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January 7, 2001 7:30 PMI just woke up from a major nap-athon. Still not thinking a whole lot. After racing this morning, the most pressing thought in my head? Get me to a toilet! I didn't even kiss Paul or do more than wave at my family. I collected my medal and booked it to the long line of porta-potties. I feel happy, but tired, so full race reports will have to wait til later. Check out my duck:
Whee! :) If you want to see pictures, you'll have better luck peeking at the disney-deads site, who got a lot up ASAP. Or check out the team penguin site. I didn't take many, and the ones I did I won't have developed til who knows when. My mind is still kind of stuffed full and I can't really process it all just yet. Here's the short and sweet:
Here's a more detailed version: The worst thing that happened to me? Pee. I've never used a porta potty in my life. At 3 AM in the morning it's too damn dark to see, so the first time I used one before the race start, what looked like an ok seat to me was actually wet. The second time at 4 AM? Same thing. The third time I went before the race at 5 AM? AGAIN. I've decided men are just disgusting. Women sit down. So it has to be the men who are responsible for that. I can understand being excited, but dude. So excited you just can't aim your penis correctly? Then SIT DOWN to pee! Don't splash all over. I don't like sitting in stranger's piss. That only pisses me off! Ugh. During the walk out of the holding area to the corrals a lot of guys jumped out of the group to take a last whiz in the bushes, not even caring that there were a lot of press cameras around. I heard a lot of women in the crowd saying things like "Ugh! Men!" So it wasn't just me that was a little grossed out by them. Geesh. Thankfully the only l time I had to pee during the race I managed to coax Adrith into skipping the porta-potties in the Epcot parking lot and just hold it til we got to the REAL bathroom inside the park itself. After that I decided I wasn't going to pee again until it was over. No way. The first problem was the first 5K. Calf cramps. I'm pretty used to them by now and I know if I can just keep on walking through them they will go away. Adrith was hurting pretty bad too and she needed to slow down and apologized for holding me back but I told to cut that out. I told her ages ago I didn't care if we finished or not. The point was to raise money and get to the race, and then just try our best. I wasn't about to ditch her at this late date. I probably drove her nuts asking her about her feet and calves every other minute but I told her I wanted total honesty.
Making sure I got long sessions in and training at 10 min miles on a cross trainer made the 18-20 min mile pace we finally settled at feel pretty easy. (Adrith has the splits, so I don't even know what our average was.) I think Adrith had some doubts since her long walks didn't quite make it to 13 miles, but she's a trooper and hung in there. I told her to just yell if I was going to fast and I think at first she was a bit shy about doing that. Eventually we seemed to settle on me walking a few paces in front and her behind me. After a bit if I didn't hear her wind pants swishing behind me or see her shadow out of the corner of my eye I started looking around me for her and she'd holler to let me know she was ok. Any time I saw anyone looking ratty I'd say "hi" and tell them to keep going. I saw a lot of grateful smiles for that. Lots of charity team people-- leukemia, diabetes, neurofibromatosis, arthritis, etc. And it was the usual folks at the back of the pack -- young people, old people, skinny people, wide people, walking people. After mile 5 or 6, I kept reminding her that if she was overtired we could always stop at any mile marker where there were aid stations or flag down a bike cop. There is nothing bad about dropping out. It far stupider to keep going when you know you need to quit and just set yourself up for serious bodily harm! There's always another race. It's just not worth it to kill yourself over! Adrith let all the water out of her hydrapak somewhere between Epcot and Magic Kingdom which seemed to help. She hadn't trained with it much and wasn't expected how heavy 4 lbs of water feels like on your back after so long. There were bike cops checking around and telling people what they needed to be paced at. Disney says the minimum is 15 min miles. And of course, your really need to train there or better or it's going to be utter hell for you. But in real life they give it til about 20 min miles for the cut off before they pull you off the course. Adrith hung in there right on the edge of that line and she seemed really determined to stay in front of the pick-up van. They had other "booster vans" all along the back of the pack asking folks if they needed a boost to the next mile marker to get people back on to the minimum pace. The boosters are like your safety net. If you fall too behind the last of the booster vans, though, it's the final pick-up van and you don't get a another chance. The race for you is over. We took one partway to mile 8, I think, with an Arthritis charity walker who coincidentally was from New Hampshire too. We did the big Magic Kingdom parking lot ok and saw my Dad and Paul waving Mom's flag off her tricycle. We just made it to the booster van from 9-10 with some four or five other people. One lady in the back of the van waved at her daughter as we caught up and passed her and cracked up at her