathon without changing anything else. I'm not sure if the weight loss will happen this time around. I am more concerned about staying fueled and healthy at this point. I will admit though, the idea is tempting and whatever happens, happens.

Anyone who knew me in elementary school, knew I was not an athlete. Even in middle school my volleyball skills were laughable. In high school is where I got the title of "runner". Now I'm a marathoner who's looking to crack 3:10 and move onto 50K's and 50 milers. I don't believe I will ever break 19:30 in the 5K or even 40:00 in the 10K, why? Because I will never focus on those distances alone. I do believe I am capable than more than use to give myself credit for. I am just waiting for a "bad run" to remind me that I am not a runner and that I will always have to work hard to reach my marathon goals. Some days I lose respect for the distance, but I know the marathon always finds a way to humble you, no matter who you are and what kind of shape you are in. I am excited and nervous to see what changes happen in these next five weeks. I could keep getting faster, hit a plateau, or peak too early and crash and burn. One thing that I don't take for granted though, is that I'm marathoning again! And that in itself is a victory I've been long waiting for.

Thoughts on a Long Plane Ride Home

This eagle carries sadness on its wings
The flight is different this time
The clouds drip with melancholy
The rain comes down harder this time.

To be so close and feel so far
To be so far and feel so close
Only you can understand
These feelings I feel.

Runs are running through my mind
Dances dance in my memory
Hands hold strong in my thoughts
These moments now hover in the past
But are carried with me in the present.

Four by thirty feels like and eternity
Until we know more about our meant to be’s
And our compatibility
Where we’ll be both physically and emotionally.

I count forward two hours
And wonder what you are doing
Are you thinking of me at the same time
I am thinking of you?
Do you share my doubts and fears?
Do you share my dreams and desires?
Do you share my love?

I miss you
I want to undo and redo
Take back and rephrase
And show you
That the hole in my heart
Only got there yesterday.

Anniversary Poem

He loves me…
He loves me not…
He loves me…

Petals fall delicately
On emerald grass below.
They mix with dandelions and clovers,
Honeybees and caterpillars.

He loves me…

Wind picks up the satin ovals,
And teaches them a swirling rainbow dance.
A tribute to the passing clouds
White puffs floating overcast.

He loves me not…

Love and passion fill my heart
As I concentrate on each delicate petal
Like soft silk between my thumb and fingertip.
Gently plucking and dropping
Silently wishing and praying

He loves me…

A thousand miles seems like a million
Days are years and seconds are hours
Until I see you again

He loves me not…

Six months together
And yet I miss you

He loves me…
And I love you.

I lay here in the hot sun
Amongst the grass and petals waiting for you
To come lie next to me
As butterflies dance overhead.
Holding my hand.Holding me.

Our Trip to Alaska (rough draft)

An "unedited" piece I wrote for a college class.


