Lenses

After missing a run this week, I am six miles from Van Buren.  I discovered today that I look at the world through many different lenses.  Getting up late this morning “forced” me to go to the local grocery store for some coffee because making and drinking the three mugs I usually drink would have taken far too long.  On the way in I saw a man and a woman speaking to each other.  Hearing their conversation and looking at their body language it took only a second to realize they were flirting.   I wanted to talk to them to find out how long they had been thinking about each other.  That is what struck me about the lenses.   In searching for ideas about this blog I wanted to find something interesting.

Seeing the world through the running set of lenses has brought out amazing new things in me.  Made me look at almost everything differently.  Looking at vacation pictures of others makes me want to go there to run with the local groups; maybe take a cross country run through whatever mountain they are on.  From knowing how to look at the world through the anti-running set of lenses I used to wear, these are a ton of fun.

On the schedule today was a five and a half mile interval session at dawn.  Mile and a half warm up, 2x800 with a 400 recovery, mile, 2x800 with 400 recovery, and a mile and a half cool down.  With the delayed schedule, dawn was 11:00am.  Walking up to the track I could see the heat waves irradiating from its surface, called the Schlieren effect.  I did half of it.  I don’t run well in the heat.  But that set of lenses I have that helps me make sensible decisions told me it was prudent to bail.  Three miles from Van Buren.  I will see downtown tomorrow.

The life of an amateur runner

I had my entire week planned.  Tempo on Tuesday, three easy ones Thursday, middle distance stock run Saturday, and intervals Sunday.  Good plan, until I remembered my appointment on Thursday.  I guess I will have to move that run until Friday.  No matter, I have run three days in a row before, just make two easy runs back to back.  Until I remember my wife and I are going on a date on Friday...hmmmmm.  Looks like I am out a run this week.

Sometimes I get annoyed when I can't have my four runs a week.  I think I am going to lose all my progress, all my weight will come back, we will default on the deficit, and the world will end.  I have to remember my perspective.  First, I am an amateur athlete and missing one run in a month is no cause for concern.  Second, I am an amateur athlete.  The fact that I can even call myself "athlete" is pretty remarkable.  Take the miss, use your calendar next month, and use the time effectively.

I am STILL 6 miles from Van Buren.  I will arrive Sunday.  One day later than anticipated.  Such is life.

Madawaska, Maine

According to me, Madawaska has the distinction of being the northern most city in Maine.  I have made this decision by looking at Google maps; finding nothing but logged wilderness, then Canada in areas that would be more north.  I then did the research and discovered that, indeed, there is not a city more north, and there is a pride associated with this distinction.  Being the northern most town in New England makes Madawaska one of the four corners of the United States. 

 Madawaska is a slightly larger town than Ft. Kent where, according to city-data.com,  3,200 call the place home.  Most of the residents are descended from the French or French-Canadians.   By all accounts a very safe place to live.  There has not been a murder, rape, arson or assault since 2004.  By the numbers, life here seems to be a little bit more affluent than Ft. Kent with the median income in the 37,000 range and home values higher.  This could be because Fraiser Paper is located there.  With all of the timber in the area, it seems a logical place for a paper mill. 

This mill specializes in the production of fine grade paper which it produces from pulp, as every paper mill does.  The unique thing about this mill is that it gets its pulp from the pulp production facility in Edmunston.  Edmunston is Madawaska’s sister city in Canada and ships the pulp through a pipeline across the border.   I imagine most paper production facilities operate this way; where pulp production is separate, but close, to the actual paper production.  What sets this place apart is the international border between facilities.

I would like to recognize the Town Manager of Madawaska, Christina M. Therrien, for being the first person to respond back to me during this project.  This gave me some confidence that parts of this project have merit.  Then she re-emailed me with a little more information.  Thank you very much Christina.  You have given me untold confidence.

Christina told me to check out the Four Corner Park site.  A very interesting park dedicated to long distance motorcycling.  This park honors the finishers of the people that have completed the four corners tour.  Cool site, check it out.  The President's Letter gives you much more information, as well as the opportunity to order a paver.  

There is also the Four Seasons Trail Association.  Lots of free trails, cross country ski rentals, and events.

There is history here.  Acadians first crossed from Canada here while fleeing the British.  There is a monument, a museum, and a festival.  

