Thanksgiving 2015

Thanksgiving 2015

It’s finally time I can write a blog post; been one hell of a year.

Perhaps I should have gotten a clue from one of my very first races this year, “The Frozen Snot” I walked off a boulder falling into rocks below looking at the back of a camera screen instead of the trail ahead. The fall banged me up but no lasting damage was done. (I think)

One good race for an entire year, yes there were a couple of first place finishes in my age group at some short trail races but those don’t count. Terrapin Mountain is the only race I will feel good about when I think about 2015.

Injuries and neuropathy have plagued me for the past six months and my DNF (did not finish) at JFK 50 last weekend was just another example of my frustration. To be honest I never expected I would make thirty eight miles but the thought had crossed my mind that if I did I would finish. Well I made it but could not finish, pain, lack of adequate preparation and time worked against me. All right, maybe next year.

Perhaps I am ready to write today because I ran a 5K Turkey Trot with a woman friend whose is fighting stage 4 Breast Cancer, her second time around. She is a remarkable woman, so full of fight and life even after being dealt a bad hand twice now. Our conversations centered on what both of us are going through, interrupted often by shouts from her students, former students, family and friends. As we approached the finish line she saw a woman who was struggling. Placing her hand on her back she said, “Come on, you’ve got this! Finish Strong! ”, the stranger did, later coming up thanking Melinda, “I just had my best 5K by 14 seconds, thank you”.

This is what it’s all about isn’t it, thanks? I’m not just talking about the holiday we are currently enjoying (even though I will enjoy all the fine eats coming up). No, I’m talking about thanks in general for those things in life that cannot be bought, life, joy, family and friendship.

The death of my very close friend Larry Key back in August left a sadness that I truly did not know how to deal with. For so long all I could concentrate on was loss, loss of my not only my friend but the loss to others, father, friend a compassionate human being.  This past Tuesday I proposed a scholarship to the Frederick Steeplechasers which will be awarded to a Senior high school male and female track / cross country athlete who embodies the qualities that Larry possessed. The idea was well received and in some small measure the loss I have been feeling is offset with joy and excitement. I hope that when these awards are made in the spring of 2016 I will be the one presenting the awardees.

As I get older Thanksgiving seems to have its mixed blessings, we celebrate another year given; hopefully wrapped in a warm blanket of friends and family. We also remember those who are ill or have died (I don’t like the word passed, too nice, death I think is hard) and in some measures I wonder about my final demise. All I really want at this point in my life is not to die a pain in the ass to anyone.

To my friends and family, I love you all, Happy Thanksgiving …………….. Mike

Month of Mike Done

As I write this, a Great Friend, with wife and daughter fly home after their annual trip east to visit family and friends. Their visit, a defining part of the “Month of Mike always ends too fast yet ends with the anticipation that next year we’ll simply pick up where we left off before. It has been that way for many years and hopefully for many more to come.

I am convinced that the “Running Gods” are telling me to play more Golf. Sounds like some sort of excuse, I have really enjoyed playing this month but I believe it to be true. This past Thursday we received a pallet load of labels, no big deal in itself but this time the truck had no lift gate, meaning a roadside unloading. Pilling my dolly high with cases of labels, I placed my right foot on a support, pushing hard downwards to lean the dolly back. My shoe, loosely tied popped off and I pile drove my foot into the pavement below.  To say this was a “Bit” painful would be an understatement, I immediately felt like I would hurl but managed to keep a measure of composure and a profound limp while I wheeled the “Devil Dolly” to the garage. I ran four miles today with a good bit of discomfort in the heel, not from the PF I’ve been dealing with but from my new and improved measure of self-inflicted accidental abuse.  UGH!

My month included Doctor Visits and normal tests for Cancer follow ups. The good news is there is no news, my tests came back clean. Next month I meet with the Gastroenterologist, another follow up. We should have an interesting conversation, later on that. I see the Podiatrist July 2nd about my foot, I imagine I'll get a "Green Light" to resume training in earnest.  

Resuming running has led to a reduction in pain medication but not to a degree that I am happy with (yet). Most of my runs have been three to five miles in length with about twenty miles logged last week. I can honestly say that I am not getting the same “Bang for the Buck” from running that I use to but I realize it might take time and more distance. I grow impatient, I don’t want to be put on medication I’ll have to take all the time, yet if I have to take Hydrocodone all the time what’s the difference.

For no good reason at all I feel much is about to change in a positive direction. There are many things spinning in our little family, kids doing well, Sue with a new school next year and me …….. Well, if I can keep from beating myself up perhaps I’ll get my act back on track.

Later

Mike  

Month of Mike 2015

Once again the "Month of Mike" returns starting off tomorrow weekend with a class of 75 Golf event followed by the annual MSM Alumni Golf Tournament on Saturday. I look forward to seeing friends whom I have not seen for some years.

