Progress

I've been running fairly consistently the past few weeks. I'm back up to 2.25 miles. (The most I've ever run at one time is 3.0 miles.)

It's strange that I would be running at all, given my history with running. My Senior year of high school marked the final year of physical education, and one of the "tests" we had to take was running the mile. Our goal: run it under 8 minutes. I guarantee you, I've never run an 8 minute mile. Supposedly we would have three attempts to master this 8-minute mile. I had P.E. the last hour of the school day, and it just so happened that our softball team had a game right after school. Most of the girls on the team decided to walk/jog the mile slowly... figuring they'd have other chances to run the mile. I, on the other hand, was determined to NEVER RUN THE MILE AGAIN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE!!!!!!! So, I ran, and I ran hard. You'll be happy to know that I finished the mile in 7:59!!!!! Yes... it was a modern-day miracle. However, I didn't make the softball game. I was so exhausted from running that I finally told the girls to leave without me and tell the coach I wouldn't be at the game. It took me quite awhile to make my way to the office (upstairs and on the opposite side of the school)... in fact, I had to stop and sit down in the hall to rest up for the remainder of the journey. When my mom came to pick me up (probably 20-30 minutes later), apparently my face was still beet red. But on a happy note... I made an "A" in P.E. that quarter. All of my softball girlfriends never had another chance to run it and so got "B"s.

You probably wonder how I ever even thought to start running again. Well, my last year of college, I had a crazy group of friends who made a pact. Among other things, this pact called for each of us to get at least three cardiovascular workouts a week. They were easy to get if we were all doing something together... raquetball, tennis, etc. But, I didn't have a good activity to do by myself. (There were harsh punishments for not getting the activities in. Mostly the punishments consisted of taking someone - the person who called you out on not getting them done - to dinner. Obviously to "call someone out" first, this meant frequent midnight calls at the designated end-of-the-week. I even got a call near midnight in a hotel room in NYC. Fortunate for me, I had run stairs in the hotel... my sister, however, was not so dedicated and suffered the consequences when she returned home.) Anyway, I decided to go running one day... see what it must be like. I remember being impressed that I could run one whole mile without stopping (after five years or so of NO running). I made the mistake of mentioning that to one of my friends. He suggested we should run together, which I quickly shot down. One day at work, though, he left me a note that said, "Would you be interested in either running or playing raquetball after work?" I responded, "RAQUETBALL would be fine." However, somehow he overruled me, and we started running together. As they say, "the rest is history."

I haven't run all the time since then, but I have found a few people here and there who run and keep me consistent for a period of time. So... hopefully this current trend will continue. :)