Thirty-Three Days Until Fifty-Five
I hate running but I love my son.
This morning I went running with my son. I made him promise to get up early, change his hiking time with a friend, and fit me in at 9 am for a two- mile run.
You should know that I hate running. When my mother was dying, running through the neighborhood saved my sanity. I ran every day after I visited her in hospice. I ran every day to quiet the grief of the pandemic and her illness and the fact that I could not be with her every day. I ran so I would not think.
After she died, I hung up my running shoes.
But now that I am approaching my 55th birthday, my doctor told me I better start a regular exercise routine. I joined a gym and then quit. I started doing Yoga again but needed more cardio. I thought about spin class or cardio barre or boot camp, but I could not stop thinking about running again. I’ve had this persistent thought that I should master the 5k and sign up for 5k races around town. Maybe this would help me get into exercising again?
And who better to run with than my very own 21-year-old exercise guru son who is home for the holidays? Even if I hate running, I love my son. So after he changed his morning plans to accommodate my schedule, I suited up in olive leggings and a matching olive sweatshirt, grabbed my sunglasses, and met him at the door.
“Aren’t we going to stretch?” I asked him. We leaned against the front fence and stretched our calves for 14 seconds and then he said, “Let’s do this.”
At the one-mile mark, I asked him if we were nearly done. He said not quite yet. He was nearly jogging in place until he realized he could walk as fast as I was running. “That’s mean,” I told him. “Now wait up for Mommy.”
He was very supportive. “You’re doing great, Mom,” he said as I was huffing at 1.3 miles. “You’re almost there,” he told me as I wheezed into 1.65 miles. “You got this,” he said as I started to complain about my ankle, my shoulder, my back.
We ran down the streets where I taught him to drive. We ran past the homes of childhood friends where I used to drop him off for playdates. We ran by the scene of him flying off his little bicycle, and the frozen yogurt place where he got his fruit smoothies, and the park where I would swing him when he was barely three years old.
He is now much taller than I am. It is not my fault that my short, little legs cannot keep up with his longer, hairier ones. It is not my fault that my running, okay, jogging pace, equals his lightly-striding-down-the-street pace. It is not my fault that I am a bit less gazelle-like than he is, but together, I was equally as enthusiastic about exercise.
Regardless of my fitness level, my son stuck by me. He kept my pace and regaled me with stories from his evening out last night. I noticed that he could talk and jog at the same time. But no matter. I was happy to be running again. I was happy to be with him. I was particularly happy to hit the 2-mile mark as we rounded into our driveway — thank god.
I had the world’s bestest and cutest running coach encouraging me every step of the way. And I made it. Two miles in 23 minutes. Maybe, by some measures, that’s not the greatest time. But it was a great time for me. So great, in fact, that I left my sneakers by the door.