daughter's face. That was funny. After mile 10, I think it was walking through Magic Kingdom and knowing it was only one more 5K distance that helped Adrith pull what she needed to finish out from deep down inside. We didn't need any more boosts after that. Me, like the dummy I am, had taken off my jacket in the parking lot and stuck it in my hydrapak. Leaving the camera in the pocket! I would have given anything to take a photo of her expression when we got through Main Street and we were in sight of the Cinderella's Castle. It was great. She looked absolutely grubby from sweat but with misty eyes and a fab smile. When we got to Splash Mountain or thereabouts I realized I had a chocolate Luna bar in my pack so I ate it. Chocolate never tasted so good! The race support people were dispensing water, sports drink and gels but I hate how gels taste so I never took any of those. Gels are the most disgusting things I've ever eaten. The home stretch out of Magic and past the Grand Floridian and Polynesian resorts weren't too bad. I started messing up our pace then because I kept creeping ahead faster than Adrith could manage. She was tired, and understandably so, but I REALLY had to pee and it didn't help that the whole golf course area back there had all these lakes on both sides of the road! I didn't even care about the finish line. I was wanting a bathroom! We could hear the music and crowd at the half-marathon finish before we could see it but it seemed to boost everyone up. Adrith was surprised that we were passing some people. We rounded the bend and I saw everyone there. Hannah had finished earlier and she and her family were hanging out with my family to cheer us in. We crossed holding hands. Then I waved to the folks, told Adrith to just find my family and tell them I was off to the bathroom. I got my medal, mylar blanket, half waved, half kissed Paul who was at the exit and rushed past him to the porta potties. And I wiped off the entire seat. I could see in there since it was now day time and it LOOKED ok but I wasn't taking any more chances on getting my rear soaked again. I had it with the porta-potty thing! I said hello to everyone and hugged the kids, got some water and an orange form the recovery tent and then we took a bus back to the resort. Adrith sat down in the lobby while I called our race director to tell her we made it fine but we leaving early. Too tired to stick around for the back of the pack full marathoners or the awards ceremony. Paul fetched my car and took us home. We crashed and just slept for hours. So how did it feel? Fine. I was well prepared. It was about what I expected. There were no surprises. Over the last months I got to know what my body can and cannot do, how it reacts. I'd taken and studied course photos, so I knew where I was at all times. Basically felt like a big checklist in my head that I was just working my way through. The first time I did 13.1 miles in training was WAY harder than the race was on Sunday. I imagine I did 85% of my training on an elliptical cross trainer. Weight training for my ankle helped me a lot -- the pounding I'd worried over wasn't bad at all. (Love my shoes!) Later that night I did some yoga and I'm more relaxed now that I've done it again. Stretching feels GOOD! So now I'm hearing stories from other racers on mailing lists and things. Surfair did the full marathon and she said one of the wheelchair people accidentally mowed Minnie down at the finish. Minnie wasn't hurt badly, but still! How awful! Over at the half marathon finish, Donald and Daisy were hanging out. Dad told me Daisy was dancing up a storm but her costume was so bottom heavy that when she moved one way her tail went the other way and it made him laugh because it reminded him of Karen in diapers years ago. I still think it was all a great big hoot. :) PS: Guestbook entry from Joe H. cracked me up. He must have just read my entry above...
January 9, 2001And I'll keep flogging a dead horse... Adrith put her trip reflections up today. Here's some more from me. THURSDAY Adrith flew in that evening, and I picked her up. We came back to my house, went for a quick mile walk, zipped to Target, then came back again to eat dinner with Paul who finally got up from his nap. Sorta weird finally meeting someone in person whom you've been talking to for so long over e-mail but that's what happens when your cyberworld and real life manage to collide. She's very sweet, and she missed her husband Joe so much it was cute. (This trip was the first time they've been apart since they got married.) FRIDAY Paul and I got up around 9 something in the usual whirlwind of alarms and screams. He ran off to work. Adrith and I grabbed a quick breakfast and hopped on 528. We dashed to the Kennedy Space Center for the day and tried to see as many of the exhibits possible. While the weather is much better now in winter, it kind of stinks that sunset is so early because the whole thing closes at dusk. I can't do it any justice here -- I plan to take Paul again soon for a launch so I'll cover that then. But It was a good call. I got all misty when we were watching the moon landing -- I never get tired of it no matter how many times I see it. Can you imagine? There are people out there who dare risk their lives to explore space? I remembered thinking "Jeez! If astronauts have the drive to travel so many gazillions miles to go see what the moon is about, I certainly can manage to travel 13.1 miles to see what a half-marathon is about. It's a lot closer!"
