The Many Uses of the Runner's High

At the Beer Run pre-race, with dog

The gym is quieter today, now that it’s April and people have abandoned their New Year's resolutions. There are more than enough treadmills, and yet the round guy with the rattail of gray hair dangling down his neck chooses one right next to me. Always smiling, he trots away, perhaps finding the power of his olfactory reach amusing. We all passively inhale his pugnacious fumery, and none of us have the balls to react. It's a smoldering, almost peppery smell, a hint of moldy orange peel and vinegar rounds out the bouquet. And something else that reminds me of Los Algodones. The way the dust clung to you. The smell of bad meat cooking. Morning-after tequila breath and sour milk. Wet dog. But a whiff of border pharmacy is ambrosia to you when you are clinging to life suspended on a wire of pain.

So began a story I started to write last year inspired by running. It hasn’t been abandoned entirely – I’m still planning on writing a story with a runner as the narrator. Runners are an interesting breed. Here’s an activity that epitomizes first-world privilege in its simplest form…a person buys special shoes and pants only for the purpose of running in circles going nowhere, only because they might not get exercise at all otherwise. I’m told runners are neurotic – that they run away from intimacy. It’s true most runners run alone. They’re all running from something that’s for damn sure. From fear maybe. From themselves.

I myself ran today for the third time this week. Feels good to get out of the gym, and not only for the reasons implied above. You burn twice the calories in half the time. You see flowers and dogs and sunlight as you go. There’s also a moment during running, usually just under halfway through, just as you are about to give in from the pain in your legs and chest, when the endorphins flood and you suddenly get the feeling you can run for the rest of your life.

Last year's Beer Run with hubby

This rush is what got me through the 2014 Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in Michigan last May. It was my first run of the year – last spring was absolute garbage for weather. Normally I wouldn’t start of the year by running a full 5K, and I hadn’t planned to. My mom had just been diagnosed with cancer again, her breast cancer having metastasized to her liver. I suppose that she had decided to register for the run before the reality set in about her prognosis. So she and I along with our cousin Veronica and her hubby Ken met in Arcadia CreekFestival Place in downtown Kalamazoo with plans to walk it. Before the run began, the entire plaza was abuzz with pink-clad folks stopping by various booths and tents. I got a lovely t-shirt. You could get tote bags, pens, key chains. I pinned on my number and a sign that said, I’m racing for my mom. I got loads of free ibuprofen and naproxen. Plenty of coffee and sticky buns and Danish. I didn’t dare spoil the spirit by commenting on how much actual research might be funded in place of all these giveaways manufactured in the name of awareness.

At some point, a ceremony was held in the amphitheater, in which all survivors among the crowd were to come on stage and be honored in a great show of sisterhood and celebration or what have you. While the charity might give itself a badge for positive attitude, this display brought about a painful moment of clarity for my mother. When I asked her why she wasn’t joining the fray on the stage she said, “I don’t feel like a survivor.” It was then that we wandered over to a table so she could sit down, and she told us (Veronica, really) that she had a year, maybe a year-and-a-half, to live. Prior to this, I hadn’t been able to get much out of her in terms of what her diagnosis really meant, but I understand why she needed Veronica there to say it. I’ve had that kind of woman friend (that kind of woman cousin too) that you can share your pain with when you are too Midwestern to share it with those it will hurt the most.

At Race for the Cure 2014

I haven’t seen my mom break down much. We aren’t a dramatic family. But I still recall the deep sadness in her face that day. It wasn’t fear of death, but the sorrow of losing her life – a life she loved, in which she was finally happy and learning to embrace mindfulness. So much time spent working and studying and caring for others, and now what time she had left for herself was coming to a premature end. It took Susan G to bring this weight down, finally, onto Mom’s shoulders.

I myself couldn’t process it. I put my arm around Mom and tried to ignore the cold creeping in. But Mom couldn’t run or even walk the race. We started out at a decent pace, but in minutes Mom confessed she didn’t feel up to going on and told us to go without her while she waited in the car. For a moment I considered joining her. The point of the day was to be with her after all, and I couldn’t possibly take the time to walk three whole miles while my mom sat brooding alone. So I decided to try and run the thing at full pace – and I did. The entire 5K after not running for six months. You can imagine how my hips retaliated. Major tinwoman syndrome for a week. But I made it back to the car in half an hour to give comfort to my mom while enjoying the brain chemicals I so badly needed.

Today I ran from my sadness and thought of what to write. I imagined myself as all those characters you see running in movies, usually at the beginning to the opening credits, usually a character who’s got some dark secret, like the protagonist of Shame. I felt my heart slamming against my ribcage and my calf muscles pulsing and realized that running is my optimism. I do the PantherProwl and the Beer Run every year to show that my disease hasn’t crippled me. I still have legs and I still have life. Maybe I even hope to extend it. It’s the only one I have after all. 

The Beer Run, by the way, which is part of the Locust Street Festival of Music and Art, is a great event for the beginning runner. It's only about 1.8 miles, and includes stops on the way to enjoy a brief quaff of beer at Riverwest joints Dino's, Lakefront RBC (love that Fixed Gear), Nessun Dorma (a favorite grad student hangout), and Falcon Bowl (complete with polka to cheer you on.) Many walk it. Many dress up like fools for the occasion. If you get hot, worry not, for the local residents enjoy spraying you with hoses as you run by. If you are a real runner, you could conceivably run it, make all the stops, then run it again before it's all over. Nothing like the runner's high added onto a good early summer drunk. It's June 14th. Join me! Let's all run from intimacy together!

Panther Prowl, October 2014