Running and mom (R&M 1)

I haven't run for very long. Maybe the past 3-4 years. Even then, probably the past two years were the 'serious' years when I did road races and other events. Race is perhaps a bit tongue in cheek. I enter them. I finish them. Somewhere along the way I usually question why in the world I subject myself to such an experience. It ends with entering the chute and crossing the line. Short races are blissfully quick but more painful in the end. Longer races demonstrate where your limits are. Either way, they are challenging. But why do I run? I ask myself this question often, especially on the longer runs where all you have is your mind. I'm not a particularly good runner; I'm certainly not built to run fast. I'm not really even built to run far. Yet I return to the sport - indeed to the experience - almost daily. And I participate in events with fervor. The reasons are not noble. I do not run to reach some nirvana, to lose weight or to face fear. Quite simply, I run because I can.

Some years ago, I learned that my mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, a particularly unkind degenerative disease of the central nervous system. Over time, I've watched my mother first struggle with her balance, then use a cane, then a walker and, more recently a wheelchair. Though I'm aware that variations of MS can be more vicious, I struggle to conceive of what those forms might resemble. True, my mother's vision has not faltered and her MS is largely confined to her lower body. Blessings in disguise, some might say. But this is my mother. How could something this awful, this bleak, happen to this beautiful woman? These and others are questions to which there are no answers.

And while my emotions have swayed significantly over the years, my mother provides the proverbial anchor. In my youth, I reacted to the injustice of her illness with anger and disbelief. As I aged - as I ran - I took on a more reflective posture. I knew I could not understand such things. I knew that this experience was one that had a learning moment. I simply needed to discover it. On those running days when I find myself struggling, I look to my mother. Though MS cripples her body it never cripples her spirit. Her vigor and enthusiasm for life is inspiring. I take this spirit with me on all my runs and throughout life. When I hit the 'running wall' - either on the road or elsewhere - it is her spirit that allows me to climb it.

My mother can't run. I run to honor her. I run for her. I think of her often on those longer paths and I think of her at the end of the shorter ones. More simply, though, I run because I can.