Month: August 2017

august 8/UGH

Knee Injury.

Day Four

Still stiff. Still sore. Still hard to walk. Still using crutches. Well, just one crutch and hardly at all. Am I using a crutch or it, as a crutch?

Not being able to walk that well is getting old. This is the part of an injury that is tedious. The first day, you’re in shock and you don’t care about anything but getting rid of the pain and the feeling that something is in the wrong place. The second day, you’re a bit elated because the pain is gone and everything seems to be in the right place and it looks like you probably won’t have to go to the doctor—at least not yet—and there’s a glimmer of hope that you might not have to spend months recovering. The third day, you can walk, just a few steps, without crutches and even put a little bit of weight on your right leg. You marvel at far you’ve come in just 2 and a half days! But, the fourth day, that’s when the newness and the shock of the injury wear off. You’re improving, but not fast enough. And it’s hard to gauge how much. You’re tired of icing your knee and getting up very carefully and sitting on the couch or the bed or a chair all the time. You want to walk the dog. To not have to drive the 2 blocks for your son’s appointment. To enjoy the summer day. You worry that you’ve misjudged this injury, that it’s serious and that you’re doing more harm than good. You feel restless and lazy.

Ugh, day four, you’re such a bore!

I’d like to craft a ghazal about my injury, but it’s hard to do a ghazal without sounding forced or too cheesy. Not sure I succeeded, but I tried:

The injury happened on Saturday, so it’s only been four days
but even prior to the traumatic event, there had been lots of sore days.

My knee had felt weird, or slipped out of place, or just not right,
but it still worked. That was then, in the before days.

The days before Saturday, when my knee decided it was fed up with marathon training.
Getting up from a chair too quickly, I felt less shocked, more dazed.

I knew that something was wrong, something wasn’t fitting back into place.
I couldn’t stand up straight. And I wouldn’t be able to for days.

Now, it’s Tuesday and I’m recovering. Slowly. Mostly patiently, but it’s hard.
I ask myself, Sara, how long will this last: months or weeks or days?

Went to open swim. Swam only a few strokes but I knew: bad idea. My knee didn’t want to bend and I was worried that I would be in the middle of the lake and get a terrible calf cramp. No thanks. So, I turned around and got out. I can try again on Thursday.

Knee status: still limping. still stiff, but much better. My optimism continues to grow.

Treatment: Continue to get up out of chairs very slowly. To walk slowly. To move slowly. To be slowly.

august 7/Maybe?

Knee Injury.

Day Three

Another day of trying to not do much of anything. So hard not to be active. Luckily, or is it unluckily, I have nowhere to go today. No excuse to mess my knee up more.

My mom was restless too. When her cancer came back, she would pace around the house. Walking in circles for hours. When she started using a walker, one of us would follow behind her, making sure she didn’t fall. When she couldn’t walk anymore, when she couldn’t really move, she would chew gum. Lots of gum.

Can walk without crutches. Still limping. Still awkward. Seems like good progress.

A stiff knee. A restless spirit. A hopeful soul. A stalled imagination.

Limits. Restraints. Reminders. Recalibrations. Adjustments. Accomodations. A rethinking of goals, expectations, demands.

Look, 
I get it.
I
Must be careful not to
Injure myself
Too
Severely.

Yesterday, I didn’t care. Then I believed it was over. Today, I’m not so sure.

Put my bike on the stand and biked for about 12 minutes. Moving the legs feels good. My legs get so still and sore and tight and bored, just like the rest of me.

Gee knee, it’s NOT swell to see you.

After a day of walking around the house and up and down the stairs, both knees are stiff and sore.

Knee status: Stiff, swollen, less painful, awkward, improving. Can bike and walk. Stairs are getting easier. Also can straighten my knee while sitting in bed or on the couch.

Treatment: slow biking, ibuprofen, careful walking, rest, apply ice to reduce swelling, ingest ice cream to reduce swearing, avoid doctor, introduce a measured optimism, sit outside in the sun and watch the latest episode of So You Think You Can Dance live with daughter.

august 6/OH WELL

Knee Injury.