Call it fortunate or unfortunate, my golf game is in pretty good shape. Once again I have a running injury. This one started ten or eleven weeks ago when my foot twisted badly crossing a "Rock Garden" while on a seventeen mile training run. For six or seven weeks I cut back my running and when I did I ran almost 100% on roads and the C&O Canal to avoid twisting my foot. I thought it worked, until, eight miles into the Capon Valley 50K the beast returned. By mile twenty I was in serious discomfort, somewhere around mile twenty eight I was walking down some of the steep downhill's backwards. It wasn't a total disaster however as I was rewarded with a free shower the last hour of my run. The sounds of the storm were intense, the wind blew branches off  trees and when the temperature plummeted twenty some ought degrees I went from being hot to cold within minutes. Were it not for an "unofficial" aid station manned by Superhero Police Officers passing out beer and Moonshine I might not have finished the race..... thanks guys whomever you may be.

My plans for the fall have not changed, I still intend to try Oil Creek in October for my "One and Done 100K" followed by JFK 50 miler in November. We'll just have to wait and see, I have nothing to prove, if this brings anything other than self satisfaction I'll just have to bid farewell to Ultra Running.

Follow up visits with the Docs have been good, later this month I'll have routine blood
work with the follow up with the Oncologist. Even though there is no logical reason to be nervous I always am.

Not running has once again reinforced the importance of doing so from a pain management standpoint. I am still using more pain medication then I would like, still by many standards,  low dose, but even so this worries me. My hands are the chief issue and quite frankly I cannot play golf when my hands are "Wonky" (my technical term for electrified burning hands)

The GI Track is way more predictable these days with few real surprises (although they still happen). Removing most dairy from my diet seems to have really helped but  I do miss my Ice Cream. I am resigned to the fact that I may deal with these challenges for the rest of my life but this is a small price to pay.

Next weekend I'll drive a U-Haul to Chicago with my Father's possessions. Dad will be moving in with my brother Bill. It has been hard being witness to his decline and hard to pull apart the home that Mom and Dad built over a lifetime. I hope I will look at this transition and attempt to be better prepared for my final years, for Sue and my children.

Month of Mike will be a "Mixed" Month, I am grateful to be here to embrace it.

March 19th 2015 Terrapin Mountain Week

March 19, 2015

It’s Thursday afternoon, less than twenty four hours before I leave to head down for perhaps my favorite race , “Terrapin Mountain”.

I leave with mixed feelings, as excited as I am about the race I dread what I need to do in the next twelve hours to prepare. Our host for the weekend has a wonderful home, yet there are not enough bathrooms for the number of guests for anyone to have the luxury to ponder life, complete a Sudoku puzzle or read “Gone With the Wind” cover to cover while on the Throne. Therefore as part of this year’s training I’ve discovered a devastating, totally effective solution …. A single Dulcolax and a couple beers. Yep, sometime tomorrow morning (hopefully by four or five A.M.) I’ll be clean as a whistle, mean and nasty, ready to focus that energy on the mountain….. Well at least I have a plan.

Since I haven’t written for some time I guess I should fill in some blanks.

It’s been a tough winter for us “weak winter” Maryland people. Snow and Ice covered the ground in a blanket of white/grey for ten weeks straight. On the mountain we had a stretch of four or five weeks that never saw an above freezing high temperature. Running was reduced to waddling out in heavy clothes mainly on plowed roads as trails were simply too nasty. In a word it … sucked.

I am now more than ever convinced of the benefits of running and perhaps the timing of running. Since my normal schedule has been interrupted my dependence on pain killers has jumped a lot. I am very hopeful that once I can get back to a “Normal” running schedule this will change. I am of the opinion that an early morning endorphin hit set my day in a positive framework. Looking back I can see that many days “going south” were saved by an early or midafternoon run to get “my fix”.

I may be writing to myself, it does not matter as this has helped me to go back, allowing me to keep everything in perspective, I am fortunate that I seem to easily forget hardships.

It’s my mother’s Birthday, she’s been gone two years now. Still I have few words, even as I placed flowers on her grave this morning. Happy Birthday Mom, you’re always with me.

First Day of 2015

Amazing how quickly time can pass, I have not written in months even though there were a few times I felt like I should.

So I a nutshell, JFK came and went, another finish to add to the collection of ten. It was my slowest ever at just a hair over eleven hours, frustrating as a fall on the AT screwed up my left knee. The damage was not apparent at first but after twenty seven miles my knee flared up. The discomfort started a chain of events in my GI track which pushed me into four "comfort" stations (nothing comfortable about those stops) costing me probably twenty to thirty minutes. Oh well. Many thanks to my kind friends for their role in helping me train and in pacing me to the finish. I doubt I could have done this one alone.

My dependence on the pain medication had not diminished but after seeing my oncologist we are trying Gabapentin again. The early returns are in, it seems to help and I believe I'm heading on the right track.

So what does 2015 hold in store? We'll there are no certainties in life but I'm the eternal optimist. Saturday I'll run a 25K, later a couple of ten mile races and then a race called the "Frozen Snot", a course supposedly as unpleasant as the race's name. February I may do a 50K followed by Terrapin Mountain in March followed by my first mini-triathlon in April.

Good to be talking about races instead of Cancer, oh, about that ........ last round of blood letting, prodding and CAT scan show no trace. Three years clean.

Happy New Year All

Mike