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| Having popsicles 6 feet apart |
I've been staring at the screen for what feels like an eternity. At the end of every year this would come easily to me. But today, not so much. I am grateful for all the runs of this year, and am certain they helped my sanity, but I'm not so sure they can overshadow what a horrible year this was. Not to mention all the other awful things that happened in 2020. If someone erased 2020 from my brain I'd be ok with that. But for now it's sitting here in my head, waiting to be poured out in summation, and frankly, I need the closure, so here goes...
The year started off with a bang, January 7, with the death of Neal Peart (of the band Rush), and although totally unrelated to COVID it was a sign. (FYI yes I am a serious Rush fan-one of the few female nerd fans). In February Jamie and I went to New Orleans to run in the Rock and Roll race. It was your typical cluster of a race, followed by a week-end with the masses on the streets of New Orleans, chaotic, crazy, fun, and the last time in 2020 we would have such an experience. In March, specifically March 11, my birthday, the worm turned as the NBA shut down the season. COVID became real.
For the first few months that followed we all retreated indoors and all runs went solo. They even turned off all the fountains at the lake. We were still naively thinking marathons were going to happen, so we were still running long runs, which were painful to do alone. One of my most memorable runs was a long run in April of 21 miles where we couldn't take it anymore and decided to run together, and it was eerie and empty at the lake. We got some stink eye looks and comments from others that day. In fact, it took awhile before groups started running together again and the fountains were turned back on.
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| So Pac trail is normally very busy |
Race cancelations started happening one after another, and yet the long runs continued, which was good, because the days grew darker. Toby was hit by a car while out on a bike ride (he ran a red light and didn't see the car). Luckily he survived, but had surgery and intensive recovery to follow. Then later that summer my sister died rather suddenly. She had a bad liver, so we knew this was a possibility, but when it happened it happened quickly. With everything else going on my passing of a 5 mm kidney stone was just a blip, even though it took 3 weeks and finally passed 2 days before surgery. Then came the back troubles, which I attributed to COVID and everything else. Still, even through all of this the runs continued...
Finally, in late August a race did NOT get canceled, so off we went to Mesa Falls Idaho!
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| Jamie and Jerod ran the full and Jedonna and I ran the half |
It was so fun to run in a real race once again, even though it was pretty small. Great scenery helped!
Back in Dallas we had peeps who were running the virtual Boston marathon, so we collectively put on a "race" at and around the lake. Everybody from our running group and several significant others and family members had a hand in putting this on, which ended up being one of the most amazing events of 2020.
In the fall we ran a trail race in Kansas, which again was pretty remote, but it felt good to finally run a marathon in 2020. I blogged about it here:
https://tntlinder.blogspot.com/2020/10/marathon-55-kansas-rails-to-trails.html
As the COVID numbers started rising again late fall I didn't think my next marathon was going to happen, but it did. Blog:
https://tntlinder.blogspot.com/2020/12/marathon-56-mississippi-gulf-coast.html
Yes, running events did happen, and we had some fun group runs, but there was no White Rock Lake Celebration Run, no Turkey Trot, no local Dallas marathon, no festive hill run, and no NY Eve Loop the Lake, which was beyond depressing. I think it was fitting that my last run of 2020 was alone in the pouring rain.
As we roll into 2021 it's still the same story, at least for the first few months, with running events canceling or postponing already, but we do have hope that better days will come this year as the vaccine continues to get distributed. I will be curious to see how long it takes for the return to "normalcy" in road races. I'm hoping it happens by Fall...but it might not. The smaller and more remote races have a better chance of happening. We will continue to hunt them down!
Here's to a better year than 2020, which is a pretty low bar, but hey I'll take it.
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