Adventures in Walking

I'm going to ignore the fact that I've been a horrible blogger, and instead tell you a story.

First, a little backstory: In training for the 3-day, I usually have 2 days of shorter walks, then one really long one, and one slightly shorter but still long one, with a day off in between some of them. I plan them around my grueling work and social schedules. Usually the long walks are on my day off. Instead of sleeping in, I get up at the crack of dawn to finish the miles at a reasonable hour, see some nature, and avoid walking all of those miles at the gym. I have a uniform: runner's shorts, a tank top and a hat covering up my greasy hair. I usually put an oily deep conditioner in my hair before the long walks.

The hardest walk I did was my 11-mile in Houston. I got up early, routed out a 4.5 mile path, then walked it one way (with a stop at mom's in between to refill on water and eat breakfast), then walked it backwards. I took a break after that for about 15 minutes because I had a couple of blisters, then drove to the gym to slowly hobble for 2 more miles.

The easiest I did was the 12 mile last week here. I have a 3-mile route and a 4-mile route that start and stop at my house. I did the 3 mile, had some cheerios, did the 4 mile, had some more cheerios, did the 3 mile, then went to the gym for 2 miles. Before I knew it I was done! No blisters or pain!

And the funniest walk I did was this past Sunday. I should mention that Jess helped get me on a training schedule because she is off during the summers so we did 3-5 miles a few times before it was scorching hot. She asked if I was going to walk on Sunday and I told her I needed to do about 4 miles and I could either do it very early before work, or around 5pm after work.

We decided to go after work, so she met me at the house, we filled up our water bottles and set off. We started noticing the heat about 1 mile in because it was getting hard to talk and we were panting. The sun was beating down on us and the heat was coming up off of the sidewalk. I kept promising that just up ahead there would be shade. But there wasn't shade in all of the normal places because we were walking exactly half a day later than I usually do, so the shade was opposite! We stopped under a tree and I asked if she brought her phone. We could call Bean and have him pick us up. Of course, we both left our phones at the house.

So now we are about 2 miles away with no way to get back but to walk. So we walked to the corner and rested under the next tree. Then we walked to the tree after that and sat down. Jess mentioned that she was almost about to start seeing black spots. I tried to figure out what in the world I would do if she passed out on the side of the road. I said, "There's a swimming pool just up there..."

We trudged on and stopped in the generous shade of a school and stared through the tall gate at the pool, where some residents of the apartment goofed around. I said, "I will jump in that pool with my clothes on, but only if you do it too." Jess said, "I don't think I can jump that gate." We walked around the leasing office and behold, 3 kids were playing with the coded fence! They held the door open for us and we walked right in. We took off our shoes and socks and waded into the murky water at that ghetto apartment complex. It wasn't even that cold, but it was a lot colder than we were! Once we cooled down, we started laughing. Uncontrollably.

The other people all sat at one end of the pool watching us. They all had clothes on too, so we didn't feel too weird. We got out of the pool, put our socks and shoes back on, and continued dripping down the sidewalk, laughing about what we just did, laughing about being soaking wet and walking down the street, laughing about Jess' rat-tail ponytail shadow on the sidewalk, laughing about what Bean would say when we got home.

The last half of that walk was cool and easy. And almost completely shaded! We talked and were half dry when we got back. I have never done something like that in my life and it was a highlight. As Jess said, "Now we have a story!"

This week I have a 9-mile on Thursday, then Friday morning will be a half marathon- 13 miles! I can't wait!