This blog is about running?  Supposedly.  I did not find a road race here, but did see a mountain bike race.  I have found the Aroostook Runner's club and have reached out to them.  Aroostook County is where Masawaska is located. So far I have yet to hear from them.  Here's hoping. 

I am about six miles outside of Van Buren.  This northern tip of Maine reminds me of the landscape along Interstate 86 near Binghamton.  Very pretty and rolling.  On to Van Buren, Caribou, and Presque Isle.  Then, for the first time, west.

The Secret to My Success

When people hear about my weight loss or how far I run they are often impressed.  Not that I put this out there in my introduction, “Hi, I’m Todd.  I lost 85 pounds and am training for a 10 miler in October.”  I do play it a little close to the vest, usually it comes up when coworkers notice that I am not eating the communal pizza and doughnuts.  The response to why I am not eating it usually goes something like, “Really, 85 pounds how do you keep it off? Running? How far do you run?”  The answer is, in actuality, a lot more complicated than that. 

I eat a lot of very healthy foods, whole grains, more apples than you can shake a stick at, I try for organic meats.  We have a guy we get the meat from at our farmer’s market.  It is expensive, organics just are, but, boy is it good.  The result of eating this way is that I feel bad when I eat the foods I used to.  Physically and mentally.  The guilt is really amazing and I am impressed that I can feel as logy as I do.  And I do eat that kind of thing from time to time; who doesn’t like cheese cake?  The other part of it is that I have to make the choice, do I have that doughnut now, or wait an have a half pound grass fed burger and a couple of beers on Saturday.  Generally, I choose Saturday.  Mostly because I know if I choose the doughnut now, I will still have the burger and the beer.

I have been reading a lot about how our brain makes decisions.  I read How We Decide, Jonah Lehrer, as well as many of the articles on his website.  Basically, the decision inside your brain works like this.  One part wants the doughnut now and the other knows how you will feel after.  It is a lot easier to quiet the side of the brain that wants the doughnut now if you have something to look forward to later.  Beers and burgers.  You can train your brain to accept that it will get the satisfaction it is look for in the doughnut later.  One other thing is it really helps is if you don’t see the food.  If it is right there in front of you, you are going to choke it down at some point or another.  If it is in the break room, go outside for your break.  It is just how we are wired.

I also look at all of the decisions individually, rather than as a whole.   If I thought about it as, “I am going to have to resist 67,319 doughnuts between now and the time I retire,” I would feel powerless.  But I know I can resist one, and from doing it for a while I know that each time builds on the last.  Eventually I give into temptation.  Then the next time around I remember how I felt.  Sometimes it helps sometimes it doesn’t.

Same goes for running.  If I looked at my mileage to get across the country, I would never start.  I know I can run from Ft. Kent to Madawaska, then to Van Buren and on.  I also know I cannot do these things in a day.  I had a tough interval session today.  Mile warm up 2x800 with a 400 recovery in between, 800 recovery, 2x800 with a 400 recovery in between, mile cool down.  The 800 recovery in the middle was an on the fly decision.  Interval training is not easy.  Also, I was thinking, “how am I ever going to get through the last one if I feel this way now.”  I took the extra 400 recovery and reverted back to an old trick.  I counted backward.  At the start of the interval I said eight; then every 100 meters I counted back again.  8,7,6,5  and on (this is easy to do on a track).  Eight sets of 100 two times.  It feels different, to me, to think of it in those terms.

Breaking the goal down to manageable pieces is the real secret to everything.  Set the goal, hit it, feel good, set another, hit it, feel good, set another, don’t stop…success.

The Madawaska post was going to go here tonight, but I heard from the town manager.  A little more research and I should have a nice writeup. 

Discretion is the Better Part of Valor

My intention today was to head out on an early morning five miler.  Nothing too tough.  Just a few miles to wake up then off to the market.  According to the weatherman we are in the last day of a heat wave; the high today is to be in the mid 90's; I was running at 8:00am.  About mile two I started to feel the heat.  I brought water with me in one of those bottles you can strap to your hand.  I was a third of the way through it, and very thirsty, at half way; I normally don't touch it until half, then have about a third left over when I am done.  Things were not boding well and I was preparing for a tough last couple of miles.  By mile three, I was seriously considering bagging it; I bagged it at four miles.

