A 26.2 Mile Path of Love
On finding motivation beyond mile splits for the Detroit Free Press Marathon
The question: Is this the path of love? 4:30 a.m. alarm. Coffee in mug. Water bottle full. Toast with peanut butter, banana, and honey — the perfect race day breakfast. LFG!
Is this the path of love? Me and my brother’s wife shivering in the predawn dark in downtown Detroit on our way to the starting line. The man who works at the transit center telling us we can use the bathrooms inside, instead of waiting in the long line of runners vying for the porta-potties on the street.
Is it this? The first few steps in this journey of over 26 miles, the culmination of months of training. People lining the streets early on this October Sunday morning, shouting at strangers: “I’m proud of you” and “looking strong.”
Watching the sun rise over the Detroit skyline from the Ambassador Bridge as we cross the Detroit River to enter Canada. Waving to the Canadians gathered to cheer us on, and laughing with the border security guard who welcomes us back to the USA when we emerge from the underwater tunnel.
This is the long, sometimes grueling, sometimes empowering, sometimes heart-tugging path of love. One foot in front of the other, mile after mile. Checking our pace, popping energy gummies into our mouths every few miles, pumping our fists in time to the music playing along the course. Drawing momentum from the spectators and other runners to keep us moving forward.
Reminding each other of our whys. I am running this for her — using my experience with three previous marathons to guide her through her first, setting aside my obsession with performance metrics and my hyper-competitiveness with myself to focus on supporting her. That’s my path of love.
Latching on to a pace group in the final miles when the going gets really tough. “That was our 20-mile warm up,” I tell her. “The real race is these last 6.2 miles.”
Is this the path of love? I ask myself the question when she goes silent toward the end — no more energy for jokes or stories — and falls a stride or two behind. I turn to tell her she’s stronger than this marathon, that this is her postpartum victory lap, that we can do hard things. LFG!
Then this path of love takes us through a screaming crowd of spectators who insist we’re almost done. And there’s my parents and my husband cheering us on. I tell her she’s going to see her beautiful baby soon and this will be the last hard thing she has to do for the rest of her life. And then there’s my brother and the baby and the finish line.
And somehow we’ve got a final burst of energy to cross that finish line smiling and I wrap my arm around her at the end as my legs disintegrate into jello. I’m so glad the path of love has led me here.
Inspired by “The Question” by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer.
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