The Journey of Running - Day #6 Week #2

 

It was being a runner that mattered, not how fast or far I could run. The joy was in the act of running and in the journey, not in the destination. 

John Bingham

Not a very athletic picture today unless you factor in that it was taken at over 11,000 feet and altitude training can help some runners. I know a bit of a stretch. I will get to the significance of the picture shortly. 

Today is a rest / cross training day. The third of the week. 

Coincidently I watched Parker Valby, the runner from the University of Florida who cross trains three to four days a week, qualify for the Olympic Trials 5000 meter run final last night. These can be key days to further fitness. 

However, rest is important too.  I am an early morning trainer now. I used to like the afternoons to run - or even early evenings. But as I aged I found early morning was where I could most consistently get my running or biking or swimming in. So today for me I got to sleep in and rest a little more. That explains this post being a little late. We all need days when we don't have to get up an out. But instead let the day start a little slower. 

We are now at the end of the first two weeks of a ten week plan and I want to encourage those that may have found it hard to stick with the plan. Here's a secret. No one ever sticks to these plans 100%. Life happens to all of us. All we have is today. Don't worry about what didn't happen yesterday (or the day before) just try to do the workout for today. And today is an easy assignment. You don't have to do anything. 

And that gets me to this picture which is about an interesting journey. 

On the right is my mother. She is in the middle of a summer trip with a friend (to her right) around the country mostly using Greyhound Buses. It was 1959. 

My mother had applied for and been awarded a Fulbright work study grant. She was British and had applied partly because she had told the man she at one time thought she might marry in England that she did not feel she could marry him. Apparently she thought after making the decision to break up with that man she thought she would never marry and never have a family as she was in her early 30's and that was very late to marry in those days. 

So instead - courtesy of the US government -- she came to Boston to study social work at Simmons College and work at the Mass General hospital. And in August of 1959 she and her friend Audrey -- also in the US from England -- decided to use their vacation time to go around the country. And here they are on Pikes Peak in Colorado on August 1st 1959. 

Before the trip I think she had met my Dad already, but I don't think things had gotten serious yet. Here's the interesting part. 

By the end of December 1959, they were married. 

My mom spoke about this cross country trip with her friend Audrey a lot when I was growing up. I did not realize until she passed the significance of it as such an important time between her past life in England and her ultimate life in this country with my Dad and then ultimately my sister and brother and me. 

I found this picture yesterday evening organizing family photos. I don't remember ever seeing a picture from her bus trip before. Coincidentally this week is her birthday week. She would be 98.

All of this is to say that a 10 week training plan is just a map for a journey that may go places you never expect. They may lead to fitter or faster running or they may lead to something even better. 

Long run tomorrow!