I often see people running in the heat and wonder why.  Maybe it is schedules, maybe it is something else.  In the countless others I have encountered while out there, I have never seen anyone that could be counted in a class other than amateur athlete.  When you weigh what you are gaining in that single run against what you are risking I can't figure out why I see a runner in the midday heat pounding around.

Brought me into thinking about people running through injury.  I will grant that in certain cases, motion assists in the healing process.  I still have found no substitute for rest and ice.  Going out when you have persistent soreness is not a great idea, and is certainly out of the question if you have acute pain.  Stay home.  What are you gaining?

Do I feel down on myself for bagging it today?  Not really.  I do wish I had started a little earlier.  Van Buren is ebbing closer.

Heading east on Highway 1

My intention was to have a post about every city as I reach it.  Madawaska was due today.  I have it written, but I am rapidly discovering the blog that I have envisioned in my head would take up about 40 hours a week.  Being a believer that life is worth living, and living it, I don't have that kind of time.  Last night would have been a perfect night to write up, edit, and publish the Madawaska post; but I drank beer with a friend of mine.  The good news for me is that it is twice as far from Madawaska to Van Buren, and the weekend is coming.  I wrote the post, but I am not happy with it.  I am letting it sit for a day or so before going back to it and shaping into something more befitting of the vision in my mind.  Skipping ahead...

Tooling along US 1 I am heading out of town on a little recovery run.  I had thought the scenery would turn from rural woods and farmland into town, then back again quickly.  Not so.  There seems to be some sort of sprawl; I can't call it urban, but the town strings out along the road.  To get in I ran the five miler where I thought of my wife and sister.  Coming out, I was forced inside.  On my way home from work the thermometer in my car read 95.  It was 7:30pm.  I think the heat index was still above 100.  I opted for the low humidity, persistently 69 degrees of my complex's workout room.

My thoughts drifted around like they do.  Rather pleasantly about my daughters and love and how I would begin this post, for mill running it was quite nice.  But I heard him when I stepped off the mill.  Just now I realize that I was so surprised by him that I forgot to wipe it off.  A cricket.  I love the sound of crickets.  It is one of the sounds that brings me back places.  Crickets are good memories, but omens of summer's end the way spring peepers are of its beginning.  I remember sitting at night with my grandfather in the back of his house watching the cars come over 206 on the next hill into town.  He had an outdoor wood stove.  I remember the way they would signal the return home after spending summers at the lake.  I didn't like the lake.  I felt like a teenager in a retirement community.  I didn't have fun there so the crickets meant that I would have three, maybe four weeks at the most and I would see my friends again.  Now they mean an impending family reunion.  I like crickets.

A Darling Wife and a Dear Sister

Raced the sun today and got done well into evening bordering on twilight.  It was dark enough that I started to run on the sidewalks for the last ¾ of a mile.  Starting out I knew I had time; but I knew I had to hustle.  I was thinking about what it would be like running down (in this case up as at this point I would be heading north) into Madawaska trying to wrap my head around the enormity of this project, and my thoughts kept drifting back to my sister, then my wife.

I received a text today from my sister telling me that one of my posts was inspirational.  That these are the concepts she works on with the people she works with.  It made me feel really good that I made her feel that way.  Sometimes I get the feeling that she is awed by what I do.  To me, I am the same guy I have seen in the mirror forever.  There is nothing special about me; but she thinks there is.  Why?  I thought.  I have not done anything particularly remarkable.  But then again, maybe I have.  I thought about the reasons why she sees me in a different light.  I settled on that she looks at me as a whole person, and I look at me in small parts.  Pieces.  She sees 85 pounds lost, I see one pound lost 85 times.  Losing one pound is not remarkable.  She sees an Ivy League degree, I see two years at community college and two more on the hill.  Two years at two places, anyone can do that.   I have a lot to learn from what she sees.

The reverse is also true.  One three sentence text made my day.  SHE finds ME inspirational.  Got me thinking about the support she is giving me in this.  I asked for her help with some things as she is a copy editor.  After explaining the concept, she was fascinated.  Wow.  Something I thought of fascinated her.  She is the creative one.  If I can fascinate her, this must be slick.

