Why I Run

In a moment of exhaustion, after yesterday's half marathon, I came here to jot some of the thoughts that ran through my head as I ran 13 miles downtown. 


I thought about a lot of things during my 2+ hours of running, but at one point, (likely, right before the hill or when my foot went numb or when my knee ached...) I began to think about all the reasons why I keep doing this running thing.


For goodness sake, I'm not a natural runner. People raise their eyebrows a bit when I tell them that, yes, I'm running the half marathon...not the relay, not attending as a cheer-er...though I've done and love both of those roles too! 


Rather than clean up (ie. edit/wordsmith) my list, I'll keep it as it was....Here's the list I came up with during my run. Reasons that keep me running. 


I run because I can. 
I run to prove that girls who spit can still be sexy. 

I run for my health.

I run for my sanity.

I run because I don't want to be photographed as a walker.

I run by choice but know that there are others in the world who are running for their lives or running from violence or walk more miles than I'm running to get access to clean water each day. I run with them. 

I run because in running, I remember that pain is not my problem, it's how I respond to pain.

I run because it gives me space to think and feel and pray.

I run for the feeling in the pit of my stomach that strikes minutes before the buzzer goes off at the start and for the way my heart races seconds before I cross the finish line and for all the eyebrows that raise when I say, yes, I'm a runner. 

In December, I still hope to run a full marathon. That's 26.2 miles. At this point, I can't imagine yesterday's half marathon as the mid-point of a race, but in light of that goal, I also kept telling myself "You got this...this is just one of many 13+ mile training runs to come this year..." 

**In the interest of self-disclosure, I find it necessary to also confess that it was indeed Justin Bieber's Baby that carried me around the bend of mile 3 and Eminem's edited version of Till I Collapse that carried me through mile 9 (Thanks Rob for that).

There you go.