While running my last marathon, I told myself I would never do this again. The temperature in Duluth, Minnesota that day reached seventy-seven degrees and ninety-one percent humidity. I was just coming off a quadriceps injury and experienced pain and dehydration the entire way. I had to stop and walk numerous times along the course. I finished in four hours and twelve minutes, a time that was an embarrassment after qualifying for Boston the year before in three hours and thirty-seven minutes. One thing, about running marathons, though, is that about a week after the race, your muscles have recovered, your mind has blocked out most of the grueling parts, and you start to think about how you can improve in your next one.
This happened to me, and a year after Grandma’s Marathon I signed up for a race on Prince of Whales Island, Alaska. It worked out perfectly. The race was a week after I graduated from college and my parents said they would pay for my plane ticket as part of a graduation gift. Our family also has relatives that lived in Ketchikan, Alaska. We’d spend a few days with them and then take a three hour ferry to the island on the Friday before my race. There was no way I could turn down this opportunity to spend five days in Alaska and run a marathon there, so I signed up for the race and bought the plane tickets a month in advance on Expedia.com.
My sister, Christy, a freshman in college, came with me as my support. Christy had been to both of my previous marathons and so she had a slight idea of the pain I went through each time. I usually had her give me a massage after each marathon while I scream out “Ouch, not so hard!” or “Oh boy, yeah, right there. I didn’t even know I used that muscle to run.” Its not that Christy loved her role as designated massage therapist post my marathons, but she did like the idea of going to Alaska for five days.
We left home for the Madison airport at 12 PM Tuesday. My mom drove us because she wanted to be sure to take lots of pictures of her two little girls going on their first vacation without the parents. Security check went smoothly compared to the length of time it took my mom to hug and kiss us goodbye. We still ended up having and hour and a half of extra time to sit at our gate after we got all checked in. Finally, it was time to board and Christy and I gathered our three pieces of red matching luggage. The plane taxied out to the runway right on time and awaited permission for take off when this message came across the cabin’s intercom:
“Good afternoon ladies and gentleman. This is your pilot Jim Bradford speaking. Listen, its just going to be a slight delay here. We just got word from flight control in Chicago that they have strong winds at this hour and they are not letting planes land. We were told just to hold tight for about another fifteen minutes and they’ll let us know what’s going on. Sorry for the inconvenience, but there’s nothing we can really do right now. They don’t call Chicago the windy city for nothing.”
I glanced at my blue sports watch. It was 1:30. We still had plenty of time to catch our connecting flight. Our plane from O’Hare to Seattle didn’t depart until 3:20. I reached for the Sky Mall magazine in the seat pocket in front of me and began skimming through the pages of back scratchers, coat hangers, and nose trimmers.
Pretty soon the pilot came back on the intercom.
“Well, ladies and gentleman, I have some good news. The winds in Chicago have died down and they are permitting planes to land again. The bad news is that they have set our arrival time back one hour. We’ll just have to hold tight until then and make friends with our neighbors until we are permitted to take off. Sorry for the inconveniences this may cause you, but there’s nothing I can really do. The flight attendants will be passing through the cabin shortly with beverages.”
I checked my watch again. An hour from now it would be 2:45, which meant our plane would land in Chicago around 3:15. There was no way we were going to make our connecting flight. I watch Christy twist her boarding pass over and over again until it ripped into two long thin pieces. Inside I felt the same, but I was trying to be the calm one.
“Ok, so we’re not going to make our flight if it leaves on time,” I informed her.
“I know,” she responded.
“Well, we’ll just get off and sprint to our gate, maybe it got delayed because of the wind too.”
She nodded vigorously and smiled. I was glad I made her feel better, but I doubted my own hopeful idea. I wasn’t sure what we should be doing at this point, so I called my mom and told her what was going on.
“Well the airlines have to make it right with you. They will have to find you another flight to Seattle. Go to the information desk as soon as you get to O’Hare and tell them what happened. They’ll find something for you. Don’t worry about it. Everything will work out. In the meantime, I will call your uncle and let him know what’s going on.”
My mom was always the rational one during a crisis. When I was seven, my pet rabbit ran away and I cried for days. She told me that rabbits only lived with people for a little bit before they had to go back to their real families in the woods. Then when they have a baby, it can come to live with us again. Sure enough two days later a baby brown bunny appeared in my rabbit cage.
At 2:45 PM on the dot we took off from Madison. While in flight, the flight attendants announced all of the different connecting airlines’ gate numbers for any people who were going to have to jump off this plane once it landed and catch another one. As soon as our plane touched down in O’Hare and the pilot turned the seatbelt sign off Christy and I scrambled to get our bags and get to the head of the plane. We sprinted through terminal after terminal and up and down escalators hauling our luggage over our shoulders. Soaked with perspiration and huffing and puffing, we reached gate B17 at exactly 3:23. Our plane had just taken off. Christy and I hung our heads and slowly sulked over to the United Airlines information desk near gate B8.
We stood in line for about twenty minutes before someone was available to help us. The lady behind the desk flicked her finger for us to come forward and flashed a full-teeth grin. We responded with frowns.
“How can I help you ladies today?” she asked.
“Our plane out of Madison was wind delayed and now we missed our flight from here to Seattle,” I explained to her. “We still have to catch a flight from Seattle to Ketchikan, Alaska at 7:50 PM Pacific time as well.”
“Hmmmm,” she responded as she began typing away at the small off-white 90’s style computer in front of her. “Let’s see what I can do for you.”
I watched her shake her head no and curl her lips. Her curly blond hair was tied up in a tight bun that stretched the wrinkles on the sides of her tan face into parallel lines. Every once and awhile she would play with on of her gold hoop earrings and mumbled negative things to herself, like “nope, not that one” or “gee that won’t work.” I thought I was about to go into a brief state of depression when she finally told us she could find anything for today or tomorrow to Seattle.
“Let’s see, here’s one for Thursday. Let me now check and see if I can connect that up with a flight to Alaska.”
Another eternity passed, followed by more head shakes and negative mumbling. I wanted to crumble to the floor.
“Well, I can get you to Alaska on Sunday at 10:30AM. How does that work?”
“No!” I yelled as tears began to stream down my face. “My race is Saturday! I have to be there Saturday!”
Christy rationally explained to the woman that I was going to Alaska to run a marathon, as I incompetently couldn’t tell her because I was balled my eyes out in front of the entire information desk. The woman returned to her computer, more determined than ever now to help us get to Alaska. She even tried to get us on a connecting flight to Vancouver. There was nothing available.
“Well, your only option is to go on standby for the 5:30 flight to Seattle. Unfortunately that plane has been overbooked. If you can’t get on, there is another one leaving at 7:30 which has been overbooked as well. I’m really sorry I can’t do more for you ladies. I hope you make it to your race.”
“Gee, thanks lady,’ I mumbled under my breath.
We gathered our things and slowly drug them over to gate B10 to wait for the 5:30 flight. I called my mom to tell her what was going on. She responded with the response she always had when she knew things may not work out.
“I’ll say a prayer for you.”
When it was 5 PM, they began boarding the plane. Christy and I waited patiently hoping that most of the people in the rows that they were calling didn’t show up. A lot of people were lining up to get on, though, and the situation felt hopeless. Finally they began to read the standby list. Everyone in the world seemed to be on that list. Name after name was called.
“Rachel and Christy Matheson.”
Christy spun her head at me and looked at me like I was Christmas morning. I must have looked at her the same way because she gave me a huge hug that lifted me off the ground.
“We’re going to Alaska,” she shouted.
“No,” I said, “we are going to Seattle.”
We gathered our luggage and handed the woman our boarding passes. I kept listening to the announcements and realized that our names were the last to be called on the standby list. Once we were all settled in, I called my mom back.
“We got on,” I told her.
“Praise the Lord!”
5:30 came and went. The pilot came across the intercom at 5:45.
“Well, ladies and gentleman. As you can see, we’re not going to get out of here on schedule today. What happened is that the radar is malfunctioning and we are waiting for the flight mechanics to bring us a new part. I would say lets just go, but as I’m sure you all know, we do need out radar while in flight, ha ha. Anyway, hopefully the piece they bring us fits. The last one didn’t. Just sit tight and we will be underway soon.”
“Oh-my-gosh, seriously?” I mumbled to Christy. “Whhhhy?”
“Hey, at least we made it onto this plane,” responded my young optimistic sister.
Another twenty minutes passed before the pilot had an update.
“Well, it looks like the part they brought us didn’t fit after all. I’m afraid that we are going to have to switch all of you to a different airplane. I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”
I threw my head back against my chair and closed my eyes. This was a nightmare. There had been a slight, small ounce of hope that if this plane would have left on time, we could have made our connecting flight in Seattle. Now all bets were off. Christy nudged me and I open my eyes.
“Hey, you alright?”
“No. Don’t talk to me.”
Eventually we all unloaded off the plane, walked down to gate B5, and boarded another one. That plane took off right away and we were finally on our way to Seattle. I sat at a window seat and along the route, and I was able to catch glimpses of snowcapped mountains and river passes before the golden sunset. I wish I could say it made me feel all warm and happy inside, but nature’s beauty couldn’t contend with the frustration this trip had caused me to feel thus far. All of this so that I could go and put my body through three and a half hours of running hell.
We landed in Seattle around 9:30 PM Pacific time. Immediately after we got off the plane, Christy and I went up to the desk attendant right outside our gate and told her our dilemma. She began typing away at her computer and her black curls bounced from side to side as she shook her head. Before she said anything, she printed off three tickets and handed them to us.
“One of these is for your hotel and the other two are for dinner and breakfast. Hang onto these, they are like cash.”
She resumed typing and Christy and I stared at each other quizzically.
“Ok,” she said. “I’m going to call down to Alaskan Airlines and tell them your circumstance. I can’t do anything for you up here since it looks like all flights to Alaska have stopped for today. They will be able to help you find something down there. Just go down two floors and to your right. First, though, go to luggage claim and see if your luggage came through from the flight you just got off of.”
Sighing heavily, I picked up my two bags which seemed to be much heavier than before and headed towards baggage claim with Christy trailing behind me. Baggage claim was a zoo and we had to push our way to the front to catch of glimpse of what was coming through. Slowly the crowd began to diminish, and finally it was just Christy and I left. Our luggage never came out.
“You stay here and keep an eye out. I’m going to go over and talk to the baggage helpdesk,” I said to Christy.
I stood in line for over fifteen minutes with other travelers who were upset over the whereabouts of their luggage. I finally motioned Christy to come over and stand by me. Christy didn’t want to give up, though. She continued to stand next to the moving luggage belt, watching the same blue suitcase go around and around. Finally I had to yell at her.
“Christy! Just come over here, forget it, they weren’t on the plane with us.”
For the first time on the whole trip, my optimistic little sister broke down in tears. I think the reality of the nightmare we had gone through, the possibility that our luggage was lost, and the fact that it was 10 PM at night, 12 AM our time, hit her. I put my arm around her and hugged her in close. I realized at this point I needed to watch my temper and be more sensitive around her.
“It’s gonna be alright, Christy,” I said as cheerfully as I could. “We are going to find our luggage. It will get to Alaska with us. We have enough stuff to get by until then.”
I was glad that I had planned ahead for a situation like this and packed all of my marathon clothes and running shoes in my carry-on. Christy had enough clothes and personal items in her carry-on to get by for a couple of days as well. We reached the front of the line and told the woman what our problem was. She looked at our claim tickets and typed the information into her computer. She told us our luggage had arrived and was set aside to be put on the first plane out tomorrow from Seattle to Ketchikan. They would then hold it there for us until we got there. I was relived to hear that our luggage had made this incredibly crazy journey with us. I was concerned, though, to know how we were going to get to Ketchikan. I thanked the woman, then Christy and I went to find the Alaskan Airlines desk.
Down the escalator and to the right we found what we were looking for. The woman behind the Alaskan Airlines counter was in her mid to late fifties and very kind. She walked with us over to the United desk to first see if they could help us out, since they were the ones that messed us up in the first place. The man at the United Airlines desk wasn’t able to find any flights in his computer going from Seattle to Ketchikan, or Seattle to anywhere in Alaska for that matter. I began to get teary eyed again as they explained they could get us there by Sunday evening. The woman from Alaskan Airlines was an earth-angel though. I literally thought I saw a halo above her head as she stayed with us until she found us a flight to Ketchikan that left the next day.
“Here we go. This one leaves at 8 AM tomorrow and will take you to Anchorage, then Juneau, then Petersburg, then Wrangell, and finally Ketchikan. You’ll arrive at 4:30 tomorrow afternoon. How does that work for you ladies?”
“Great!” I cried.
I gave Christy a huge hug as the woman printed off our tickets as well as a set for the flight back home on Sunday. We gathered up our things one last time for the night and went outside to find a shuttle to take us to our hotel. Once we arrived the receptionist accepted our ticket that the Untied flight attendant had printed off for us and we made our way up to our room.
“What time do we need to wake up tomorrow morning,” Christy asked as she took down her long brown hair and climbed into bed.
“I requested our wakeup call for 5:30 AM.”
“K,” she said as she began programming her cell phone.
We set both our cell phones, both of our stop watches, the hotel alarm clock, and asked for a wake up call. There was no way we were going to miss this plane.
“Wait,” I said after we finished synchronizing everything, “lets get up at 5:15, just to be safe. Then if we don’t get up, we’ll still have the wakeup call for backup.”
“Sure, sounds good,” she said adjusting her watch to that time.
“You know, it wouldn’t hurt to get to the airport a little earlier. Let’s get up at 5 AM and then leave at 5:30.”
Christy looked up from her watch and raised one eyebrow at me.
“If you keep this up we just won’t have to go to sleep at all. We can just stay up and head over there right now.”
“Ha, ha. 5 AM. Program it. Goodnight.”
I woke up in the dark and looked at the hotel clock. It was 4:45 AM. I was to anxious to fall back asleep so I got up and began getting ready. Christy heard me moving around and groggily opened her eyes.
“Is it time to go?”
“No, I just can’t fall back asleep. I wanna make sure I’m all ready to go by 5:30. You can sleep longer if you want.”
“Not if you’re making all that noise I can’t.”
She got out of bed and went into the bathroom. By 5:15 we were both ready to go. We went downstairs just as the shuttle was arriving and it got us to the airport by 5:30. Passing through security at that time in the morning was a breeze and once we found our gate number we laid out on the open benches and went back to sleep. By 7 AM the airport was buzzing. I nudged Christy to wake up.
“You hungry?”
“Yeah,” she replied.
“Let’s use one of those tickets to get some breakfast then.”
We found a small bagel shop that was serving ham, egg, and cheese bagels. The smell made my mouth water. The last meal we had was at O’Hare while waiting for our names to be called the standby list.
As Christy was paying for her food, I looked down and saw a five dollar bill lying on the ground near the register. I picked it up and handed it to Christy.
“Did you drop this?”
“No.”
“Shhh! Yes, you did drop this. Here,” I said forcing it into her hand. I decided that finding five bucks lying on the ground was a sign that this trip was going to start to go right.
Christy and I departed for Anchorage at exactly 8 AM, not a minute later. We did what they call the “milk run” and had to make stops along the way to Ketchikan for people to get off and board. It got dreadfully tedious, but we were able to see a lot of the Alaskan scenery that would have never seen if we flew straight into Ketchikan. I took hundreds of pictures of the mountains, rivers, and glaciers each time we took off and landed. At 4:30 our plane landed in our final destination and we went to luggage claim. I asked the helpdesk if they had some luggage put aside for Rachel and Christy Matheson and handed them our claim tickets.
“Yes, it arrived this morning at 8:00,” said the man.
He went into a small room full of lost luggage and grabbed our two suitcases. A flood of cool relief washed over me. We grabbed our things and found my uncle standing near the exit. He greeted us with a warm Alaskan smile.
“Your mom has been updating me about your journey. What a trip, huh?”
“Yeah,” I responded. “All of this to run a marathon.”
He chuckled and helped us carry our bags to an awaiting ferry giving ten minute rides to Ketchikan.