Day Two

Certain immediately. Something wrong. Really wrong. At first, shock. But never denial. Or despair. Just shock. Now, recovery. And adjusting expectations. And acceptance.

Do I move to acceptance too fast? Am I giving up too soon? Will I be able to race with my daughter next Sunday? Will I have to go for another expensive doctor’s appointment? Or physical therapy? Will I be able to run again, even just a 5k at a time?

Confronting the possibility of stopping enables the doubts to creep in. They never enter as enemies, but as friends, bearing gifts: reasonable explanations and justifications for why running a marathon was always a bad idea. Too much time. Too much stress. Too much for my body.

Scott picked up some crutches for me at the store this morning. I’m 43 and I’ve never used crutches before. Never had a broken leg or foot or sprained knee. Lucky.

A crutch is defined in 2 main ways: 1. as a literal object that you brace under your armpit to help you walk and 2. as a metaphor for an unhealthy dependence on something you use to deal with a problem. What’s wrong with a crutch? Why is the metaphorical meaning so negative? Does it reflect a disdain for vulnerability and an over-emphasis on self-reliance?

It’s funny how an injury likes this bothers me more because I can’t walk, then run. Walking is much more essential to my life than running.

Oh, to walk again!

Told daughter I might not be able to race in the triathlon with her next weekend. She asked if she still could. Something clicked. Why not try to do as much of the race as I could? I should be able to swim and bike. Maybe I could walk instead of run? And, maybe I could do that with the marathon too? Walk a lot of it? Have I re-entered denial? Decided that I gave up too soon?

Knee status: stiff and swollen, but without pain.

Treatment: It’s hard to put any weight on it, so I’m using crutches. Icing the knee and taking some Ibuprofen. Getting up slowly. Swearing, if necessary. Avoiding stairs, if possible. Watching a marathon of So You Think You Can Dance with daughter.

august 5/UH OH

Knee Injury.

Day One

Well, it happened. My right knee decided that it had had enough. After days of registering its complaints, it went on strike. Tonight, when I tried to get up from a chair, I couldn’t straighten my knee or put any weight on it. Pain. Not overwhelming, but still. Pain. Was it because I stood up too quickly, not giving it a chance to slowly pop back into place? Is it another bone spur? The same bone spur?

Will I be able to run a marathon? Unlikely, I think. But, maybe. Who cares? All I want is to able to walk again. And to not have another moment when I’m googling how to pop your knee back into place and seriously considering doing it. Or a moment when I have to tell Scott to shut up because he’s just said that “something looks like it’s sticking out wrong.”

Knee status: pain when I try to straighten it and the unsettling feeling that something is not in the right place.

Treatment: google possible problems, then stop because googling problems is almost always a bad idea. Try to calm down. Don’t move. Go to bed early.

august 4/9 MILES

58 degrees
a little more than the almost downtown turn around

Running when it’s in the 50s is so much better than running in the mid 60s! It was a beautiful morning for a run. I felt strong and not too tired. I ran the first half without stopping, then took a brief walking break at the top of the hill and another one at some point during the run–I think? After spending a lot of time thinking/writing about the run to lake harriet and how it wanders beside the creek, I was struck by how straight the path to downtown is. While it occasionally strays from the biking path, they are usually right next to each other. And the path crosses under several bridges–Lake Street, the Railroad Trestle, Franklin Avenue, I-94, Washington Avenue, the biking/walking bridge to the East Bank of the U of M,10th Avenue and 35W–but not over them. You also don’t cross any roads. The biggest features of this route are the two hills: Franklin and 35W. And the river, the gorge, the views of the U of M campus and the Minneapolis skyline.

I picked up Mary Oliver’s collection of essays/poems, Long Life, from the library yesterday and started it after my run. I haven’t even made it through the forward and I’m already inspired!

Writing poems, for me but not necessarily for others, is a way of offering praise to the world. In this book you will find, set among the prose pieces, a few poems. Think of them that way, as little alleluias. They’re not trying to explain anything, as the prose does. They just sit there on the page, and breathe (xiv).

