The pain pulsating through every fiber of my being had melted into a dull ache. Those familiar with extreme duress in the medical field explained to me later that after a certain point of exposure, the brain stops sending the “You Are Hurt” signal. In a complete mode of survival to the finish, I tried not to think about. Occasionally, the masked pain that crippled the synaptic signals through the brain would get an SOS trough. Of the millions being ignored, it only took one getting through to cause a complete body spasm.
I was at the end. Literally, the end.
The digital digits on my Garmin GPS read 29:27 minutes. For the last 29 hours, I had been on the journey of a lifetime. It was a 100 mile Ultra Run that encompassed the city streets and rolling foothills of the community I live in, Sacramento. Dubbed The Extra Mile Run landed on the one, if not the, hottest calendar day on record for May 15/16 in history of Sacramento. Now, a blazing 104 air temp, made the pavement I was running on close to 120. Exhausted, flares of exhilaration birthed in me. I was less than a half mile from the middle of an inner city playground that doubled as my finish line. Located in the heart of Sacramento’s worst neighborhoods, the Oak Park residents were screaming and cheering in the distance. Despite my Ipod blaring in ears, between downbeats of the song moving me forward, I heard them. They had gathered in the back of the school and created a human tunnel of more than 1000 people. More than 450 Oak Ridge Elementary School children, many of their parents, the staff and faculty, and a few hundred of my closest friends had been standing in the baking sun, waiting for me. I was more than three hours late. It was a long night..
The high noon sun did not disappoint. The route took me in front of the school, un detected. Two of my pace crew, Micah the Marine Medic and Ruthie Bolton the Olympian, peeled off to alert the crowd I was five minutes away. I had to run past the school and take a side street past a housing project. Now, running the length of the school, one street away, the tops of the playground were visible over the projects roofline. Once at the end of the street another hard left would dead end into the schools tattered up grassy playground, and I would see the playground and the crowd for the first time.
Seated on the balconies of the projects, perched gang members, stood up off of their make shift seats made from milk crates. With their 40 ounce bottles firmly gripped they stood in a formed line that resembled roll call drill in the Marines. At full attention, one raised a peace sign. It took every ounce of energy to acknowledge them with a pumping fist raised in the air back to them. The other two raised their 40’s and tipped them slightly over, causing the tops of the warm beer to pour out. I later learned, “a tipped 40” was sign of the utmost respect the ghetto could pay to someone who they respected.
The volume of the sound system at the finish line was now louder than my headphones. The crowd was at a feverish pitch. As I approached the dead end, a small gate had been removed giving any person unfettered access to the campus. On many occasions, the open gate ushered in problems. Today, it was a gate way to the promise of health care for uninsured children. Those children were now chanting.
Hope was in route.
As I got to the gate, the last three runners had been hand selected by me to be on each side of me at the finish. To my left was Steve Lewis, the principal of the school. He was the first guy I met when I was asked to venture on to the campus to see what could be done by my church to help these kids. That was five years ago. Now Steve and I are close friends and he had just expended every ounce of energy he had to run the last 50 miles with me. Yea, fifty. As a seasoned marathoner and Century Road Biker, Steve understood endurance.
On my right was Rick Cole. Rick is my boss and mentor. He is the one who had asked five years ago if I would venture on to the campus and see if his congregation could help. We later joked that since he had got me into this whole journey, he should finish with me. He came on at mile 87. I was nearing my fifth emotional melt down and seeing him pushed back the pain for a bit. He was a site for weary eyes.
Both men had a front row seat to the most excruciating and exhilarating moments I had experienced in my life.
By now, some of the crowd had walked up the route, to get the a glimpse of the arrival. Prior to going through the gate, I glanced at my watch, I was at 29:32 minutes. That simple glance had taken away my breath the same way a roller coaster does when the bottom of your cart drops unexpected from beneath you.
A friend from high school appeared in front of me hold a sign saying, “Go Jason.” All my “go” was gone. But Sobrina’s face and her smile acted the same way liquid adrenaline would have acted had it been shoved into my veins through a syringe. At mile 27 she had appeared like a mirage in the blurred heat rolling up off the street. Prior to that point, I had not scene her since high school, nearly twenty years ago. Her and her husband heard the story play out on the news and she had to come see it. With her son by her side, she cheered to the top of her lungs. The shortness of breath was overwhelming.
