I Love the smell of fried chicken in the morning-two liquor stores in one block and one STUPID Southern Run

While training for the 2011 Princess 1/2 marathon, I got the opportunity to visit one of the South's more beautiful cities.  Normally, if I really like a city--it is in Georgia.  But this time, I am making an exception.  I got to travel to Charleston, SC, for a few days for a business conference.  I absolutely loved Charleston.  I loved the buildings.  I loved the restaurants.  I loved the way the people talked (pretty much like me).  We stayed at a swanky motel downtown-The Charleston Place.  Lovely, Lovely, Lovely--It had a Pandora bead store and a Godiva Chocolate store in the Lobby.  A girl can't ask for much more than that.  I had shrimp and grits at almost every meal.  If I were to leave Georgia, I would consider, Charleston.  But I digress....

During my conference, we had a 3 hour break one day.  We had started with a breakfast meeting at 7:30 and worked until 9:30 or 10:00 and were not meeting back until just after lunch.  Well, all good and true Southerners know that Charleston is the place where the first shots rang out in the war of Northern Aggression.  I had a great plan to change and go for a two to three mile run to the park and look out to Fort Sumter and feel the stirring of my soul.

I did change, and I studied the map for runners.  At this time, I was not using a GPS watch of any kind, rather a $15 Target watch that just kept up with how long I had been running, and would tell me what time it was.  But I set out on my historical run.  I usually run with music.  I was running and making good time, it was January in Charleston, the weather was beautiful, and I suddenly realized that I was coming up on, yes, it was.....the second liquor store within the same block.  Now, I may not be a smart girl, but I don't think that is a good sign.  However, Charleston has been voted, "Most Well Mannered City",  It would have been rude to just yelp, spin around and run away....I went to the end of the block, and peek-a-boo, there were the slums.  I looked intently at my $15 watch while jogging in place, turned around and giggedity jogged away.  I went about two to three blocks and turned and continued on my merry way because Fort Sumter awaited.

I jogged and walked through a beautiful section of town, one that I had eaten dinner in the night before.  I passed on by the restaurant and kept going... and going... listening to the music, thinking about that map from the hotel room.  Suddenly I saw a sign on the side of a building that advertised that I could buy an "Eight Piece Suit for Only $100".  Hmmmm.  I had done it again.  As I found a major intersection, I turned and continued on.  Fort Sumter and the stirrings of my soul had to be somewhere.  I was running out of areas from which you could look out and see water.  I felt sure that a battle that took place off of Charleston harbor had taken place in water.  So....I kept moving.  Also, I now had no idea where my hotel was.  I knew I had not left South Carolina.  I felt like I was still in Charleston, but really, had no way of knowing.  I was beginning to lose steam.  All along I had been walking a minute or two and running three or four minutes and walking again.  Unless I got nervous, then I just ran.  I was jogging slowly, and I ran into the most glorious smell---FRIED CHICKEN.  There is nothing like the smell of hot oil and chicken being fried.  I believe that I was about to hit "the wall" but that snort of Fried Chicken grease, got me over, and kept me going....it's a Southern thang.

Shortly after that , signs began to appear, signs pointing the way to the park and visitors center.  Then, out of the haze that was my lack of water and no luna bar-after all it was only going to be a two mile run--yeah and Gillian was on a three hour tour--I saw beautiful columned homes, that one could imagine ladies and gents coming out on the second floors to watch the ships fire on the Union held Fort Sumter until they gave up-thus starting the Civil War.  I finally made it.  I stood there in awe.  I had read about it. Watched Ken Burns specials, movies, but it was something else to stand there.  I will tell you I got a bit choked up.  I was standing at a pivotal point in our nation's history

But I still had to get back to the hotel.  I thought really hard about that map.... Moved over from the point where I stood, toward the center of the park, and reoriented myself, and took off.  Within 6 minutes, I was back at the hotel.  Almost two hours since I left.  The park was a half a mile away from the hotel.  It was a real adventure--Not necessarily one I want to repeat.  I learned, I don't read those little maps that they leave in your hotel room well. I need ones that are already oriented for me, like on the computer.  These days I generally run on the treadmills if I am in a city with which I am unfamiliar.  Or maybe I could just strap my Magellan from the car to me and plug my ear phones into it and go.....its a thought!

Me an Athlete, Are You Kidding?!?!?!

I recently joined Dailymile.com in order to have the widget on the side of this blog.  However, I love it.  Mostly because each time I go to log in and sync my runs with my running watch, it pulls up my profile.  You will never believe what appears under my picture.  Donna C., athlete.  Right now I have the web page pulled up on another tab and I just looked up and it says my name,  followed by the phrase "is an athlete."  Whoda thunk it?!?!  It also keeps up with how many miles I have run this year and it will send me an email and tell me how many miles I have covered this week.  When I am putting the time in this is like a huge "atta girl", when I am not it is another reminder that if I am going to eat a can of pringles in two sittings, that I should be putting in the miles.

In my last entry I was training for the 2011 Princess Half marathon.  I used the Jeff Galloway method to train, (sort of).  I did a dumb thing.  I did this alone.  I didn't have a training partner, a facebook group, or anyone other than my husband and kids to keep my hopes up.  I read the Jeff Galloway stuff online.  Late in the game, someone at a meeting for work mentioned the couch to 5K program and someone else said something about a Run for Jesus plan.  I just went out there by myself and ran and walked and ran and walked and ran and walked.  I was slow,  I had the feeling that if someone was watching, I would've looked like the astronauts in every movie, when they are walking out together to get on the spacecraft.

When people asked me if I was a runner, I said, NO, no , no.  I walk, run, lope---you know, whatever.  I made and still make every excuse.  When I tell people that I have been in half marathons or 5 K's, the next thing out of my mouth is inevitably, I was really slow, but I finished.  Who Cares!!!

I think because I am not shaped like the traditional Kenyon runner, and my mph speed proves out that I definitely do not have Kenyan DNA (the Boston Marathon has been Dominated by Kenyan Men and Women since the late Eighties), I cannot possibly be a runner.  It is strange.  I cook often, yet I don't compare myself to Julia Childs.  I drive every day, yet I don't compare myself to ____________(fill in the blank with your favorite NASCAR driver--I don't want to offend).  I think that I put too much pressure on myself to try to live up to something that no one expects-I expect me to be an elite athlete before I can wear that title, no one else ever did.  No one else ever cared about titles anyway.  I just didn't want to wear one I didn't earn.

I wish that I had found another athlete wannabe with whom to share the experience up to this point. Within the past year, I joined some facebook groups and regularly read some blogs of others who are trying to do it all and find balance in some areas of their lives.  Some of the folks I know and have known for a long time, others I have never met, never spoken to, yet we share a kindred spirit of some type.  The wonderful thing is that we encourage one another.  When you start from couch potato aspiring to athlete, you need some encouragement.

I recently got a text from a friend asking if I would run the Allstate Atlanta 1/2 marathon.  When we got the chance to talk, we have another friend and possibly three more that may join in.  None of us live near one another and only two of the five other than me, know each another at all.  However, we are all excited and the best part is the encouragement and the friendship.  The bling from this run is great! But I realized that my friends are beginning to see me as a runner.  They are putting me in the category as an athlete.  The computer has, maybe I need to stop making excuses and do it too.