Spring Break with Ma and Pa (rough draft)

An "unedited" travel essay written for a creative writing class.


Spring break 2005…Cancun, Mexico…with my parents…
Ok, so maybe not every college sophomore’s ideal spring break trip. I was just happy to go some place warm, though. I needed to bronze my white Wisconsin skin. I finally convinced my parents to take me with them on their vacation. The year before, UW Madison and Poynette High school’s spring break did not match up. So my parents, brother, and sister went on vacation without me. I didn’t get to go anywhere but home during my spring break that year, thanks to my lack of money and coordination with friends.
In 2005, though, our two schools’ spring breaks matched up. My parents booked an all inclusive vacation to Cancun. I was excited for the fact I was going someplace “cool”, someplace warm, and someplace for free. “With my parents” though, held other implications. No drinking, no going out, basically no fun.
We flew out of Rockford, IL straight down to Cancun. As soon as I stepped off the plane and walked down the tunnel, I could feel the humid tropical air through my sweatshirt. It felt warm and inviting. We made our way through customs and found the bus that would take us to our hotel, the Oasis Viva.
At about 9 pm that night we boarded the bus. Our guide invited us to buy and drink Coronas as he gave us a brief tour along the way. Despite only being 20 at the time, in Cancun, the drinking age is 18. As we drove along, I imagined what would happen if I raised my hand and beckoned the tour guide with Coronas to the back of the bus. My father’s (the man who has never had a drop of alcohol in his life) jaw would drop. My mother (who occasionally had a can of beer on a hot summer’s day) would flash me the evil eye and tell the man, “no, my daughter doesn’t drink; she’s underage” and I’d be humiliated in front of the entire coach bus of college liberals.
Cancun was lit up like Christmas. There were young people everywhere and long lines wrapped outside every club. We could hear the music blasting through the bus windows. I thought about how if I would have planned it better I could have been amongst those people right now and not sitting between my mom and little brother.
After dropping off almost everyone else on the bus, we finally reached our hotel. We were all starving and could not wait to check in and eat some Mexican food. It didn’t even have to be Mexican for all I cared; I just couldn’t wait to eat.
After dinner, my family decided they wanted to check out some of the malls and excitement that we passed by on the way to our hotel. Great, I thought, this is going to look real cool, ten-thousand drunken clubbers crowding the streets and my mom asking them to snap pictures of us. We changed out of our Wisconsin weather sweatshirts and jeans and into something a little bit more climate friendly. Then we took a stroll downtown to look at the markets, malls, and clubs on the main strip of Cancun.
We walked to an open air mall called Forum by the Sea that had performances in the center by both people and animals. That night a seal performed. A large seal hobbled its way down the mall to the center ring and did tricks for us before taking pictures. There were also human statues. People painted themselves a glittery silver or gold from head to toe and stood on a small platform in the mall as still as statues, occasionally changing positions. I really began resenting being there with my family. My mom kept taking our picture with each step we took. Can we look anymore like tourists, I thought. I almost leaped for joy when my dad suggested heading back to the hotel.
If there was one thing I was going to do while in Cancun to keep myself from looking extremely lame, it was maintain my bathing suit figure. On our first full day in Cancun, my sister and I woke at 7 am and ran for about an hour. Not on purpose, though. We were going to do a 40 minute out and back loop, but we got a little lost on the “back” part. Christy, my sister, got really dehydrated and we had no water so we stopped at a fountain in front of a restaurant and I told Christy to dip her head into it and splash water on her face. A man yelled at us for playing in the water, so we had to cut the cool-off short and keep going. Christy constantly needed to stop and walk. She was not acclimated to the humid weather at all and really struggled to keep up. I tried my best to take care of her, but I had left a note for my mom saying we’d be back no later than 50 minutes after we left so I had to keep pushing her to move so we didn’t have a search party out looking for us. After taking every wrong turn and back tracking over and over, we finally found the road our hotel was on. When we got to the hotel, we went straight to the bar and ordered two tall ice waters. All of our runs after that were much shorter and we hydrated better before heading out on them. One good thing that came out of the run was that we covered a lot of the city that surrounded our hotel and by the end of the trip, I knew Cancun like the back of my hand.
Later on that day, my parents decided to do some shopping at an outdoor market. I just rolled my eyes as my mom packed her oversized blue-jean purse with baby wipes, water, snacks, Kleenex, playing cards, as if we were never going to return. She then handed the bag over to my dad saying it was too heavy for her to carry all of our stuff and we each had to take turns carrying her purse.
I was not looking forward to going to the market. Not because it meant spending the whole day with my family and not on the beach, but because I’ve never been a huge fan of market places. The atmosphere makes me uncomfortable. I’m not very good at making deals or ok with men yelling things like “Hey pretty lady, I have just what you’ve been looking for! Come here beautiful!” at me. In the market, my sister and I stopped at a leather goods shop and we each picked out a small purse to have our names burned into. The vendor only spoke Spanish, so I had to recall my knowledge of the language and threw out a few cuanto questas and a gracias to make it look like I knew what I was talking about. My dad tested my limited knowledge in the Spanish language even further when he asked me to help interpret what the taxi driver was saying and get us a good deal on our ride back to the hotel. I let him down, though, partly because of my shyness but mostly because it had been over a year since I had taken Spanish 102 and it was only an elementary level class.
On Tuesday I got screwed out of another day of tanning. My dad planned a ferry ride out to the Isla Mujeres and rented golf carts to tour the five mile long, half mile wide island. I felt like an idiot on the back of the golf cart driving around a little island with my mom leaning out taking pictures of every single tree and building we drove by. It was stop-and-go the whole way and I began to feel nauseous. I was so happy when we decided to stop at a lighthouse that sits on the coast of the island to walk around. The lighthouse is a historical landmark of the island, but I’m pretty sure my mom got more pictures of all the iguanas that were cooling themselves on the rocks around the lighthouse than of the lighthouse itself.
That night after dinner, I still felt sick and went to bed early. My family attended a show put on by the hotel staff that consisted of native dancing and colorful costumes traditional to Mexican culture. As I laid in the hotel room curled up in a ball, all I could think about was how I’d rather be here than with them. The show sounded lame. The next morning though, I didn’t hear the end of it. My family still raves to this day about the performance they saw. I guess I’ll never know what I missed.
There was one traditional Mexican event that I didn’t miss out on, but now that I look back on it, I almost wish I would have. Every Wednesday there is a bull fight at the Plaza de Toros in Cancun. My parents insisted on us attending this historical event, and so I didn’t object. We got seats in the front row that allowed us to peer over the balcony right down into the bull ring. My uncle had seen a bull fight in Spain a few years before we went to Cancun. Even though he does most of the veterinary work on our dairy farm and has even butchered cows, he had returned from that trip telling us that the bull fight was one of the worst things he had ever witnessed. Needless to say, if he couldn’t handle it, I expected the worst. After watching a cock fight and some volunteers from the audience try to play soccer in the ring with a bull chasing them around, it was finally time for the bull fight. The matador strutted his stuff and seemed, in my opinion, pretty arrogant, so I rooted for the bull the entire time. Everything started innocent, but got bloody fast.
To weaken the bull, men on blinded and padded covered horses would run by the bull every once in awhile and throw large darts in its back to draw blood. The matador would keep taunting the bull to make it run and blood would flow out of its back and down its sides, dripping onto the dirt below. At one point, the matador got a little too confident and the glistening red bull caught him off guard, knocking him into the air and down to the ground. Men ran out to rescue him before the bull came back for more, but the damage had been done and they had to help carry him out of the ring. The crowd erupted in cheers for the bull.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, the matador recovered enough to come back and finish his job. He taunted the bull and as it charged at him, he quickly moved out of the way and stabbed it in the back of the neck with his sword as it ran by. Blood spewed out and the bull roared in pain. It began moving slower and weaved back and forth as if it was drunk. He continued to taunt it and make it run around. The men on horses returned to finish the bull off, stabbing it with more darts. Finally, it collapsed, right in front of where we were sitting. I peered over the ledge just in time to watch one of the men slit the bull’s throat. Never again will I go to another bull fight (but I can relive it whenever I want with all the pictures my mom took).
The day after the bull fight, we decided to take a break from all the site-seeing and finally hit the beach. It really wasn’t as great as it sounds though. The week after spring break, I had a Chemistry and Calculus exam. Also, my mom only brought spf 30 sun block. Despite my mom’s skin cancer precautions, though, I was able to get a little bit of a tan while reading, memorizing formulas, and doing problems over and over. During my study breaks, of course I had to sip virgin piña coladas.
One evening, my dad decided he wanted to do some exploring and see Cancun’s night life. He invited me to go with him and we walked down to the main strip of Cancun where all the clubs are located. College kids filled the streets, loud music blared, and long lines stood outside of every bar. Wondering what was so great inside these bars, my dad waltzed right into one as I embarrassedly lagged behind. Luckily the bar he chose was not on of the most popular ones and was pretty deserted. I still felt like all eyes were on us, though. My dad doesn’t drink, so it was awkward for me to see him in a bar. He sort of walked around, looked at the interior design, and then said the place didn’t impress him much, so we left.
On one of the last days, my dad paid to take two mini speedboats on the “jungle tour,” which pretty much amounted to driving boats through a narrow path between two small islands where we “might” see alligators. I rode with my brother and let him drive. Being only 16, my brother enjoyed the privilege a bit too much and we were literally airborne for most of the trip. When we reached our destination, a man helped us anchor our boat and we put on snorkeling equipment and jumped into the water.
Back in the third and fourth grade I had considered being a marine biologist. I have always been fascinated with the ocean and I love snorkeling and collecting shells on the beach. Yet ever since I tried to take a fish I caught off of a hook and rubbed the scales the wrong way, I’ve been terrified of touching fish. When we jumped into the water in Cancun, I had to face my fear…times a thousand. The water where we jumped in literally looked like a black cloud of fish. I couldn’t move without touching a fish. I freaked out and was screaming at my brother, “Oh my gosh, don’t let them touch me! It’s going to hurt! I don’t want to touch them!”
After I got over the dramatics, and out of the cloud of fish, I calmed down and really began enjoying myself. I let my body sink down under the blue glass and into a whole other world. Multi-colored coral and fish of all kinds filled the ocean floor. Everything seemed to be closer than it actually was underwater. Huge fish would swim right in front of my face, but actually be a few feet away, which I was just fine with. I took pictures with my underwater camera as they swam by and got some great close-ups of the marine life in Cancun. I was sad to leave the water and return to land. Our trip was coming to an end and I knew I’d miss the jungle tour the most.
We boarded our plane around noon on Saturday. It was a long trip home and I studied most of the time, but I couldn’t help dozing off once in awhile and imagine myself driving around Isla Mujeres, watching the bull get his revenge on the matador, and snorkeling in the Caribbean. I realized then that I’m always have a picture of Cancun in my mind that many college kids never get to see. When I returned in 2006, though, I left my family behind.

