That's sort of how this year of running has worked out for me. In the beginning, I did it partially as a joke. I hated almost every mile of it but could at least laugh at myself and the fact that a little four miler felt like I was actually getting a workout in. But toward the end of the year things started to change a little bit. I wouldn't say I enjoyed running any more, just that I couldn't imagine not doing it. It wasn't an addiction the way it was when I was running 135 miles per week. But I liked the way it made me feel, I liked the fact that some of the muscles in my legs were finally visible after four years of hibernating beneath a layer of fat, and I liked that I actually had a butt again. I liked that on a week when I got way off pace I could bang out a 16 miler fairly easily. Sure, I was sore the next couple days, but doing something like that would've been next to impossible a year ago. Despite only running 25-30 miles per week, I was doing it consistently enough to kind of, sort of, maybe get in shape a little bit. It wasn't race shape or anything like that. But it was the kind of in shape that a healthy twenty-something should want to be.
It was a silly goal and I know there are hundreds of turkey trot champions out there who dwarfed my mileage this year. But when I ran my 1,380th mile on Saturday morning, I felt a genuine sense of accomplishment. Running 25-30 miles per week wasn't hard. I never thought it was going to be a very physically demanding goal, just that it would require consistency. Consistency in doing something that I didn't particularly want to do. In the entire year, I'd say there were only a handful of runs that I legitimately enjoyed and almost none that I looked forward to when I woke up in the morning. Running's just not my thing anymore. I know that some people love it, I know that I loved it at one point in my life, and there are even still things about it that I love. But one thing that never got much easier as the year went on was getting out (and staying out) the front door. And I think that's okay. Maybe even a good thing.
I think there's a benefit in sticking with something like this and forcing yourself to do it, day after day. The cliche that it "builds character" is true. One of the most important lessons to learn is life is about delayed gratification. In the era of iPhones, iPads, YouTube, and Hulu+. There's almost always something you'd rather be doing than what you should be doing. The motto of "do what you love and the money will come" is bullshit when what you love is watching TV, eating pizza, and drinking beer. No, I think it's much more important to do what you find rewarding and satisfying. And as crazy as it sounds, I found becoming an extremely mediocre recreational jogger to be wildly satisfying. And a lot of that had to do with forcing myself to get my little runs in every week. Even when I didn't want to, even when it was raining, even when I could think of a million things I'd rather be doing. There was a benefit to all of that, outside of becoming a so-so jogger, I think it made me a little bit of a better person. Obviously, I'm still the reacher and Jenny's still the settler in our relationship, but I closed the gap just a little bit. Umm, on second though, the gape probably widened. Jenny's becoming a doctor and working an ungodly number of hours, that's got to be way harder than jogging around the block a few times per week and patting yourself on the back like you're Flyod Landis George Hincapie Lance Armstrong Galen Rupp. But still. (See what you've done Lance, I now have to reference Rupp as my go-to American athlete who did something really inspirational on a world stage).
Before we get to my New Year resolutions for 2013, let's go over some quick stats about this year:
Total mileage: 1,380.31 miles
Total runs: 260 (an average of 5.3 miles per run)
Longest run: 17.86 miles
Shortest run: 2 miles (I wouldn't count anything less than 2 miles as a real run)
So what's the plan of 2013?
Well, I decided to make this whole resolution/improving myself as a human being thing permanent. Each year, I will complete all previous resolutions and add a new one. So in 2013, I will run 1,380 miles again, but I will add a new goal: Read 26 books and write 26 blog posts. There's a little more wiggle room with this resolution because books can vary considerably in length, but I'll honor the spirit of the resolution without necessarily setting specific requirements about page length, quality of book, etc. I'm sure I'll read some short ones and some that are longer. The goal is basically to consistently be reading something the whole year. And the blog posts goal is a way to actually get me to update this thing. I really enjoyed writing about my jogging adventure at the start of the year but quickly lost steam when I ran out of ways to say "I used to be really good -- well kind of, and now I'm just a jogger and it's sort of silly but also fun in a weird way". So this year, I'm no longer going to pretend that this blog is about running or jogging or anything in particular. I'll talk about whatever I feel like. It's safe to say there will be ample supply of Denver Bronco and Seattle Sounder posts. Probably a couple stories from back when I was a real runner, and maybe even a post or two about whatever books I read.
So that's that. Thank you to everyone who took an interest in my mini-comeback this year. I enjoyed hearing from you, it was nice to know that there are some people who would actually hold me accountably if I slacked off and didn't reach the coveted 1380 mark!
The adventure begins again on Tuesday!
Happy Holidays.
