boston_marathon_finish_line

What a difference a week can make.

When I wrote that last post I was feeling stressed, frazzled, unmotivated. I said I wasn’t sure I had another marathon in me. Well, I was wrong. About as wrong as I could’ve been (or so I hope), because on Monday — THIS COMING MONDAY– I will be toeing the line at the Boston Marathon.

Yes, BOSTON!!!  (much internal squealing)

I am hyperventilating as I type this. Still. I mean, who does things like this happen to? To quote Top Gun, I feel as though I’ve somehow soloed under a lucky star.

Yesterday, I got a call from my Aunt who lives and works in Boston. To make a long story short, she was trying to find someone to fill a charity slot vacated due to injury. This was proving uber-difficult because a) most runners who she knew are already registered for the race, and b) most other people who are runners are not in training to run a marathon on less than a week’s notice. Enter…me! I think she was half-joking when she asked, “So, want to run Boston?”

I just so happen to have been training for a marathon. This charity slot is worth a ton of money, but the cost to me would be nothing — zip, zero, zilch — save for my plane ticket out there. My aunt and uncle have offered to put me up at their house in Arlington and be my Chiefs-of-Stuff: shuttling me to the race start, cheering me on, and plying me with pasta before the race and wine and ice after.

Do I want to run Boston? Hell, yes! It just doesn’t get any better than this.  Insanely perfect, really.

Part of me feels bad about this — I didn’t qualify the old-fashioned way, after all, when I know people who missed qualifying last year by the tiniest of margins, and I’m not in tip-top marathon shape, even — but that part is very, very, very small.  Because, it’s not like I sought this out; it fell into my lap. And it’s not like I’m taking it for granted one iota; instead, I’m planning on giving constant thanks and reverence to the gods of running who are granting me this ridiculous opportunity from now until I cross that finish line…and well after.

I’m not a speedy runner. A long-standing goal of mine is just to break four-hours at some point in my life. And qualifying for Boston, while always in the back of my mind, just never seemed like much of a reality. There is a chance I might never qualify; and I would’ve never, ever have tried to go without qualifying. But this? This chance? Really, how could I say no?

So, on Monday, I’m going to stand at the starting line of the Boston Marathon, and soak it all in. I’m going to revel in the dedication and talent of so many there surrounding me (and, most likely, ahead of me), and steep in the history and hallowedness of it all.

As Wayne and Garth would say, “I’m not worthy”…but I’m going anyway.

And in the words of Chief of Stuff, “What a world.”