So there I was, on the mend after my 10 workout sessions per week week when the world shifted and everything turned bizarre. Monday, my phone sounded the alarm at 4 a.m. for my 5 a.m. OTF workout. Granted, it was 4 a.m. somewhere, but not in Reno. However, that’s not the kind of detail you verify as you stumble around in the dark, pulling on workout clothes and shoving yourself into the car to get to the gym on time. It’s only something you notice when you arrive at the gym and the parking lot is empty and dark and you wonder: “Where is everybody?”
And that’s when the wise clock in the car tells you it’s not 5 a.m., but 3 a.m. and you’re two hours early for the start of the work week. Monday would also be the day I strained my calf again, nothing major, but enough to make the entire day one of those you merely “survive.”
Tuesday, I was up again at 4 a.m. to teach a CompuTrainer class with Rich at the bike shop. Halfway through the day—as I was daydreaming about “sleeping in” until 6:30 a.m. on Wednesday, I received a text from my hair lady who informed me that my hair appointment was happening (the following day) Wednesday morning at 6 a.m. … in Carson City, which is about a 40-minute drive away from my house.
My life was slowly turning into something like that Groundhog Day movie, only instead of cute rodents and trying to woo a woman who’d majored in French literature, I was doomed to get up at ungodly early hours every day. Hello darkness my old friend….
But this blog really starts on Wednesday evening, after three days of sleep deprivation when I’d signed up for an OTF class after work. I guess I felt all right, all things considering (a bit tired, maybe.) I stepped onto the treadmill, did my one-minute walking warm-up and upped the pace to 8:30 mile per minute (7 mph). On my first stride, it happened: KABOOM!
It was like that feeling when a tendon is on the wrong side of your elbow and snaps back into place. Only this was in my calf so the snapping was more like an explosion and (although no one around me will verify this) definitely audible. My calf, if it was a rubber band, had slammed into my tibia. Or, it was like my calf was this wet towel that snapped the back of my leg with a sassy take that, bitch. Kaboom. It was the weirdest sensation ever.
It didn’t hurt—not in the slightest—but it was a strange enough feeling to freak me out a little bit. I finished the workout (granted, I didn’t run but I rowed and jumped and lunged and all of that.) When I went to my massage therapist the next day, and he swore that my calf was looser. And, despite my fears that I’d really torn something or detached the muscle from the bone, I might have gotten lucky and actually done something beneficial.
My text to Rich the night before as I headed home went something like this:
Rebecca: OMG my calf exploded at orange!
Rich: Oh no. Are you OK?
Rebecca: I don’t know. I’m either completely fine or I’m really fucked up.
Rich: …
And that’s where I still stand with what I did to myself a week later.
A chapel that’s built into the red rocks of Sedona. I limped around, taking pictures. I really wish I could have done some running, or at least some hiking here.
That’s not what this blog is about though, or at least not all of it. This all prefaces the fact that I went to go see my mom who lives in Northern Arizona, and the trip really takes a long time to get there, and so I had a lot of time to think and sit. Normally, I’d come up with a recovery plan, how to train myself back to practice shape. I’m tired of all of that, though. I’m tired of these injuries for things that I really have no interest in doing that keep me from being able to do the things I actually want to do.
On my first day in Arizona, we drive for nearly three hours to Sedona, and we go to Cathedral Rock (a friend of mine told us we had to hike it). I’ve always loved Sedona, the brief glimpses I’ve had of it. The red and orange cliff faces, the bright blue sky. There’s an energy there that hums, that calls. This is the first time I would have been able to hike there, and I asked friends for recommendations. Cathedral Rock came out of it— a mile hike. I had no idea that a lot of that mile is really (super-duper, really) vertical.
Normally, I think I would have been OK with it (I have a “thing” with heights) but with a quasi-maybe/probably/don’t know injury, I’m not sure what I can and can’t do. I get as high as the final push to the top where you’re supposed to climb through a narrow crevasse in the rock and I can’t help but think what would happen if my calf failed.
Granted, there’s a young mother— younger than I am— who is there with her two daughters Her oldest is three and does the climb unassisted. The infant is strapped to her back. They pass me on the climb—right at the narrow crevasse— and I feel my heart sink for all I’ve made it impossible for myself to do.
This and experiences like it make me feel as though I can, at times, glimpse what having a form of Arthritis must be like. I know, of course, I’m wrong. That this is an approximation, a clunky metaphor at best. Yet, to live a life in which what you want to do— what you can imagine yourself doing— and what you can actually do diverges and goes separate ways, that is the territory of athletic injury, too. In these moments when I am more fragile than a small child, I’m reminded not to take anything for granted.
I didn’t post this blog on the weekend like I normally do because I didn’t write a single word when I was visiting my mom in Arizona. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her, and I didn’t want to spend it in front of a screen. Now that I’m back home, I feel guilty that I lapsed on this obligation, although I’m glad that I did. I needed the time to think.
If anything, I’m learning a lot about patience, about the need to recover and how to value time. When I ruptured my achilles the first time, I felt my life was going to fall apart. I thought no one valued me for anything aside from my ability to run a certain pace for 26.2 miles. I realize now that that’s a really awful thing to believe about yourself. A person is much more than their body; and if it’s not, it’s time to find a new group of friends.
More than that, though, I feel like I have a purpose— I’m riding the CCC for Carter, for his grandad Jerry and all the awesome people I met there in 2018. Whether I ride the fastest time or the slowest is immaterial as long as I do the ride. This is how I feel about my writing—my art—too: it’s a privilege to write my essays and stories, it’s an honor to share some of my images with you. It’s not something I want to rush. I want to savor the experience—all of it. Even as flawed as it is because, as a creator, I am known for my quirky vulnerability. I am honored to be known at all.
Now that I’m back in Reno, on a not-so-special day I strapped on my running shoes, and ran a few laps around the college campus where I work. That sounds nonchalant enough, but I really don’t do that ever, but I needed fresh air on my face, even for only forty minutes. The clouds were rolling over the Sierra Nevada and there was a wind at my back or in my face. I ran for four minutes, walked for two (I think I averaged 11 minute miles) but I have never felt so grateful.
And I guess that is my lesson this week. Life is spectacular only if you see it that way. (IMO life is always spectacular.) In reminding myself to be grateful, I see it more. Calf explosions, trips to Arizona, a small run at work: these are miracles. I’m so grateful for them all.
Thank you for following me on this incredible journey. I hope to have more exciting updates for you soon (new partners on this journey, new adventures and NO MORE INJURIES!) If you’re inspired or inclined, check out my fundraising page. Are you a cyclist? Send me a message and learn how you, too, can join Team Carter and ride for a really, really, really good cause and an incredible kiddo who has an amazing family.