Thursday, June 13, 2013

I am excited so THAT is why I am annoying!

In 1985 I started running , in fact I remember my first run . It was with my brother Tom and he schooled me that day. He would run far ahead of me and then let me catch up to him only to pick up the pace and start the process all over again. He said it was to make me work harder to catch him and to improve my speed. I have always remembered that run , in fact I drove part of the route that we ran and decided to write this.

Around the same time I read the paper and saw a math teacher at my High School was running in the New York City Marathon and I remember thinking , maybe someday I could do that as well. Throughout my high school years I got better at running and kept thinking about the New York City Marathon , I knew I was getting closer to running it, but it still seemed so far off. I would watch it on TV and picture myself running along side of the leaders and finishing the race in central park.

After Graduation of high school I pretty much stopped running. I did pick a college to go to only because it had a cross country team and the other ones I was accepted to did not. I even met with the cross country coach, but that same day I got the lead in a play ( I was a Theatre Major) and was not allowed to participate in sports for fear of injury. I always promised myself I would get back into it.

Just like running with my brother, I caught him and then he sped up.

While at college I discovered the wonders of alcohol, I never drank at all before I was 21. That is the truth , but I made up for lost time from the years of 1991 to 2009 . My stress relief was beer, I don't know if you would call me an alcoholic but I was on my way to achieving that title and because of that the NYC marathon was quickly becoming a dream that I would never fulfill.

I have told this story many times, but in 2009 my life had changed for the better when my sister called and invited me to run with her in Corning NY in the Wineglass Marathon . I was very drunk when I had this conversation and did not remember that I signed up ( while inebriated). I discovered my confirmation e-mail the next day and it said "No Refunds" . I was committed to running.

I finished the race and have run 4 more marathons and countless other races since , including the Buffalo Marathon this past Memorial Day Weekend. I have not come close to qualifying for New York , but have been getting closer to qualifying for Boston, so I have been concentrating on that  . In fact I blogged about it earlier this year. My goal was to qualify for Boston after the Erie Marathon, New York was quickly going off my radar again.

I have in other years try to get into NY by way of the lottery, I have been told several times that the odds of making it in this way was extremely hard. I decided to enter the drawing again this year , but figured since there were many deferments from last year's race (which was cancelled and entrants could defer their entry to this years race) , the odds were even more not in my favor.

So on May 29th I sat in front of a computer , waiting for my rejection notice as I have done in years past. It was a long day, I was at work checking it all day. I left work not getting an answer , and I figured since it was taking a really long time , I wasn't in and was fine with that. I will start my training for Erie and move on as I have done in the past.

But then I came home to this:

I have been on cloud 9 since!

Now to the point of all of this rambling , I keep bothering my brother Kevin, who is also running this year with a bunch of silly questions about the race. I think I might be annoying him, as well as another friend who is running it this year. I just want to apologize in advance for my annoying behavior. If you want to block me out of your lives completely , I understand. 

It may be a very long 5 months for everyone around me , I am sorry!