A few weeks ago I ran the Manhattan Half in Central Park and it was, like, nine different kinds of fun. Since the onset of a nasty pain--from a stress fracture it turned out--in my left foot on a long run last April, this was my longest distance (not counting the impromptu walk/run hybrid that finished off the AC Half-Iron two days after I last took off ye olde walking boote). The soreness after the race was so very very sweet.
After a few days' recovery to re-focus on Oreo consumption, that Friday I went for my scheduled one-hour run and felt the exact. Type of pain. As before. In the exact. Same. Place.
BOLLOCKS.
Long story short, my doctor says it's a stress "reaction" (not a fracture, so "yay") and to be safe I oughtn't run for 6-12 weeks. But he's not making me wear a boot just yet and elliptical, bike, and aqua jog are all ok. He says. So there's that.
So I gave some serious and sustained thought to aborting self-imposed pre-Placid sobriety.* After much despair (but no booze), that weekend I replaced my long run with a second bike ride. And while on the trainer I watched The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness, a documentary about Studio Ghibli which produces various fantastical anime films like Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke, and which has also inspired the name of my eventual cat. And this, along with various Twitter feeds about death, has provided enough of a vague semblance of hope that I haven't yet tried to run my foot down into a nub or swim to Bermuda with the intent of being eaten by sharks.
Here's why. The studio's director, Hayao Miyazaki, kept coming back to this im/permanence duality. On one hand, he said that when he starts making storyboards, he has no idea what the final outcome of his story will be - it's constantly evolving from its inception until it's finished. And at another point, there was a shot of a not-especially-dynamic-looking tree outside the studio's window accompanied by his voice stating "the scene has totally changed... Films sure are organic."
But on the other hand, at the start of the Great Recession in 2008 Miyazaki set out to make a scrapbook of pictures of how day-to-day life evolved as a result of the downturn. In the end, though, he said, "I tried to document the depression but all it showed is life going on as usual."
This was all timely brain fodder for an injury pity party ride. Basically, the process of anything is subject to being completely doused in napalm at any time and having a linear training regimen for an Ironman or anything else is useless. All you can do is try to find a way around it.
For me, for Placid, that will involve non-weight-bearing running substitutes through April to train for the marathon, then starting the race knowing I'm probably unprepared but totally ready to sacrifice each metatarsal in my left foot, one by one, if it means I can finish this godforsaken shitshow of a race. I shall not yet go Placid-dropout drinking!
"All of humanity's dreams are cursed - beautiful yet cursed dreams."
* Backstory: I signed up for Ironman Lake Placid on July 23, and decided
last year not to drink from January until then. 2016 inspired a LOT
of bad decisions.
No comments:
Post a Comment