As a runner, with great accuracy, I can predict my heart rate at a given moment. You get used to running in a certain heart rate zone and the mind memorizes the physiological effects. I have memorized what my body feels like at 130-150, 150-180, and over 180. If I had to guess, my heart rate had jumped nearly 200 bpm. That’s when you feel like you are being choked and fighting for you life. That is where I was at. Imagine trying to run a marathon with your nose plugged and your air supply is coming through a straw…that’s 200.
I called out to Rick and Steve in between breaths.
“I got to stop and catch my breath.” The rickety fence blocked the crowd’s view from seeing me. They could feel that I was close, but they could not see me. I bent over and gasped. My hands grabbed my now shaking legs. No matter hard I tried to catch my breath, I couldn’t clear a deep breath. The lactic acid that builds up when your muscles are screaming for oxygen started to make its way to my stomach. A subtle nausea fills the stomach prior to the acids arrival. The acid mixes with the stomach content and vomiting occurs. My caloric reserves had been depleted for hours. I was left out of breath and feeling sick.
I had to go.
My now, the crowd was all I heard.
“Guys, its time.” My hoarse voice must have been barely audible.
I continued, “It’s time.”
A last glance at my watch sounded an alarm in me like a starting gun would seasoned track athlete exploding out of the starting blocks of a hundred meter race. I too had 100 meters to go. It was the last 100 meters of a 100 mile run.
I smiled at Sobrina. It was a smile birthed the day before in the significance of her showing up on the hot road when the crowd was me and four pace crew runners.
My watched read 29:34.
Those four digits on my watch told a story.
A story of laughs and tears.
A story of pain and promise.
A story of significance.
As I sit and finish these few words of reflection, I am 365 days removed; almost to the minute.
It promised myself I would wait one year to write about it. I needed the time to heal my head. The run messed up my mind and my body. It made me better. And in some ways it made me worse.
Trauma and Truth.
Some called it torcher. I call it tenacity. I run for a reason.
Let me explain how I got here.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Four Digits Tell A Story
The pain pulsating through every fiber of my being had melted into a dull ache. Those familiar with extreme duress in the medical field explained to me later that after a certain point of exposure, the brain stops sending the “You Are Hurt” signal. In a complete mode of survival to the finish, I tried not to think about. Occasionally, the masked pain that crippled the synaptic signals through the brain would get an SOS trough. Of the millions being ignored, it only took one getting through to cause a complete body spasm.
I was at the end. Literally, the end.
The digital digits on my Garmin GPS read 29:27 minutes. For the last 29 hours, I had been on the journey of a lifetime. It was a 100 mile Ultra Run that encompassed the city streets and rolling foothills of the community I live in, Sacramento. Dubbed The Extra Mile Run landed on the one, if not the, hottest calendar day on record for May 15/16 in history of Sacramento. Now, a blazing 104 air temp, made the pavement I was running on close to 120. Exhausted, flares of exhilaration birthed in me. I was less than a half mile from the middle of an inner city playground that doubled as my finish line. Located in the heart of Sacramento’s worst neighborhoods, the Oak Park residents were screaming and cheering in the distance. Despite my Ipod blaring in ears, between downbeats of the song moving me forward, I heard them. They had gathered in the back of the school and created a human tunnel of more than 1000 people. More than 450 Oak Ridge Elementary School children, many of their parents, the staff and faculty, and a few hundred of my closest friends had been standing in the baking sun, waiting for me. I was more than three hours late. It was a long night..
The high noon sun did not disappoint. The route took me in front of the school, un detected. Two of my pace crew, Micah the Marine Medic and Ruthie Bolton the Olympian, peeled off to alert the crowd I was five minutes away. I had to run past the school and take a side street past a housing project. Now, running the length of the school, one street away, the tops of the playground were visible over the projects roofline. Once at the end of the street another hard left would dead end into the schools tattered up grassy playground, and I would see the playground and the crowd for the first time.