Snippets of Stories 3

Scene from the story Twenty-six Point Two that I used to apply to the UO and OS Creative Writing g-school programs.

Once I got out of the water station, I began to run again. I planned to repeat what I had done in the first half. Mile thirteen to fourteen wasn’t too bad, but as soon as my body knew that I had decided to finish this marathon, it fought back. I felt as though my quads were swelling. I could almost hear a Thud! every time my foot hit the pavement. I longed for the next water station. My throat was so dry. I took walking breaks every mile and felt like no matter what I did, I could not get enough to drink. I was taking water at every water station. Gu, my energy source for this race, didn’t help at all, and neither did my miracle mix of peanut M&M’s and fruit snacks that got me through my first marathon in a Boston qualifying time. The aid stations were handing out Ultima Replenisher, a sugar-free version of Gatorade which made me gag. The liquid briefly hydrated my mouth, but then left it drier than before. My legs felt sluggish. I yearned for water. Ten steps later I grabbed one. It was warm.
“Go Anna!!!!!”
I looked right and saw my sister jumping and clapping. My mom stood next to her looking less enthused. Say something, mom, I thought. She didn’t though. She didn’t cheer me on nor did she tell me to quit. She just stared at me and from ten feet away I could see the age wrinkles around her eyes. I turned my head and faced forward, continuing on as my sister cheered from behind.
At mile sixteen, I seriously contemplated dropping out of the race. There were a few emergency aid stations marked along the course. When I reached one at mile seventeen, I thought, just try run to the next aid station and drop out there. I couldn’t get my medal unless I finished. Greed kept me going at this point. I did not drive five hours to Duluth not to get some hardware! Despite the selfish motivation, when I thought about how much more I had to still run, I felt worse. Old women were passing me. I lost sight of the nine-minute-mile pacer. Stopping to walk no longer helped.
Around mile seventeen and a half I became desperate to find any energy source. An older woman was handing out cups of ice at the very end of the next water station. I grabbed one as I ran by her and tossed a few cubes in my mouth. I began to choke.
“You ok,” asked a young man who had caught up to me.
“Yeah (cough), I’m fine (cough).”
I looked over at him. His nipples were bleeding through his white tank top. The lines of crusty red made me nauseous.
The cool in my mouth zapped me like a bold of lightening. I suddenly had energy again. I ate ice for the rest of the race when available; sometimes almost choking on it, but the slight relief the ice gave me made it worth it.
The marathon route entered Duluth. Some how, maybe because of the heat, in my mind, I had gotten a mile ahead of myself. I thought I was approaching mile twenty. I checked my watch and thought I had picked up the pace and was making good time. Then I came to mile nineteen. If I had the water and salt to spare, I would have cried. To think I only had 6.2 miles left and to realize I actually had 7.2 mile may not sound like a huge difference, but at that point, I dreaded every step.
In town, people cheered for us the entire way. Some even handed out food and water, or sprayed us down with they’re garden hose. One guy had a tray of small cups of beer. I passed up the offer, not because I was underage, but beer was the last thing I wanted to be drinking at that point. I couldn’t get enough water. A mile further down the road, a woman was holding out a giant tub of Vaseline. I was glad I had prepared my body that morning by rubbing down with Blister Shield wipes. At least I wasn’t dealing with chafing too.
I wish I could have enjoyed the last six miles more that I did. I had to use all my focus to keep going. No matter how hard I tried to run, I hurt, and I had to walk. All I could think about was how thirsty I was.
“Keep going blue shorts! You look strong,” yelled a spectator.
They have no idea what kind of pain I’m in, I thought. I just wanted to finish, that was all. Just cross the finish line and then sit down.
“High-five! High-five!” Yelled a little boy holding out his hand to runners. I extended a sweaty palm to him, but missed.
When I reached mile 23, I knew I just had a 5K to go. I had done countless 5k’s over my life. Compared to a marathon, the distance was minuscule. I had a feeling that this would be the longest 5k of my life. I came to a small bridge in the course that I had to run up and then back down. When I saw it, my heart sank. I knew from my last marathon that running down would be the worst part. The extra pounding took my already almost crippled legs and finished the job. Every step from there on out was like a combination of fire and nails in my quads.

To My Valentine:

I chase orange melting into purple.
A lone bird without a V,
Leaving my nest in the sunrise;
High above the nimbi,
Thousands of miles spread out between us;
Your heartbeat fades into a distant patter,
Mine races in front of me.

This Eagle’s flight cannot take me away from you,
My love expands past the mountains that separate us;
I follow the winding river’s curves,
And they lead me straight back to you.

Dusk settles on the earth below,
But above these white puffs its still morning

And I chase on

To catch the sunset to find my own sunrise.
I yearn for the day
I wake to pink sky with you by my side.

And when night lingers
Outside my windowpane,
And fog rolls in
To cover the valley range,
I will not fear or distress
‘Cause though its not here
In the rolling west,
I know there’s sunrise
In the distant plane
Where my heart is on this Valentine’s Day.

Snippets of Stories 2

The beginning entry of an untitled story I began a few months ago.

