10 Miles?! No problem.

Time of departure: About 6:40pm-ish
Return: 8:30-ish

Phase of the moon: Waning Gibbous, 93% Full

Temperature: 73F
Humidity: 44%
Partly cloudy. But I could see the sun setting in the west, orange ball that it was.

Route: Down the lakefront, past Belmont, to the 5 mile point I charted on gmap
Approx Distance: 10 miles!!!
Running buddy: Self. My 2007 xmas mix CD.
Clothing: Brooks pants (pants I bought for Europe), Hind t-shirt. It's funny. When I last was really writing about running, it was always a struggle to figure out what to wear. Rarely now do I have the same problem. I feel like I always just know. And if I'm wrong, I'm okay with being cold or hot. I used to be so afraid of it.

What did I eat pre-run? Some Tings left over from Saturday night. Nutritious, I know, but I was just thinking I needed some carbs. :)
How did I feel? Awesome. Did I say awesome? Yea, I meant awesome. :)
What do I like about running? Cause it's kickass. Naw. I don't know. Cause all day I've just felt kind of under-expressed, as a human being, as an organism. Running makes me feel real.
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Okay, I'm just glad to have written gotten this far in the blog. I'm not going to write a whole thing, I don't think, because I'm exhausted and tomorrow is another day and I need to have sleep because with any luck, I'll get to live tomorrow too and... Yea, okay, so obviously, I'm tired.

I don't know where exactly I am with training. I know Eric and I are talking about doing the Half Ironman on August 2nd. This is 15 week away. Which isn't a ton of time. I want to run faster. I should start swimming. I should have started already, but it's hard to get into the pool that first time. This weekend I'd like to go for a loooong bike ride, see where I'm at. How crazy is 56 miles + 13 miles of running?

So, this morning, I'm not even sure I had committed to running this evening. Maybe I was thinking about running 6. I texted the usual buddies to see if one of them wanted to run...one is broken, one is sore. Hmpf. Okay, so I'm on my own then. By the end of the workday I was thinking I wanted to run 8. Why? What is this feeling you may wonder? I wonder. And I'm not sure I know. There's a sense that I've been craving the wrong foods (too much for foods that take up space versus foods that are high in nutrition--read: green leafy vegetables). There's a sense that my mind has been too cluttered, that I've been thinking the wrong sort of thoughts. There's an awareness I have now that the distance will help reorient these things. I've been missing the feeling of soreness, tiredness, achiness in my legs. A feeling that like, "Yes, I did something. I pushed myself beyond what is totally comfortable and, yes, I did it. I can do it. I can accomplish what I seek to accomplish."

I haven't, in a long time, wanted a run as much as I wanted this one. That's the thing, when you're training for something, for a marathon say, you are on someone else's program. There's an order to things that you're trying to follow. There is always a run that you should do. Or, when you're running with a buddy, you share the decision making about the nature of the run. And maybe you're just running because you decided beforehand that you should run, and you're holding yourself accountable. But when you're off a program and buddy-less, you are free! Free to realize, in the absence of structure, I WANT THIS. I do. I want this.

And today, oh, boy, I wanted to run. I didn't have to trick myself out the door. When I decided it was time to go, I just happily went outside and started running. Physically, I felt great. I started at a decent clip. At about the 2 mile point, I realized that 8 wouldn't be enough to satisfy. I would run 10. Yes. I would run 10 miles. A nice round number. I think I craved a feeling of accomplishment. I wanted my body to feel tired. I wanted my mind to the feel the master of its domain. I wanted control of myself. I wanted to feel cool. :) Because I do feel cool to be able to decide, on a whim, I'm going to run 10 miles. And then go do that. Wow. I think, all my life, I wanted to get to the place that I am today.

Wow. I just typed that, but reading it again, I realize it is true. This is where I wanted to be. Have wanted to be. This has been my subconscious goal, I think, to attain this level of fitness, though I'm not sure I realized it until now.

I wasn't just jogging today either, I was running. I never was at my slowest pace--like at the marathon. I was always pushing the tempo a bit, sometimes more, sometimes less, but never totally relaxed. This was good. I didn't walk at all, and only stopped once for 3 sips of water at the 7 mile point. And I almost didn't do that. Part of me wanted to just tough out the whole thing, but I figured I'd allow myself one water break. I don't need to start being a masochistic fool about training. (I watched G.I. Jane last night. I love that movie. I don't think it's a great movie, but I always enjoy watching it. And it always makes me want to run in the rain. And it makes me perversely miss the military life.)

Okay. I had observed all sorts of things about nature, but I'm tired now, so they will go unrecorded. Basically, it was a nice warm spring evening. :) Ya'll should've been out there.