We got to our rooms then called up Paul to beg him to bring us our bags from the house. Originally we'd planned to go get it after Kennedy but we didn't have time to stop if we were trying to get to the encounter. It wouldn't have made a difference. We got to Disney property on time only to spend a long while lost looking for the dang resort. Port Orleans and Dixie are going to be remodeled into one huge complex so all the old signs must be gone. And I had to pee really bad. That should have been my theme song all weekend -- Yakko from the Animaniacs singing "Are we there yet? I'm hungry. I'm tired. How far? My nose is snotty, need to move my body, need to use the potty, better stop the car!" I took staying hydrated to heart -- I don't know how much water I bought and drank all weekend! Paul brought the bags we'd forgotten, then went back home. Hannah called to warn me about the expo because she'd gotten her tag earlier that afternoon and it was a mess. Anita called to see if we got in ok since we'd had trouble with check in. We were too wired, so we decided to eat and then walk around and when we came out of our rooms we saw a lady with an "NF" sweatshirt on a few doors down. It turned out to be Anita, the race director, who was going to walk off some pent up energy as well. She had some ice-cream while we ate another dinner and then walked around with us while telling us all kinds of things about herself, NF, past races, etc. I was really glad when she said that NF made close to half a million dollars this year. Leukemia, a much bigger organization made 8 million, but I think 1/2 is great for NF when it's the tiny, relatively new organization that nobody can pronounce! We all hope as they gain a better foothold they make more. Hannah told me last year they only had 11 people at Disney. This year we had 30ish. I can't remember what race it was that only had two NF racers. Alaska? Hawaii? We got back and tried to sleep. And I called Paul to thank him for all the stuff, but that he'd forgotten the inside part of my hydrapak. Kind of crucial! He said he'd bring it the next day. SATURDAY We got up early, had blueberry pancakes as big as my face at the restaurant at Dixie, then tried to grab a bus to take us to the Wide World of Sports so we could get our racing numbers at the expo. We bumped into some more NF people, so that felt good. Hannah's warning made us want to get it out of the way ASAP, and I was glad. We caught the lady who was doing group registration and she got us taken care of. We both bought commemorative chips at the expo so we didn't need to borrow any. They were about $20 -- much cheaper there than getting them through the website ($40). After we got our numbers, we went down the bleachers to the center area to get our T-shirts. I didn't realize it until much later but they accidentally gave me a marathon shirt instead of a half-marathon one. Now I have to see if there are any left I can trade with. Otherwise I guess I have a full marathon shirt for motivation, huh? The expo had a lot of booths for different things but the one that attracted me was the TrackShack one because they had a lot of InSport stuff. I got a hat, and three shirts. One for Paul for when we bike later this month, and two for me. Moving Comfort (the other brand I love) was also there but their stuff wasn't race appropriate nor bike trip appropriate so I didn't bother with it. We got done really fast and we debated hanging around until John Bingham's lecture at lunch time but then decided to scrap it. The expo wasn't entertaining enough to stay there for another 3 hours. We caught a bus back to Dixie, then picked up a boat to Downtown Disney where we had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe and window shopped all over. We came back by boat only to grab another bus back to the expo for the pasta dinner. We saw more NF people heading the same way. We grouped in front of the All Sports Cafe, and after Anita explained that her assistant was going to take everyone's photo, we did introductions. Kristen, an NF patient was going to walk the full was there with her parents. Her father broke down in tears when he explained he unknowingly passed NF on to her because his own case had never been diagnosed. This upset the father of the baby twins because they've only been diagnosed this year and their parents are still in the acceptance stage. He had to take a walk away from the group. Todd, who was racing for his own son also got all choked up. It was extremely emotional. I got misty-eyed myself. It hurts a lot -- all you want is to have healthy kids. Nobody wants this for their babies. Learning to parent is hard enough without learning to provide care for children with special needs. And NF is not discriminatory -- it can hit anyone at anytime of any background. At any time. It could be me a few years from now. It could be Paul. It could be our kids. And to think there is really no treatment and no cure... how frightening is that? Adrith put it best -- what these people face every day supersedes anything we'd be facing as first time racers at a half marathon. What's a few hours worth of effort and pain compared to the efforts these folks put in 24/7? Hannah showed up just in time before we took off for the tent, so Adrith got to meet her at last. The pasta dinner was pretty decent for race food, but we had such early tickets I got hungry again later that night right around 8 PM. Four hours later. (Panda!) I called Paul to hurry up and bring my bottle for my hydrapak he's forgotten the night before. My parents stopped by to get instructions for spectator parking and NF shirts to wear in support. Dad got all kooky over the directions. Anita called to remind us of the bus departure time for the race start. By this time it was 9ish so we went out to the food court to eat again and Anita came along with her daughter Emily soon after. So we sat around chatting for almost two hours and went back to pretend to sleep at 11 PM. SUNDAY I slept on and off. When 2 AM hit, I bolted out of bed and threw my pj's in a bag. Threw on leggings sans undies, sports bra, long sleeve shirt, NF singlet over that, pony tail, hat. Applied NF tattoos to my face and hands. Rubbed Body Glide everywhere. The only place I forgot to rub was my fanny crack. Fortunately, I didn't chafe there. Hannah had warned me repeatedly to rub it ALL OVER and she said it again to everyone else at the pasta dinner.