It was one of those humid sunny days in late August that tease the senses into thinking summer may just go on forever. Taylor and Paul had been driving in a red Chevy Aveo rental car along Highway126 from Eugene to the west coast for an hour. Paul, in his blue-rimmed sport sunglasses, had the windows down all the way as he drove which blew strands of Taylor’s long brown hair into her face. She brushed away the strands while she studied the road map on her lap and sipped black coffee from her thermos.
Paul played with the radio stations, switching back and forth from the local country station to the classic rock station unable to decide which he’d rather drive to. He knew Taylor hated country, and he wanted to listen it just to spite her. He loved the face she made when she was upset, scrunching up her nose and biting her bottom lip. Sometimes he’d try to rile her up, just to see it, but right now there wasn’t anything good playing on the country station.
They were headed to the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area for four days of camping, hiking, and if they were brave enough, swimming in the cold Pacific Ocean. Taylor fiddled with the map as she continued to take small sips from her thermos. She peaked at Paul out of the corner of her eye. She was attracted to him; there was no denying herself of that, but now that he was here, physically present with her in car, she turned all shy. Their hours of late night conversations online, weekend texting, and flirtatious emails for the past five months had still not prepared her for what it would be like to physically be with him again.

Snippets of Stories 1

So, there are a lot of stories that I will not post in entirety on here, but rather just share snippets. Here is a section of a story called The Breakdown of Souls that I have been working on for a few years.

Around 5 am the sun came up and shined through the open garage door into the back window of the car. As the car began to heat up, Jen awoke. She groggily grabbed her purse and stumbled out of the car and into the house. The first thing she saw when she opened her bedroom door was his picture on her bulletin board. She fought back tears and crawled into bed, only to find herself staring at a photo of them on her nightstand. He seemed to be smiling through the picture at her. She sighed, rolled over and closed her eyes. She didn’t sleep this time. She lied there until the smell of bacon and eggs crept under her door and to her nose. She wanted to just lie there in bed until he came looking for her and said that he made a mistake and that he wanted her back. Eventually her mother was the one who came looking for her.
“Jen, its 8:15, you need to get up and get ready for work.”
“I’m not going,” she said.
“You’re what?”
“Not going! I’m going to call in sick. I really don’t feel good this morning.”
Her mother walked across the room and put her hand on Jen’s forehead.
“Sick in the middle of July? Well, you don’t feel warm, but your eyes are all puffy and red.”
“Mom, I said I don’t feel well.”
“Are they itchy?”
“Is what itchy?”
“Your eyes. Gosh I hope you don’t have pink eye. What have you touched today? Don’t rub them!”
“Mom, I don’t have pink eye. I’m not feeling well.”
“Have you been drinking? Jen, I tell you, if I find out you were drinking last night, I’ll have you-“
“Mom! No, I haven’t been drinking. I’m just sick, ok! Can’t I just be sick? Why does there always have to be a reason to things for you? Not all things have a reason, Mom. Sometimes bad things happen for no reason. Sometimes unexpected-bad things- they-they happen- for…no…reason…”
Jen’s sentence trailed off into tears. Sandra held her daughter and let her cry for a moment.

Madison Marathon

At the end of my sophomore year of college at the University of Madison, I ran my first marathon. I had not intended to run a marathon that early. I had always told people I would run one after I graduated from college, when I had the time to train. I did not train for my first marathon, though.
Three weeks before the Madison Marathon, my friend Allison came to me for advise on a twenty mile route she could do around town. I had done several out and back loops throughout Madison, and I was able to estimate the distance of many of these routes based on the time it took me to run them. I began explaining a route that she could take, but it was hard because she had never been on most of the streets I was describing. I decided that I would just run the route with her and stop after about two hours, letting her finish the last hour around campus. At this point the longest run of my life was one hour and fourty-five minutes, and I had only done that twice.
The following Saturday morning, I woke up around 7am to eat a peanut butter/ banana/ honey bagel sandwich for breakfast (which to this day has remained my pre-long run meal). Then at 9am, I met Allison and we set out for our run. We ran at a conversational pace, probably nine-minute miles and dropped to 8:30s. I began eating some fruit snacks I brought along after an hour and a half into the run. We jogged in place at all of the stoplights to prove to ourselves we could run for twenty miles straight.
I ended up running the whole route I had plotted with Allison. It took us exactly three hours. When we got back to the dorms and finally stopped running, I felt a pain I had never experienced before. My quads burned, my hip-flexors ached all the way up into my mid-pelvis, and my shoulders, neck, and back were so tight I thought the slightest movement would make a muscle snap. Yet, after completing a twenty mile run with out dying or quitting, I figured I was capable of running a marathon. What was another six miles? So, I signed up for the Madison Marathon.
The semester ended two weeks before the marathon, and I went back to live with my parents over the summer. On race day, I woke up early to eat the same pre twenty miler meal. Then my mom, sister, and I hopped in the car and drove the 26 miles to the capital building. Yes, my home town is the same distance from the starting line as a marathon; the race I was about to run. The car ride made me realize how very long this race was going to be. When we got to Madison, we met up with Allison and her family. I nervously waited in a line to get my race number. All sorts of potential disasters were streaming through my mind. What if I can’t finish? What if I get injured? What if I have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the race? What if I hit the wall? What is the wall? What if I just collapse? All of this worrying made me have to go to the bathroom several times before I walked to the start. Finally it was 7:20, almost time to run. I didn’t do any kind of warm up other than walking. I thought who wants to run before running 26.2 miles? Yet, I saw people warming up all around me. Allison and I stood next to each other at the starting line. We were in a large pack of people, but somewhat towards the front. There I spotted my former high school cross country coach. I had heard he was running Madison Marathon as well, but I was surprised to find him in the crowd of runners. There was something about having my coach there with me that made me a little less nervous, but I still had no idea what I was getting myself into.
The first ten miles flew by. It shocked me to see how many people dove off the course in the first five miles to go to the bathroom. No one was shy about it either. I saw both men and women hiding behind trees and bushes relieving themselves. Allison and I engaged in conversation which helped the time to pass. We ran along side a woman who had run the Disney Land Marathon in Florida the year before. We also caught up to a man who had run a marathon the day before, was running Mad City as a “cool down”, and planned to run Lakeshore Marathon in Chicago the day after (the same race that was a mile too long that year).
Starting about an hour and a half into the race, I began eating and taking water and Gatorade at every other mile. I had brought my own energy snack of fruit snacks and peanut M&M’s. I tried to make sure I was never hungry or thirsty the entire time I was running. The strategy seemed to work pretty well. Allison and I kept up a pretty good pace and we ran together almost the entire way. We reached the twenty mile mark under three hours and realized we must have run over twenty miles on our training run because we were going about the same speed. It was also at this point that I realized the true torture I was putting my body through. We had just gone over one of the bigger hills on the course and I remember asking Allison, “Whose [explicit] idea was this?” Only to have her respond it was mine.
Around mile twenty-two by some miracle, I got a second wind. Allison and I agreed that if one of us felt good, that that person should just go. I took off and got faster with each step. I must have done something right in the first 22 miles of the race because my last 5k felt amazing. I reached the finish in a time of 3:37:31 which was good enough to qualify for the Boston Marathon in my age category.
As soon as I stopped running, the pain swooped in. My quads throbbed and quivered under by body weight as I hobbled out of the finishing area. I saw my former high school cross country coach and we congratulated each other as I waited for Allison to cross the finish. Then, I limped to a port-a-potty and signed up for a free-massage at the massage tent. I reached the point where I couldn’t walk/limp any longer, and I collapsed in the grass while I waited for my massage.
Unfortunately because the Boston Marathon falls on a Monday in April, I was unable to sign up for it. I had too many important classes on Monday and Tuesday that I could not afford to miss. I also thought since I had qualified for the Boston Marathon in my first marathon attempt, I could easily do it again. (I would later find out I was wrong). Training for a marathon takes a good base and a little bit of luck because you never know what kinds of injuries may sneak up on you. I had a good base before deciding to run Mad City and therefore I was able to run well.

Press Release

FOR IMMEADIATE RELEASE


MOVIN’ SHOES HOLDS 4TH ANNUAL FULL MOON RUN

June 20, 2008, Madison, Wis.- Movin’ Shoes will host their fourth annual Full Moon Run on July 17th at Olin Park in Madison, WI. The registration fee for the 5K is $15 and the race starts at 9 p.m. It is open to the first 500 registrants and takes place under the light of the full moon. Kids 12 and under can sign up for the 1K kids fun run for $1 that starts in Olin Park at 8:30 p.m.

Onsite registration begins at Olin Park Shelter at 7pm and ends promptly at 8:30 p.m. The 5K course starts at Bernie’s Beach on Lakeside Street and follows the Monona Bay and Lake Monona bike paths to Olin Park. Rewards and refreshments follow the race from 9:30-10 p.m.