No Explanation Necessary

What a thing to do!
To sit and just breathe.
How novel,
how necessary,
how different from what is expected.
Who needs an explanation
when there’s inspiration
and expiration
and alleluias?

And, here’s one of Oliver’s Alleluias:

Can you Imagine? by Mary Oliver

For example, what the trees do
not only in lightening storms
or the watery dark of a summer night
or under the white nets of winter
but now, and now, and now–whenever
we’re not looking. Surely you can’t imagine
they just stand there looking the way they look
when we’re looking; surely you can’t imagine
they don’t dance, from the root up, wishing
to travel a little, not cramped so much as wanting
a better view, or more sun, or just as avidly
more shade–surely you can’t imagine they just
stand there loving every
minute of it, the birds or the emptiness, the dark rings
of the years slowly and without a sound
thickening, and nothing different unless the wind, 
and then only in its own mood, comes
to visit, surely you can’t imagine
patience, and happiness, like that.

I’ve just been editing a piece in which I reflect on what leaves on a tree are for and last month I pondered whether or not trees sigh and why. Now, I want to imagine more about what trees do when we’re not around. As I wrote this last line, I remembered by Modern Philosophy class from college and studying the empiricist George Berkeley and the classic question prompted by his suggestion that “The objects of sense exist only when they are perceived: the trees therefore are in the garden, or the chairs in the parlour, no longer than while there is some body by to perceive them”: If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?

Maybe I should play with this question? Here’s a link I found to how some people in the UK respond.

august 3/REST

This should be an XT day, but open swim is rained out tonight. I’m okay with this because it’s only 56 degrees and supposed to be very windy this afternoon. Instead of swimming or running, I’m writing. For the past few days, I’ve been working on crafting a story about my latest running route to Lake Harriet. Here’s what I have so far:

The Run to Lake Harriet

The short version: taking the parkway for part of it and not the creek path.
Distance: 14-20 miles, depending on whether or not you run around Lake Harriet and/or Lake Nokomis.

The shortest version: mississippi river road path, south/minnehaha falls/minnehaha parkway/lake nokomis/minnehaha creek path/lake harriet/minnehaha creek path/lake nokomis/minnehaha parkway/minnehaha falls/mississippi river road path, north

The longest version: mississippi river road path, south/minnehaha falls/minnehaha parkway/lake nokomis/minnehaha creek path/around lake harriet/minnehaha creek path/around lake nokomis/minnehaha parkway/minnehaha falls/mississippi river road path, north

When you follow alongside water, you meander and, depending on the terrain and how the roads are laid out, cross over and under a lot of bridges and roads.

Cross over and under,
Move through and pass by,
Run near and alongside:
rivers, falling water, creeks, lakes,
rec centers, playgrounds, parking lots
waterways, pathways, parkways
streets, roads, avenues,
sidewalks, crosswalks, trails
bridges, arches, overpasses
and woods that wander beside water
that rushes, drips, 
falls, flows
and flushes 
out of Lake Harriet and Lake Nokomis and into Minnehaha Falls.

Number of times the running path crosses over Minnehaha Creek on the way to Lake Harriet: 6

Number of bridges you cross over or under: 16

Number of lights you must stop at: 5

Number of times the running path and biking path split and then come together again: 14?

Number of woods you run through: 5

Types of bridges: steel, wooden, concrete

Types of water: river, waterfall, creek, lake

Roads you run under: 46th street, Cedar Avenue, Chicago Avenue, 35W, Lyndale Avenue

Roads you run over: Hiawatha Avenue

Avenues you cross: 46th Avenue, Minnehaha Avenue, 39th-28th Avenues, 22nd Avenue, Bloomington Avenue, Portland Avenue

Roads you cross: Mississippi River Road

Streets you cross: 50th Street

Parkways you run by (or near): Minnehaha Parkway, Lake Nokomis Parkway, Lake Harriet Parkway

Number of giant bronze bunnies you run by: 1

Official name of bronze bunny: Cottontail on the trail

Number of old neighborhoods you run through: 1

Number of playgrounds you run by: 3

Places where you fill up your water bottle: Lynhurst Park, Lake Nokomis Rec Center