There I am, faintly thinking about Maine and cruising effortlessly into Madawaska; more solidly thinking about a blog post thanking my sister for support.  Instead of feeling fun and happy, I pick up a twinge of guilt.  Following this feeling, I find my wife.  I need to thank her, too.  In her own way she is showing me more support than she has about a lot of things.  She understands this is a big project and, while saying she did not want to do this together, she is making the effort to make sure I have time.  She is excited when I tell her the Town Manager of Madawaska returned my e-mail.  She is excited for me, because I am excited.   She is excited because she loves me.

Sometimes when I run my mind goes into neutral.  Sometimes I work out a problem.  Today was a gem of a run.  Not because I was fast or I won.  Because I realized I have two incredible women with me.  I started today 4.5 miles from Madawaska and with my 5.18 mile run I am right in the center of town.  Right near the Big Kmart.  My wife and my sister may think they are smiling on the sidelines watching me.  They are not.  I am at my second stop; so is my sister, so is my wife.  I am glad they are here.

4.5 miles to Madawaska

Last week is what I would consider a light mileage week.  I ran the Boilermaker, in Utica, New York and had a recovery week.  The Boilermaker was one of the coolest races I have run.  People lining the streets, countless bands, tough course, and a massive post race party.  There must have been 40,000 people there.  F.X. Matt's provides free beer to all from 9am-12pm.  It was a very good time.

So, this week I logged 14.55 miles which pulls me to within 4.5 miles of Madawaska.  I completed this in three workouts.  Two 5.25 milers around a very familiar route in my neighborhood.  I usually run this route, or a variant of it, three or four times a week.  The last workout I did was an interval workout at the local track.  I am gearing up for a few short races in the late summer and fall.  I am starting to get less focused on covering distance with speed, and more focused on just being speedy.  I did 3x800 with a 400 recovery.  I expect this to increase to 5x800 by August 21st or so.  I am also going to change one of my former long runs to a temp run; this means I will get speed work twice a week.  Combine this with the fast abs workout from Runner's World and you get an ambitious schedule.  At the very least I will be very sore.  Hopefully faster.

Fort Kent, ME

Fort Kent is a very small town at the northern tip of Maine.  From Google maps it looks like it is a cross street with a McDonald's and a Rite Aid.  I am sure there is much more to it when you dig in; and, I have e-mailed the Chamber to request a little more information.  I decided today that, for future cities, I would reach out to some community organizations outlining what I am doing for  more.  This being the first city and a Sunday, though, I would be surprised if I got a response today.  The town itself sits along the Fish River, which has salmon and trout; and the book I have, Reader's Digest's Off the Beaten Path, says along the edge are places to fish as well as access to water and fire places.

City-Data will be a frequent guest here and the numbers paint a picture reflecting the effects of the recession.  Median income is quite low, 22,584, and home prices are falling.  The rest is what I would have expected envisioning a town in upper Maine. Extremely small, and extremely white.  The vast majority of people are descended from the French or French Canadians.

Fort Kent, itself, is an actual fort which was built in 1842 at the end of the Aroostook War. No bloodshed, just talking.  After the Revolutionary War, the border between Maine and New Brunswick was never settled.  There was an attempt to settle the matter in 1820; but, while the British accepted, the US rejected the deal.  In February 1893 there was a capture of a land agent which brought out both side's fighting forces.  General Winfield Scott was dispatched to the region he arranged a meeting in March 1893.  Both sides agreed to negotiate the issue, fighting was averted, and the Webster-Ashburton Treaty set the current border in 1842.  For more, see the Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands.

That is the history lesson on Fort Kent.  My intention is to have future posts be more interesting and take on the human side of a town.  This blog launched quickly and my mileage is adding up.  Slowly, but it is adding up.  I am already more than half way to Madawaska.  My apologies to Fort Kent for not spending the time on it that I am going to spend on other parts of the country.  But that is the nature of running.  You have to focus on where you are.    I am learning that much grief and strife comes from living at some point other than the present.  I am never more in the present, in the moment, than I am when I am running.  Every foot strike is this moment; one after another, after another, after another...  In this way, running mimics life.  To be in the present is to live, and run, at the fullest.  I am sorry Fort Kent.  I am here; and you are 14 miles behind me.