Stole some blisterblock from Adrith and threw on the hydrapak and I was ready. We threw our junk in my car, then walked to the food court area to down some breakfast. Pancakes, banana, Luna Bar, and 1 L of water for me. Adrith finished up while I went to the phones to call someone to the front desk to check me out. Got that out of the way then collected Adrith and we were on the first bus out of there. I didn't want any problems getting to the start line. We got to the holding area and it was cold, cold, cold. Low 30's. We met some Penguin Brigade people there and chatted for a while. When I heard the announcer announce that the Leukemia charity team was there I left the group to go tell him NF was there too and to announce us too! You can pretty much read about the rest race itself in the previous entry. MONDAY Took Adrith to the mall and then to try the food at Sushi House. Sushi is always hit or miss. You either like how the seaweed is or you don't. Adrith decided she didn't and continued with her teriyaki. Stopped at my house and she found her flight stuff changed so we took off again to OIA. She was starting to get anxious, but I told her we had plenty of time. And to me, we did. I've been flying around nearly missing planes since I was three. Getting to the counter 30 min before your flight takes of is PLENTY. Especially when you already have tickets! You can just check in at the gate if need be. But then that's my general philosophy about everything. There is always another plane. There is always another race. There is always another day. There is always another alternative. Paul's laid-back attitude has definitely rubbed off after living with him for seven years! I got home to find stuff from Anna at NF public relations. They needed info for a press release. Lots of Dover media are interested in our story. Orlando is a poop about it because we're so much bigger and have more junk going on. But I am glad NF will get more exposure SOMEWHERE. THOUGHTS About the race experience? Very rewarding, very worth it. Come summer when I start bitching about heat and groaning about why the hell I decided to put myself through this kind of punishment AGAIN and I have fundraising freakouts I'll be singing a different tune. But you forget about the odious parts. The good parts really do shine through. When I finally met Hannah's spouse at the finish line and he shook my hand and thanked me for doing all this for their son, and when I hugged Joe himself, I knew I'd done a good job. I told Paul ages ago these would have been my Peace Corps years if I had been born at a different time and we hadn't dived headlong into suburbia and thinking of raising a family. If I didn't have a spouse. If I didn't have so many reptile rescue rejects in my house (fond endearment -- I love my pets). I grew up in a very sad, impoverished little country. I've seen a lot of sad stuff. And really you can't help everyone. There is simply too much that is fucked up to do something about it all. You choose your causes and then you try as best you can to do something, anything. And hope other people pick theirs and somehow, everything gets attention somewhere. I guess that's why I get all choked up watching the first moon landing. Seeing all those old news clips -- people around the world watching with bated breath as one. Being one people, from one global community instead of all these little divisive groups. Moments when you are HUMAN first, before you are female, Floridian, collegiate, Catholic, or anything else. I can't thank the people who helped enough. Through e-mail encouragement's, guestbook entries, postcards, letters, pledges, stories, commiserations...whatever. If there was enough space on this duck medal to put all the names on there I would. I have to go answer more questions for these PR interview-y things. You got any questions you want to ask me? Shoot them over. I'll get to them sooner or later.
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We
had dinner at an Olive Garden and drove back trying our best to get checked in
before the encounter with the Penguin Brigade and the Disney Deads at the Dixie
Landings Food Court but we didn't make it. We got there late, there was some confusion
with our room, and by the time we ran to the food court, it was starting to wind
down. We got to meet Charles and his wife, Julia, Harriet and a few others though.
Over at the deads website they got pictures up and someone snapped one of us talking
to Julia and Harriet so I lifted it here. Very dark in that food court. I also
think we kept hearing the same fiddle music going throughout our whole stay there.
(Dixie Landings is themed after a southern boating wharf sort of thing.)