I just felt like running...

If you've followed for long, you may know that I trained last year to run the 2012 New York City Marathon.  Once Hurricane Sandy hit and the marathon was cancelled, I fell into a serious rut.  I don't mean I just stopped running, I mean I quit working out period, I quit caring what I ate to an extent... it was a weird time for me.  

It baffled me in a way how some people just got over not running.  I'm sure that it sounds petty and insignificant-- "Oh, poor Katie-- you didn't get to run a silly race while people lost their homes, their livelihoods.  Cry me a river."  Honestly?  I've been through those feelings and back again.  Of course I wanted to run-- four months of my year were spent devoted to training for the race.  Every waking moment of my day was consumed with thoughts of the race-- preparing for it, surviving it, feeling so accomplished afterwards.  Of course I felt guilty and selfish for feeling all of that.  It was a big vicious circle and at the end of the day, I kind of lost my will to run.  The spark was gone.  So from November until... last week, I didn't hit the pavement, the treadmill, the trails.  

It's not like I completely fell apart and lost it or anything-- I did work out and I rejoined Weight Watchers, just for my own must-be-in-control sanity.  But a part of me started to feel like something was missing, something wasn't quite right.  My parents, Brian, and his parents all gave me running gear for Christmas, including fancy lululemon running crops and cold weather accessories that I thought were sure to push me outside.  It just wasn't happening.  I know that part of it is that I've been out of the swing of consistent exercise for so long.  Believe me, that part does not feel awesome.  But the runners high that I fell in love with felt so, so far away from where I was.

Until this week.

The New York Road Runners set a deadline of this past Friday to decide whether runners who were going to run last year either wanted a full refund of their money; a guaranteed spot to run in 2013, 2014 or 2015 while paying application fees again, or guaranteed entry for the NYC Half Marathon.  I truly struggled about my choice for a long time.  The application/processing fee is $260, so if I opted to run not only would I have to "eat" the fees from last year, but pay them again this year.  The exhaustive training was also in my mind, and I wasn't sure if I wanted to face that for a second summer in a row.  I went back and forth, debating and weighing my options and I had no clue what to do.

On Friday I went back to my running blog and started rereading the posts.  And somewhere in the midst of hallucinating whales while running along the water and reading the comments from my friends and family, I remembered why I wanted to run in the first place, why I started running three years ago, why I fell in love with running to the extent that I trained my body to run 26.2 miles.  With tons of "Are you crazy?" thoughts tumbling through my head, I opted to run the New York City Marathon in November 2013.  For the second year in a row, I'll be training through the summer and preparing to run the marathon the first weekend in November.

While I have a better idea of what I'm in for with training, I am still completely terrified.  I'm nervous and excited and anxious and happy.  I feel like the atmosphere at this race will be incomparable to any other race experience that I will have.  Runners who lost their chance last year and new runners this year will all reunite to cross the start and finish lines in a city that persevered and came out shining just as brightly as ever before.  I've always felt like New York was my marathon, the marathon that was on my bucket list if I was ever going to run one.  The city holds a special place in my heart and I connect with The Big Apple in a way that I can't explain.

This may be my one and only marathon to run, so I aim to go into it as trained and healthy and ready as I physically and mentally can be.  A part of me feels like I owe it to the people who helped me to fundraise and supported me every single step of the way.  Most importantly, I owe it to myself to cross the finish line.  So much of my heart and soul went towards the race last year-- why not do it one more time with ten times the passion and heart?  

I know that the spark is coming back because the thought of the planning for this monstrous race makes me excited, not scared.  The 3am breakfasts and Body Glide and Gu Chomps... I somehow knew that I wasn't quite finished with this stuff, and now that I'm staring them in the face again?  Reunited and it feels so good...