The $15 fee covers sign up, a free pint glass, socks, a bike light, and a raffle ticket. There will be tons of raffle give-a-ways! Post-race refreshments and specialty root beer will also be served. The top male and female in each age category wins either a free pair of shoes, gift certificate, or merchandise. To sign up, you can go online at http://www.movinshoesmadison.com/ or pick up a registration form at Movin’ Shoes.

-more-
Movin’ Shoes Run
Page 2 of 2

For the past four years, Movin’ Shoes has put on the Full Moon Run to benefit the Fit City Madison Programs whose goal is to improve nutrition and increase physical activity among all Madison residents. Movin’ Shoes has been selling running shoes in Madison since 1976. They take pride in being a small independent business and treat each customer that walks in the door as a friend. They sell merchandise for 10-15% below suggested retail and give discounts to teams, clubs, and high school athletes.

For more information contact:
Movin’ Shoes
528 S. Park St.
Madison, WI 53715
(608) 251-0125
www.movinshoesmadison.com

# # #

Grandma's Marathon Article

Published in the Poynette Press.

June 17th, 2006, Minnesota held the 30th anniversary of Grandma’s Marathon. The 26.2 miler starts in Two Harbors and finishes in Duluth. It’s one of the largest marathons in the country, last year ranking the 13th largest in number of finishers. This year, 91 percent humidity at the starting line and temperatures soaring to 77 degrees did not stop 6,909 runners from crossing the finish line. The weather forced 410 runners, more than double the usual amount, to the medical tents and 13 runners to the hospital. Among this year’s finishers was local runner Anna Heintz from Poynette who ran in a time of 4:12:50. This is Anna’s second marathon in the last two years, her first being the Madison Marathon in which she qualified for the Boston Marathon. The unfavorable conditions at Grandma’s will not discourage her from running another marathon in her future, though. She hopes to one day run a marathon in every state. Local runner Kevin Frehner (Poynette) was also among the finishers this year.

Movin' Shoes Article

Published on the Movin' Shoes website and in the Wisconsin Track Club monthly news letter.

Picture this: a small retail store that is operated by runners for runners, known for its great service, anytime return policy, and even lets you run outside in the shoes before you buy them. Imagine a shoe store where no one is on commission, one that is not out to make the most money, and best of all, gives you a 12% discount just because you are a member of WTC. Does this place sound too good to be true? Nope, it’s Movin’ Shoes located on 604 South Park Street, Madison. Movin’ Shoes has always taken pride in supplying the best quality running shoes to its customers for well below retail value. The store hosts community runs, running lectures and even a marathon training class. What more could a runner ask for? Movin’ Shoes opened their first store on State Street back in the fall of 1973. Before this time, the only way to purchase running shoes was by mail order. The owners Roger and Herb each pitched in $500 to start the store and were only open 4 hours a week. They had no register and keep all their money in, what else, a shoe box. Recreational jogging was just becoming a fad and most of their customers were University runners or people who ran in high school. The athletes did not have a very hard time when it came to picking out a shoe because the store only had 3 brands: Blue Ribbon (Nike), New Balance, and Tiger (Asics). And the average price was only $18.95. Roger and Herb also traveled to area high schools and races and sold their shoes out of the back of a van. Each customer was a friend to these men and they knew just about each of their customers by name. In 1976 Movin’ Shoes moved to South Park Street and has remained there ever since. Herb moved out to California and Karl Harter was hired to take his spot and today he owns the store and prides in staying a small independent business. He feels, just like Roger and Herb did, that each person who walks in the door is a friend. Never has Movin’ Shoes sold a shoe for suggested retail and are always 10-15% below this price. They also give discounts to teams, clubs, high school and college athletes. Movin’ Shoes has been a member of the running community from its very beginning. They have sold shoes to Olympians like Suzy Hamliton and Eric Heiden. Also, many talented and famous runners have worked at Movin’ Shoes, for example Olympian Pascal Dobert, Olympic trial finalist Jenelle Deathridge, Olympic trials participant Matt Downin and his brother Andy Downin, the 2001 champion in 1500, and many more. So what’s next for Movin’ Shoes? They are moving to a new location in Summer of 2006. They will still be located on South Park Street(528 S. Park)but now in a bigger and better store that Karl calls “The Movin’ Shoes World Headquarters.” For now though, they continue to be “Madison and Wisconsin's foremost running specialty store and provide shoes, support, and service for all kinds of runners!”For more information about Movin’ Shoes, visit http://movinshoesmadison.com/

