JJ: Funny Good, and Better than OK

Soon, but not soon enough, I will be moved into my new, permanent home on the eastern edge of Sunnyside, Queens. My new apartment is down the block from my favorite cafe, a five minute walk from a wine bar, three blocks west of friend PJ, and five blocks east of my friend BP. Funny how that happened–I was on the cusp of moving to Greenpoint (Brooklyn, gasp!) and I made two new, dear friends in the neighborhood I’d lived in for more than 12 years. Funny how, as I am basebuilding and starting to pile on the mileage again, my running commute just got half a mile longer.

And what a beautiful half-mile it is. Those nine tree-lined blocks of Skillman Avenue will lead me up a hill past Sunnyside Gardens on the left and past some of my favorite places to eat in Sunnyside on the right. In warmer months I’ll run past men playing soccer and girls playing softball in the park. Any time of year I’ll be heading home with the knowledge that if I looked back over my shoulder, the Empire State and Chrysler Buldings would be there, winking at me from across the river. (I have a view of midtown Manhattan from the bedroom windows in my new place. Have I told you that yet?) When I imagine what it will feel like to run home to My Very Own Apartment that first time (or, perhaps even the 100th time), I want to cry: what amazing fortune, what miraculous progression–my life, starting to resemble what the December-me had to believe life would look like.

Monday I ran home from work, to my current home in Astoria, where I’m subletting a furnished second bedroom from a friend of a friend. My training program called for 4 x 1 minute of hill repeats, so I decided to ge them done on the 59th Street Bridge. Doing hill repeats on the Queensboro Bridge feels like have a quarrel with your best friend: you each remain intractable, you recite the same complaints and offenses over and over, no one wins, but yet it ends well because of your undying affection for one another. Or at least, that’s what it felt like to me, because I love this bridge and I believe that her inclines and climates ultimately help me become a better runner, much the same way my best friend helps me become a better person.

It was foggy, and the mist saturated my hair and wrapped itself around my skin. Visibility from the bridge was exceedingly poor; instead of looking around like usual, I focused on form during my multiple climbs up the eastern side (headed back towards Manhattan).

Earlier in the day I had an appointment with my old PT, Danielle. I finally decided to go because Betty had been griping at me long enough; marathon training would start in less than a month;, and I wanted to get this ache sorted now before it turned into an injury. Danielle put me through various tests of mobility and balance, and determined that my issues with Betty (my right adductor brevis, an inner thigh muscle at the upermost part of my leg) is possibly aggravated by the fact that my right foot and hip is highly inflexible. So instead of my foot and hip acting as a shock absorber and balancer, poor Betty has had to do all that work herself. (No WONDER she’s so bitter, I can totally relate.) For this issue Danielle gave me a few flexibility/mobility exercises to do, easy stuff that actually leaves me achy.

The other issue, which I have only recently begun to motice, is that my lower back hurts me when I run hard. In fact, it hurt me for most of my Forest Park race this weekend. That was confusing to me, since the Pilates and all that ab work should have erradicated the strain on my lower back.  Turns out, I have been engaging my abs incorrectly! This is mildly discouraging, but at least I can train myself now to do it properly, and I can get stronger. Danielle also wants me to do Kegels! Sadly, not because I all of a sudden have a sex life, because I don’t. No, the Kegels are to help strengthen my pelvic floor, which apparently running weakens in the ladies. (I am oversharing in the hopes that this might be helfpul to other lady runners out there, not because I actually at comfortable being this frank about my womanly muscles.)

By the time I’d made it back to Astoria, I was warm from the inside out, panting, and grinning. I’d just run up and down my bridge four times, then zipped through central Astoria with the knowledge that things were being handled, and that I’m still moving towards everything being better than just OK

5.21 miles run in 49:17. Average pace 9:27; fastest mile 9:12; slowest mile 9:44. Paces during hill repeats 8:01-7:55-7:53-8:01.