Number of hills you avoid because of the new path that goes under instead of over Lyndale Avenue: 1

Number of cats that have crossed your path while you’re running through the woods: 1

I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

When I’m on a long run, I try very hard not to think too much about how many miles I have to run, how many minutes I’ll be moving before I can stop, how many bridges I have left to cross. I pay attention to my surroundings: the crunchy grit on the path, the fragrant trees by the steel bridge, the rushing water of the creek below me, the sun as it filters through the forest. Or, I distract myself with a podcast. If I fail to pay attention to the moment or to distract myself from the enormity of my task, the run becomes much harder.

When our paths cross again.

The running path and biking path on this route separate and then come back together again 14 times. Early in the run, while still on the river road, these separations are slight, with just a small patch of grass or a parking lot between them. But from Lake Nokomis to Lake Harriet, the divide between the paths grows wider. While the bike path follows next to the road, remaining on one side of the creek for most of the route, the running path wanders nearer to the water and away from the road. Winding through woods. Curving under the arch of a bridge. Zigzagging from one side of the creek to the other. When the paths converge, it is the running path that (almost) always returns to the biking path, and not the other way around. The most dramatic moment when they meet is at a place when both paths have strayed from the road and into some woods. As they come out the woods and towards the road, the paths cross and those on the running path must watch carefully to avoid being hit by a speeding bike.

I’ve traveled this route for over 20 years. In the past, I biked. Now, I usually run, mostly because I like running and I’m training for a marathon, but partly because my macular degeneration makes biking difficult and sometimes dangerous, especially if I’m biking too fast. Maybe I should slow down.

Crossing over

When running for almost 3 hours, I enter into an almost dreamlike state, where I engage with the world differently. I am present, feeling the varied textures as I move from path to bridge to path again, noticing the change in temperature as I enter the small wood that blocks out the sun and warily eyeing the approaching dog, wondering if it will lunge as I pass by. But I am also absent. Not quite there. Passing through the moments in a daze, lulled into a trance by my steady footfalls and by my attempt to not think about how much it hurts, how much I want to be done, how much I have left to run.

august 2/4 MILES

67 degrees
74% humidity
mississippi river road path, north/mississippi river road path, south

A good run. Ran faster than usual for three miles and then a bit slower, with 2 short walk breaks, for the last mile. Should I have kept running and not stopped? Was I being mentally weak? Not sure, but I’m still happy with my run.

About 4 minutes into my run, the walking/running path dips below the road and runs alongside a steep hill and above a floodplain forest and a dirt path that leads to the Mississippi River and the sand flats. I love looking at this forest and trying to see what’s down there. Maybe a tent? People walking? A dog or fox or coyote running? Today, when I did this, I caught a glimpse of the river, sparkling bright from the early sun. Just a small flash, piercing through the thick trees.

note: On the National Park site for the Mississippi River Gorge, they refer to the trees that I like checking when I run as the “floodplain forest” and the beach by the river as the “sand flats.”

 

august 1/XT

open swim: 1 loop, 1200 yards
biking with Ro: 11 miles (86 degrees)

Finally, after wanting to do it all summer, Ro and I biked to Fort Snelling. It’s about 3 miles to the entrance of the trail and then another 2 down to the state park and the lake. The last two miles were scary and very unsettling. Because of my vision and the condition of the path–partly sunny, partly shaded and narrow, with lots of ruts–I had to bike very slowly. I could tell that my vision has deteriorated a lot since the last time that I biked this route, which made me sad. I can still bike, but I have to go a lot slower and be prepared to feel anxious. When we got to the bottom of the hill, it was much better. And the 2 miles on the way back was much easier. Maybe because we were going up the hill instead of down it?

Swimming across the lake was fun, as usual. Experienced some choppy water on the way back, which made it harder to breathe. Didn’t make it harder to stay on course, though. This year, I’m not having problems staying on course, even when I can’t really see the buoys or anything but water and nondescript trees. I’m amazed by my ability to swim straight and to not panic when I have no idea where the buoy is. Pretty cool.