Steward of the Land

I wake up at 5 o’clock every morning and leave for work. I get one hour off for breakfast and one hour off for lunch. I come home around 8 P.M. each night. Sometimes 7:30 if things have gone really well. 8:30 or later if they haven’t. I have no say in how much I get paid, and I can never ask for a raise.
I am a dairy farmer
I am not one to go around telling people that I love my job, but that doesn’t mean that I hate it either. It’s the business I grew up in, and the only career I have ever known. My father was a dairy farmer and so was his father before him. I began helping my father as a child. I was driving tractors at age ten and farm trucks at age twelve. I have farmed with my two older brothers all my life. When I was twenty-one and finished with college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, I officially became an “employee” of Heintz Dairy Farms. My father had decided to retire and my brother Ralph and I took over the family business. Together we decided to make it a partnership and split our income fifty/fifty. On the farm, we each do what we are good at. Ralph does most of the veterinary work along with planting and picking corn. I’m in charge of most of the mechanic work, and I also chop feed, bale hay, disc, and grind feed. My oldest brother Marvin is not part of the milking partnership but he does help us with welding and field work and he raises calves, as well.
All together, my two brothers and I own five farms. We each own our own farm and there are two farms that Ralph and I own together. The “home farm” is where we milk the cows. The other four farms are used for keeping heifers, growing crops, and storing corn, hay, and machinery. Ralph and I each live on one of these farms, separate from the home farm and we commute to work each day. Between us we own 520 acres of land. We use 150 acres for corn, 150 for hay, 100 for pasture, 20 for oats, and the rest is woods and wetlands and is considered wasteland.
When Ralph and I first went into business together, we only milked sixty dairy cows. As time went on and expenses went up, along with the number of children in our families, we needed to increase this number to have a larger income. Today we milk a hundred cows in two shifts of fifty cows twice a day, that is, two shifts at 5:30 A.M. and two shifts at 5:30 P.M. Milking one-hundred cows takes about two hours. There is some prep work to be done before each shift, like feeding the cows and calves, putting the milkers together, and scraping the walkway. There is also cleanup to be done afterward, like cleaning the milk-house, cleaning the milkers, and scraping the walkway again. To some this may sound tedious but it is what I have done for over thirty years. Just like you brush your teeth every morning and every night, you don’t think twice, it’s just something that you have to do. In this case it’s the same six hours of work everyday.
When we aren’t milking cows, we are feeding cattle, doing field work, or fixing things. These activities usually consume my afternoons. On Sundays, though, I take the afternoon off to be with my family and it is a day I look forward to. Farming is a seven-day-a-week, 365-days-a-year job, with no vacations and no sick days. If you do need to take off for some reason, you are responsible for finding replacement. This usually isn’t a problem since my son, Bob, is now old enough to handle most of the milking chores and some of the field work. He’s usually out there helping us anyway these days, but if we need more help, my daughters sometimes even come out and help, with smiles on their faces of course. Ralph’s son has helped out as well, and so have family friends when we’ve needed them in times of emergency, like when Ralph had a heart attack back in 2000. I appreciate the extra help anytime we can get it. It always makes our job go faster. That way, I can get home sooner to be with my family, attend my kids’ sporting events, or possibly get to bed earlier. In the summer, the barn can get very hot. Just imagine days when it’s ninety-five degrees out and you’re packed in a barn with fifty large animals. The heat is horrendous. The sooner I can get the cows milked and get out of there, the happier I am.
As dairy farmers, our cows produce milk that goes into making butter and cheeses. All of our milk is trucked to a co-op dairy in the small town of Alto which is about fifty-five miles away from where we farm in Poynette. Ralph and I get paid twice a month and our check is based upon the amount of milk in our bulk tank and the value of milk at that time. Because milk prices change all of the time, we never know how much we are going to be paid. Milk prices are regulated by cheese and butter prices. We are always watching these prices and budget our spending money accordantly if we know prices are down and our next check is not going to be that big. There have been time the milk prices have been real low, and many dairy farmers that we know have had to go out of business. This is such a frustrating time because you are working just as hard, or even harder to keep the bulk tank is filled to capacity and get the most money that you can, but your income doesn’t reflect this work.
The worst days for a dairy farmer, though, are when there are milking disasters. There have been times when the pipes that carry the milk from the milk machines on the cows to the bulk tank break or get disconnected and all of our milk runs out onto the ground. Your money literally goes down the drain. Or a cow with mastitis (an udder infection) accidentally gets milked and we have to dump everything we have collected if we don’t catch it before it gets mixed in with all the cows’ milk. If this contaminated milk were to slip past inspection and somehow make its way onto the milk truck, all the milk from all of the farms the milk truck has collected from would have to be dumped. If our farm’s milk (about 600 gallons per day) would contaminate the 6,000 gallons on the truck, we would be responsible for paying for the whole load of milk. This is something that very rarely happens though, because all of our milk is tested every time it is picked up and taken from our farm for market. The milk hauler tests it for drugs, water content, bacteria, cell count (a test for mastitis), and butterfat. A milk inspector can come out to our farm without notice at any given time. To stay prepared we must always have a clean milk house and clean barn. This is all part of being subject to state and federal guidelines for producing and selling our milk. One good thing is that we have always been told that our farm has some of the cleanest and safest milk. Up until Ralph’s heart attack, we would always dip jugs into the bulk tank and take raw milk home for our families. We no longer do this because raw milk is so high in fat. Surprisingly, my family and I now drink skim milk, which was very hard to get use to since we once drank the freshest milk you could get.
Even though a person may think, for dairy farmers, spilled milk is the one thing we would cry most over, it is only one of the catastrophes I have faced as a farmer. There have been numerous machinery breakdowns or blown tires in the middle of field work, machinery fires that we couldn’t put out and had to call the fire department to help us (in the middle of field work), and escaping cattle onto country roads where they can get hit or kill someone (this has happen too many times to count, sometimes in the wee hours of the morning and we have to search in the dark until we find all of them and then fix the fence that they broke out of). With farming, you never know what to expect next and you always have to be on top of things and be paying attention. My brothers and I have each had our own personal scares on the farm, cases where we have almost died. Each of us have been chased by a raging bull, kicked by a cow, or have been on a farm vehicle that suddenly caught fire. Ralph once got his wedding ring caught on a piece of equipment and almost had his finger ripped off and had to be taken to the hospital. Marvin has had his jaw broken and the side of his head cut when a jack popped out from under the equipment he was working on and hit him in the face. I have fallen off of a barn roof, experienced short-term memory loss, broke 4 bones in my face, and received over one-hundred stitches. Farming is dangerous job, there’s no denying that, but it is my life. I don’t think about it twice. I just work harder to be more careful by telling people where I will be working and learning from the things that went wrong so they don’t happen again so I’m more prepared the next time they do.
Farming is hard work. Every season there are different things that need to be done at a certain time, in certain weather in order to get the maximum benefits. In the spring we disc, plant corn and oats, spray for weeds, and chop green feed. In the summer we mow, rake, and bale hay, cultivate corn, combine oats, bale straw, and chop green feed. In the fall we pick the corn, chop stocks, chop green feed, chop corn for the silo, and disc. A lot of these activities require rain at specific times for maximum growth. Too much rain will flood the fields or prevent the hay from drying out so it can’t be baled. Not enough rain means the crops won’t grow tall or fully mature. We must also battle with early frosts, hale storms, and high winds. We want to have plenty of crops, hay, and straw harvested so when winter comes we don’t run out. This is why problems with machinery are so frustrating. Most recently our corn picker started on fire and we had to wait a week after the corn was ready to be picked to replace it. This only makes the corn more susceptible to frost and risk of damage. It is devastating to see half a years work go to waste and then have to figure out some way to make up for it to feed the cattle.
For the Heintz’s, farming is a family business. We don’t know any other way of life. Waking at five in the morning is just natural to me. I love farming because I can see the things I accomplish from start to finish, like raising cattle or planting crops. I have a hand in it all and I reap my own rewards. I love the rural life and I always wanted to raise a family in the quiet country life. I never thought about how long I would farm when I took over the farm with my brother. I’m fifty-five now and Ralph is sixty, but I do not see us retiring anytime soon. Ralph’s kids are all grown up, but I’m still putting mine through college and right now milk is paying for that. My youngest son Bob wants to attend UW Madison next fall to study Dairy Science and plans to one day take over the family business. This would be my greatest dream. I would love to see the farm continue on after I retire, but I don’t know if he can do it by himself.
What makes me the saddest right now, though, is to see the loss of farmland to development and other farmers having to go out of business because of low milk prices. There used to be farms all over the Dekorra Township. Now, it is though the dairy farmer is becoming an endangered species. Many people don’t understand farmers and the importance of this life to us. We are stewards of the land. We bring milk, butter, cheese, and yogurt to your tables. We work hard everyday, never knowing how we will be rewarded. Most important of all, we keep tradition alive. I hope the tradition of Heintz Dairy Farms doesn’t end after me.

The Meeting

Robert shuffled slowly down the sidewalk, not making any attempt to avoid the puddles. His sweat pants dragged under his Adidas sneakers, both laces were untied. His head hung under the hood of his sweatshirt and he stared at the sidewalk three feet in front of him. The rain poured down on him making his sweatshirt heavy, but he didn’t care. He saw it was raining when he left his apartment, but he didn’t bother to grab the umbrella from the closet.
Robert rounded the corner and could just make out Donny’s Diner through the downpour. The neon lights of the diner’s sign glared at him and made him feel uneasy. He wanted to turn around, go back to his nice warm bed, sleep off the awful hangover he had. She’d be pissed though. She’d be pissed that he was already twenty minutes late, but if he didn’t show up at all, she’d be really pissed. For a split second he considered the possibility of her wanting to meet him this early because she was breaking up with him. He could faintly remember what the single life felt like. He figured it was soaring like a bird through an endless sky, always flying towards the horizon, towards a sunrise. Dating on the other hand was like falling out of the nest, lying on the ground unable to move; then watching a cat make its way towards you slowing, not knowing if it was going to bite your head off, or just tease you a little bit until you begged for mercy.
Robert reached the door of Donny’s. He tried to look through the diner’s windows to see if he could see her in there sharpening her nails or polishing her gun, but it was too dark inside to make out any images. He took a deep breath, stood up straight, and gave the handle a firm tug.
Inside the diner the air was hot and it reeked of maple syrup. Robert tried to hold his breath, but the smell seeped in through his pores and made him nauseous. A waitress hesitantly approached the drenched man as if he were a wet rat.
“Table…for…one?”
“No, I’m meeting someone.”
His eyes darted around the room and he spotted Sarah at a booth near the window. She was dressed nice, wearing a light pink blouse and black slacks. Her hair was swept up in a clip but a few strands had fallen out and were lying gently on her shoulders. The slight imperfection made Robert feel a little less uneasy as he made his way towards her. He would brush the strands away from her face as they talked; it was an easy excuse to ease the tension that he felt on the phone when she called him at 4:30 am.
“Hey, what’s up?” he said sliding into the booth.
Sarah looked up from her coffee cup that was clutched between both of her sweaty palms.
“You’re late. I said meet me at 9:00.”
Robert knew this was going to be a long morning. He decided to be on the offensive rather than the defensive that way things went more smoothly.
“I know, babe, I’m sorry. What is it you wanted to talk about?”
Sarah stared at him silently. She studied his face, his eyes. Were these eyes of a cheater? Did she even know what the eyes of a cheater looked like? Eyes like his had deceived her before, but she just couldn’t believe they had deceived her again. She glanced back down at her coffee and rubbed her damp hands on her pants.
“Sarah? What’s up?”
That’s what he always said. What’s up? Not, what’s wrong? Not, how are you? Not, baby I’m so sorry for being such an asshole. She looked up at him and met his eyes.
“Where were you last night?”
Direct. Straight to the point. Robert squirmed. He felt the diner’s florescent lights burning his cheeks. He was not in the mood for the 10th degree this morning. Why should she care where he was last night? He’s his own man, he can come and go whenever he pleases. He shouldn’t have to check in with her every time he wants to go out with the guys. She glared at him and he could feel Tiffany’s eyes on him all over again. The thought of breaking up streamed through his mind again. If she kept this up, he’d dump her just like he dumped Tiffany.
“Why do you want to know?”
“Because.”
“Because why?”
“Because, I want to know where you were.”
Robert rolled his eyes. This was going no where. A waitress approached their table hesitantly. She asked Robert if he needed anything.
“A coffee, please. And some toast.”
The waitress nodded quickly and scribbled on her pad. She was young, no older than 17. She was wearing too much eye-shadow and her wrists were covered in colorful string bracelets. Her ponytail bobbed as she nodded.
“Anything else for you ma’am?” she asked Sarah.
“No, I’m fine,” Sarah said without taking her eyes off of Robert.
The waitress scurried off leaving Robert in the hot-seat again. Outside the rain poured down. Robert wished he was back in bed. He rubbed his eyes with the end of the sleeve of his wet sweatshirt that still rested heavily upon his shoulders.
“Sarah, what’s wrong? What did I do?”
“You know what you did,” she hissed.
“No, I don’t. You’re freaking out on me and I have no idea why. Would you just tell me already, I’m sick of this bullshit. Just tell me what I did!”
He had about reached his breaking point and a few people in the restaurant turned to see who was making all the commotion. Sarah rolled her eyes and sat back in the booth. She took a long sip from her coffee cup, never taking her eyes off of Robert.
“I tried to call you last night and you wouldn’t pick up your cell phone.”
“I probably didn’t hear it. Why were you trying to call anyway, you knew I was out with the guys?”
“Until 4:30 this morning, Robert?! I seriously doubt that. You never stay out that late with the guys; you never hang out with the guys. Why are you suddenly hanging out with the guys until 4:30 in the morning?”
Robert felt like he didn’t have to answer her, he didn’t have to deal with this. This was ridiculous. Why was she being like this? So damn difficult. Did he have to call her and check in like he was 16 again? The waitress came back with his coffee. She set it down quickly and mumbled something about his toast being up in a minute. Her pony tale bobbed as she walked away.
“I told you I was going out with the guys last night. You called me on Friday, asked what I was doing and I said going out with the guys. You acted like you were fine with it.”
“I was fine with you going out with the guys.”
“Then what are you upset about?”
“Because I know you lied to me.”
Roberts jaw dropped. He couldn’t believe this conversation was unfolding before him. He literally felt like he was watching a horrible chick flick and wanted to change the channel. What did she think he was doing last night? He watched her fidget with her napkin, ripping it into micro pieces and making a pile to her right. She was no longer staring at him, but concentrating hard on ripping the napkin. Her hands quivered slightly.
They were both silent. Neither one knew what to say. Robert was the first to break the silence.
“What makes you think that I lied to you?”
“I know you lied to me,” she said softly without looking up.
Robert rolled his eyes. Again they were getting no where. He looked up at the clock above the cash register. It was now 9:58. He had been here for over a half an hour and gotten no where. He just wanted to know what was bothering her, fix it, and go home.
“Can you please just spell it out for me, Sarah? I really have no clue what you are talking about.”
“Do you really think I’m that stupid, Robert? That I wouldn’t catch on? You were out with another girl. You think I’m a fool, but I’m not. I’ve been down this road before and I won’t fall for it again! I want to break up.”
She was shaking and tears were streaming down her burning cheeks. Robert stared at her and chuckled. What on earth was she talking about? She had officially lost it. Before he could say anything in his defense, she picked up her umbrella and coat and began to scoot out of the booth. He grabbed her wrist as she was about to stand up.
“You’re making a mistake. I was out with the guys. I had way too much to drink last night and passed out at Dave’s for about an hour before waking up and walking home at 4:00. I’ve never cheated on you, ever. You’re crazy.”
“I’m crazy for trusting you!” She said trying to convince herself at the same time.
“No, you’re not. You were hurt before by someone who cheated on you, but I’m not like that. You know what I’m like. And you know what else you know, I hate being told what to do. I hate having to answer to someone all the time. You told me you were different. Waitress! If you can’t let me be and let me live my life, then I don’t want you to be a part of it.”
The waitress brought over the check and Robert threw four dollars down on the table. He pulled up his hood and slid out of the booth. Outside the rain had diminished to a drizzle, but the wind had picked up. The letter Y on the diner’s sign flickered before going out.

