Taking it to the Bridge

Tomorrow morning I’ll be on Staten Island, waiting to cross the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge with tens of thousands of other people. I’ve run fifteen marathons. I should be used to this by now. I’m not, and I’ve stopped wanting to be.

There was a stretch of time when a start line wasn’t something I was thinking about. I had two cancer diagnoses fourteen months apart, and when you’re in that, the calendar shrinks. You plan the week. You plan the next scan. A race in the fall is a thought for someone with more time than you feel you have.

I’m registered, I’ve trained, and I’m going to stand in a corral on Sunday morning. A few years ago I wouldn’t have bet on it.

The training itself was ordinary. The first and last miles are often the most challenging, though the middle ones sometimes leave you wondering why you do this, too. I used to treat that as the price of admission. Now I think it’s the point. A sore body that’s training is a different thing from a body that’s being blasted with radiation and chemo, and I notice the difference every morning.

I trained pretty well, though some of my long runs ended up shorter than the plan said. Life sometimes gets in the way and that’s ok. I’m not chasing a time tomorrow. A finish matters more to me than a pace, and odds are that I’m not coming in first nor last.

The gratitude part is harder to put into a sentence, so I’ll be specific. I’m grateful to the surgeons and nurses and technicians who treated me, none of whom I’ll see on the course. I’m grateful to my wife, Jillian, for going on every adventure with me from medical appointments to marathon miles and unforgettable moments. And I’m grateful to the volunteers, who will spend a cold Sunday handing out cups of water to strangers and never get a medal for it.

The New York City Marathon is unlike any other I’ve done. You cross five boroughs, and each one sounds different. Brooklyn is loud, and the crowds there are three and four deep. Along the long stretch up First Avenue in Manhattan, strangers shout your name off your bib, and for a few minutes you forget how tired you are. People talk about the marathon as an individual sport. That’s definitely not true on this course.

Tomorrow morning, when the cannon goes off and the bridge starts to shake from tens of thousands of feet, I expect to feel what I feel every time lately, which is gratitude for more time and more adventures.

You don’t need a marathon to experience this. If you aren’t running one, pick something that inspires you and challenges you. A trip to the gym. The book you keep drafting in your head. The conversation you keep putting off. A class you’ve decided you’re too old for. It doesn’t have to be big. It just has to be hard enough that you aren’t sure how it will turn out.