Seated on the balconies of the projects, perched gang members, stood up off of their make shift seats made from milk crates. With their 40 ounce bottles firmly gripped they stood in a formed line that resembled roll call drill in the Marines. At full attention, one raised a peace sign. It took every ounce of energy to acknowledge them with a pumping fist raised in the air back to them. The other two raised their 40’s and tipped them slightly over, causing the tops of the warm beer to pour out. I later learned, “a tipped 40” was sign of the utmost respect the ghetto could pay to someone who they respected.
The volume of the sound system at the finish line was now louder than my headphones. The crowd was at a feverish pitch. As I approached the dead end, a small gate had been removed giving any person unfettered access to the campus. On many occasions, the open gate ushered in problems. Today, it was a gate way to the promise of health care for uninsured children. Those children were now chanting.
Hope was in route.
As I got to the gate, the last three runners had been hand selected by me to be on each side of me at the finish. To my left was Steve Lewis, the principal of the school. He was the first guy I met when I was asked to venture on to the campus to see what could be done by my church to help these kids. That was five years ago. Now Steve and I are close friends and he had just expended every ounce of energy he had to run the last 50 miles with me. Yea, fifty. As a seasoned marathoner and Century Road Biker, Steve understood endurance.
On my right was Rick Cole. Rick is my boss and mentor. He is the one who had asked five years ago if I would venture on to the campus and see if his congregation could help. We later joked that since he had got me into this whole journey, he should finish with me. He came on at mile 87. I was nearing my fifth emotional melt down and seeing him pushed back the pain for a bit. He was a site for weary eyes.
Both men had a front row seat to the most excruciating and exhilarating moments I had experienced in my life.
By now, some of the crowd had walked up the route, to get the a glimpse of the arrival. Prior to going through the gate, I glanced at my watch, I was at 29:32 minutes. That simple glance had taken away my breath the same way a roller coaster does when the bottom of your cart drops unexpected from beneath you.
A friend from high school appeared in front of me hold a sign saying, “Go Jason.” All my “go” was gone. But Sobrina’s face and her smile acted the same way liquid adrenaline would have acted had it been shoved into my veins through a syringe. At mile 27 she had appeared like a mirage in the blurred heat rolling up off the street. Prior to that point, I had not scene her since high school, nearly twenty years ago. Her and her husband heard the story play out on the news and she had to come see it. With her son by her side, she cheered to the top of her lungs. The shortness of breath was overwhelming.
As a runner, with great accuracy, I can predict my heart rate at a given moment. You get used to running in a certain heart rate zone and the mind memorizes the physiological effects. I have memorized what my body feels like at 130-150, 150-180, and over 180. If I had to guess, my heart rate had jumped nearly 200 bpm. That’s when you feel like you are being choked and fighting for you life. That is where I was at. Imagine trying to run a marathon with your nose plugged and your air supply is coming through a straw…that’s 200.
I called out to Rick and Steve in between breaths.
“I got to stop and catch my breath.” The rickety fence blocked the crowd’s view from seeing me. They could feel that I was close, but they could not see me. I bent over and gasped. My hands grabbed my now shaking legs. No matter hard I tried to catch my breath, I couldn’t clear a deep breath. The lactic acid that builds up when your muscles are screaming for oxygen started to make its way to my stomach. A subtle nausea fills the stomach prior to the acids arrival. The acid mixes with the stomach content and vomiting occurs. My caloric reserves had been depleted for hours. I was left out of breath and feeling sick.
I had to go.
My now, the crowd was all I heard.
“Guys, its time.” My hoarse voice must have been barely audible.
I continued, “It’s time.”
A last glance at my watch sounded an alarm in me like a starting gun would seasoned track athlete exploding out of the starting blocks of a hundred meter race. I too had 100 meters to go. It was the last 100 meters of a 100 mile run.
I smiled at Sobrina. It was a smile birthed the day before in the significance of her showing up on the hot road when the crowd was me and four pace crew runners.
My watched read 29:34.
Those four digits on my watch told a story.
A story of laughs and tears.
A story of pain and promise.
A story of significance.
As I sit and finish these few words of reflection, I am 365 days removed; almost to the minute.
It promised myself I would wait one year to write about it. I needed the time to heal my head. The run messed up my mind and my body. It made me better. And in some ways it made me worse.
Trauma and Truth.