The 4x4 Experience

Published in The Cross Country Journal:


"Take your marks!"
I take three quick jumps, shake out my legs, and do some quick trunk rotations. My heart pounds, my palms sweat, and my right hand struggles to keep its tight grip around the baton. My eyes close and I whisper a silent prayer. Slowly, I bend over and stretch myself into the blocks, first the right leg, then the left. My stomach is doing back flips and I find it difficult to breathe steadily. Once my spikes are in the blocks and secure, I rest my knee on the warm, scabrous, rubber track. I brush the dirt and grit off my hands and place them behind the line. I'm up on the tips of my fingers, still clutching the baton as if the slightest movement of the wind would blow it right out of my hand. Ever so slowly, I lower my head and bring my shoulders forward. I stare at the starting line and try to relax. Now, I wait. “Set!"
The starter raises his hand into the air. At the same time, my body slowly lifts from its rested position. My fingers quiver under the weight placed upon them. All of my muscles are tense, despite my last minute efforts to relax them. I am nervous. My body comes to the full set position. My left leg forms a ninety degree angle. It is my strong leg and prepares to blast me forward, exerting all the force that it can. My right leg is my quick leg and I can feel the muscles in it twitching, yearning to plunge forward. Time seems to have stopped and I think to myself, “Perhaps the starter has forgotten about us?” “Bang!"
As soon as the gunshot hits my ears, my left leg pushes with all its might and my right leg flies forward with tremendous speed. My left arm drives up, forcing me forward. I stay low, building up my acceleration. With each step, my spikes dig deeper into the rubber. When I feel as though I can not dig any more, my body slowly becomes perpendicular with the track. I am all by myself. I don't see anyone in front of me or on my side. I have a feeling of dominance and power. It is only an illusion though, as I continue to sprint around the corner in the furthest lane out.
It suddenly happens. I see a figure out of the corner of my eye and flashes of light as the sun reflects off their silver baton. As we approach the straight away, I can see two more of them. We all run together. I slow my sprint a little, hoping that the rest of the runners are doing the same. We continue to pace with one another until we approach the 200 meter mark. I need to run faster so that I can stay with them around the corner. I pick up my knees and make sure my feet keep short contact with the ground. Thoughts of doubt cross my mind. What if I'm making my move too soon? How much energy do the rest of the runners have? Will I have enough sprint and speed left for last 100 meters? Slowly, I begin overtaking each runner. A feeling of strength washes over me, I am a powerhouse.
Then it hits. My legs suddenly become full of lactic acid and my shoulders tighten up. The excruciating and exhausting pain of sprinting an entire lap suddenly becomes a reality and the only thing on my mind. My legs feel heavy and weak. My heart is beating so rapidly that I swear it will explode right out of my chest. As we come out of the final corner, I know that I will need to pick up the pace even more. I try to focus on the runner beside me. The rest of the runners have fallen back and it's just her and me now.
The finish line is all I can see as I come out of the corner and down the straightaway. This is it, time to give every last ounce of energy left. I surge ahead, sprinting with all of my might. The runner beside me will not back down. This makes me nervous at first, but then I become angry. I have pushed myself too hard to give up now and let her win. At this point, I just want to get this over with. I tell myself over and over in my head, "The faster you run, the faster you are done!” I can now hear the crowd cheering, but I do not have enough energy left to make out what they are saying. Yet, their screams motivate me, and I imagine for a second that they are all cheering for me.
With fifty meters to go, I feel like I no longer control my body, as though it is not mine and I am only a bystander, watching myself run down the track. Through the tears welling up in my eyes, I see my teammate, our second leg, dead ahead in my lane. Her feet are pointed ahead and her left arm is reached back towards me. She is screaming at me, cheering me on, but I can not make out her words. She seems so far away, and I do not feel as though I am getting any closer. The runner beside me begins to pull ahead. Somehow, from somewhere, I find some small ounce of energy to catch back up and pass her. Domination! In my head, I am amused by her effort.
When I am about three meters away from my teammate, she takes off. I now run to catch up to her. I slap the baton into her hand and decelerate. Then, I collapse. I stay in my lane for a few seconds and wait for the rest of the runners to make their exchanges. Then I slowly crawl off the track and lie on my back in the grass. My other teammates run over and force me to stand up. They each have a beaming smile on their face and congratulate me. My coach quickly jogs over to me and gives me my split 1:03, my fastest this year!
It only takes me a minute or two to catch my breath and breathe normally again. Now, I cheer my teammates on. Even though I gave the race my best effort, my part is over and it is now up to them, we have not won yet. I watch our second leg get overtaken and put us back two places. I then watch our third leg overtake her competition and put us back up in first. Each member goes through the same feelings of pain and power that I had felt moments ago. Our last leg, the anchor, has the most pressure on her. We all watch with anticipation. My voice is coarse as I scream to her, "Stay relaxed! Don't let that girl pass you! GO! GO!”
Down the straight away she comes and crosses the finish line in first! Our team rejoices. Hugs of joy and tears of pain and defeat are seen everywhere as I walk over and help my teammate off the track. We make our way over to the team tent and are congratulated by parents, friends, coaches, and fellow teammates on our win. I smile and a sigh of relief washes over me. Yes, I am happy that it's over, and I am happy that we won, but most of all I am happy that for that one minute and three seconds I got the feeling of speed, strength, and power. I got the true 4x400 experience.