The Hard Miles

     Every runner knows that for every mile where the wind is at your back and the sun is shining gently on your face, and the tar is flying under your feet-- there are nearly the same number of miles where the hills are steep, the sweat burns your eyes, and you question your own judgment of merely stepping out the door.  That’s just how it is.  If you’re going to do it—there are going to be hard miles.  There are miles when the trees dance by you in gentle breezes cooling you and urging you on to the end.  Then there are the miles where your energy ebbs, your legs burn, and your feet talk back persistently.  Every runner knows there are easy miles and hard miles—but they are all good miles.

     Running can teach you a lot about life.  This has been a year of incredible loss and grief for me.  I’ve lost two of my best friends.  I lost my lifelong best friend and honorary cousin/sister when she tragically took her own life earlier this year.  The pain was—and is—overwhelming at times.  I need to choose daily to let God heal me and not let the grief cloak me in its shroud.  Then, just two weeks ago, I lost a friend whose favorite activities included chasing squirrels and playing with her squeaky hedgehog.  Sierra, our nearly 12 year old family dog succumbed to cancer and slipped peacefully away.  Grief upon grief—watching my children yet again mourn a loved one lost they had known their whole life.

     If you scan your friend’s Facebook pages it is easy to perceive that loss, grief, sadness, and mourning, are abnormal--that there is something wrong with you if that is your present lot.  However, that is not the truth.  Unfortunately, in this life the hard miles are part of the journey.  Everyone has them—even if they don’t talk about them.  Maybe if we did talk about them we wouldn’t feel so isolated when we have them.  When you are running some hard miles you have two choices.  You can get out there and do the work of grief, rebuilding, hoping, trying, reaching, and striving.  Or—you can give up.  You can choose not to let your feet hit the floor that day.  In the process, our world—no matter how safe, gets increasingly smaller as we choose not to make ourselves vulnerable to love and lose, hope and fail, dream and be disappointed.

     Over the past year, during these very hard miles—I’ve learned some very important things.  First, I’ve learned faith will get me through.  Hope in a better future will help to heal, and the love of friends and family is the very best salve of all.  I’ve learned some deep lessons about the adequacy of prayers that have no words because your heart is too wounded to speak.  I’ve felt the unspeakable comfort of friends who have no words—who just hug me and cry with me.  I’ve experienced the incredible grace of a wounded spirit who is learning to gingerly, carefully, expectantly, put one foot in front of the other.  These are lessons you do not learn running easy miles.  So, while no one ever really chooses the hard miles, they do prepare you, teach you, mold you, and shape you in a way the easy miles never could.  This year, I’ve learned that a mile is a mile.  Easy or hard---with faith, hope, and love—they are all good.

 

Run on.