Patience, Puke, Pride, and Vegemite Virginity.

I have been running for almost 4 weeks now since my 4 month hiatus (thanks to my imbalanced ass).  There’s got to be some equation out there about how much patience you’ll need for every week you take off.   I’m not sure what it is, but it’s probably more than I normally have.   

I fully admit that I don’t have a lot of patience– never have.  In many areas of our lives, I think that this CAN BE a good thing; it pushes us to be better.  It’s a fine line and a slippery slope, though. I have to work  on it, be it on the highway with all the skilled drivers in Atlanta, on my bike when someone gets to close to me, when my waffle iron takes too long (!), . . . or when I’m trying to find a shred of speed buried in this body.

I’m not going to turn into one of those triathlete whack jobs (we all know ‘em).  No way. There are too many other things I love in this life to become totally obsessed with just one.  Having said that, though, I put a lot of time and energy into this sport and it’s frustrating to be so far off from where I want to be. Matt keeps reminding me that it will come back, that I need to be patient.  Ugh.   Trying.

Thanks to a wise decision made by our homeowner’s association to use satellite instead of cable, the TV in our community gym never works for more than 3 minutes at a time.   I hate being cut off from the trials and tribulations of The Kardashians.  It’s just too painful, so I don’t even turn it on anymore.  I would prefer to stare at the walls than miss out on what Kim Kardashian is wearing for the Girls Gone Wild bikini shoot in Cabo.   This morning I got smart, though, and finally brought my ipod with me.  I never run with it, but I think I might moving forward.  The rest of the civilized world may be on to something.  

So my coach gave me an interesting 6mile workout this morning, holding the first 4 miles at different paces/mile, and the last 2 included some faster half-mile intervals.   The pace will remain nameless to protect the innocent (or unfit), but let’s just say that it was one that certainly wouldn’t have sent me into puke zone before my injury, but I was gagging on my puke (or was it my pride?) after the first one.  Patience.    I actually questioned if I could even do the next one.  My coach is smart enough to stick my ass on a treadmill where I don’t have a choice.  Basically, you run the pace or you fly off the back.  So I had to do it.  I just had to convince my head that it had to play along.

I think it’s funny how some of the most difficult moments of  testing ourselves don’t necessarily occur at National or World Championship races.  They occur on days when we’re alone in a small room (with no Kardashians), perhaps coming back after some time off and wondering if we can pull off what was once so easy, and having the faith that our bodies will follow whatever our minds determine we’re capable of.

Luckily, Coldplay’s Viva la Vida came on just at the start of the last interval, and it was just what I needed.   A sign of God, perhaps?  I took it and ran with it, literally.  

The 2nd interval was actually better than the first, but I am so far off from where I want to be, but where I want to be is a place that I’ve been before.  I just need to shut up, be patient, and keep chipping away at it.   Patience!

On another important sidenote, I can officially report that I have now lost my Vegemite Virginity.  I had approached this important milestone with understandable trepidation.  All the horror stories, the advice… it was just overwhelming.  And as most of these types of “experiences” go, losing my vegemite virginity was, well, less than earth-shattering.   Who knows, maybe it’ll get better with time?  Maybe we just need to understand each other a little bit more? Perhaps we rushed into this relationship?  I’m not giving up on you, Vegemite, but I need you to give a little more in this relationship.  So far, I’m just not impressed.