Some called it torcher. I call it tenacity. I run for a reason.
Let me explain how I got here.
I was at the end. Literally, the end.
The digital digits on my Garmin GPS read 29:27 minutes. For the last 29 hours, I had been on the journey of a lifetime. It was a 100 mile Ultra Run that encompassed the city streets and rolling foothills of the community I live in, Sacramento. Dubbed The Extra Mile Run landed on the one, if not the, hottest calendar day on record for May 15/16 in history of Sacramento. Now, a blazing 104 air temp, made the pavement I was running on close to 120. Exhausted, flares of exhilaration birthed in me. I was less than a half mile from the middle of an inner city playground that doubled as my finish line. Located in the heart of Sacramento’s worst neighborhoods, the Oak Park residents were screaming and cheering in the distance. Despite my Ipod blaring in ears, between downbeats of the song moving me forward, I heard them. They had gathered in the back of the school and created a human tunnel of more than 1000 people. More than 450 Oak Ridge Elementary School children, many of their parents, the staff and faculty, and a few hundred of my closest friends had been standing in the baking sun, waiting for me. I was more than three hours late. It was a long night..
The high noon sun did not disappoint. The route took me in front of the school, un detected. Two of my pace crew, Micah the Marine Medic and Ruthie Bolton the Olympian, peeled off to alert the crowd I was five minutes away. I had to run past the school and take a side street past a housing project. Now, running the length of the school, one street away, the tops of the playground were visible over the projects roofline. Once at the end of the street another hard left would dead end into the schools tattered up grassy playground, and I would see the playground and the crowd for the first time.
Seated on the balconies of the projects, perched gang members, stood up off of their make shift seats made from milk crates. With their 40 ounce bottles firmly gripped they stood in a formed line that resembled roll call drill in the Marines. At full attention, one raised a peace sign. It took every ounce of energy to acknowledge them with a pumping fist raised in the air back to them. The other two raised their 40’s and tipped them slightly over, causing the tops of the warm beer to pour out. I later learned, “a tipped 40” was sign of the utmost respect the ghetto could pay to someone who they respected.
The volume of the sound system at the finish line was now louder than my headphones. The crowd was at a feverish pitch. As I approached the dead end, a small gate had been removed giving any person unfettered access to the campus. On many occasions, the open gate ushered in problems. Today, it was a gate way to the promise of health care for uninsured children. Those children were now chanting.
Hope was in route.
As I got to the gate, the last three runners had been hand selected by me to be on each side of me at the finish. To my left was Steve Lewis, the principal of the school. He was the first guy I met when I was asked to venture on to the campus to see what could be done by my church to help these kids. That was five years ago. Now Steve and I are close friends and he had just expended every ounce of energy he had to run the last 50 miles with me. Yea, fifty. As a seasoned marathoner and Century Road Biker, Steve understood endurance.
On my right was Rick Cole. Rick is my boss and mentor. He is the one who had asked five years ago if I would venture on to the campus and see if his congregation could help. We later joked that since he had got me into this whole journey, he should finish with me. He came on at mile 87. I was nearing my fifth emotional melt down and seeing him pushed back the pain for a bit. He was a site for weary eyes.
Both men had a front row seat to the most excruciating and exhilarating moments I had experienced in my life.
By now, some of the crowd had walked up the route, to get the a glimpse of the arrival. Prior to going through the gate, I glanced at my watch, I was at 29:32 minutes. That simple glance had taken away my breath the same way a roller coaster does when the bottom of your cart drops unexpected from beneath you.
A friend from high school appeared in front of me hold a sign saying, “Go Jason.” All my “go” was gone. But Sobrina’s face and her smile acted the same way liquid adrenaline would have acted had it been shoved into my veins through a syringe. At mile 27 she had appeared like a mirage in the blurred heat rolling up off the street. Prior to that point, I had not scene her since high school, nearly twenty years ago. Her and her husband heard the story play out on the news and she had to come see it. With her son by her side, she cheered to the top of her lungs. The shortness of breath was overwhelming.
As a runner, with great accuracy, I can predict my heart rate at a given moment. You get used to running in a certain heart rate zone and the mind memorizes the physiological effects. I have memorized what my body feels like at 130-150, 150-180, and over 180. If I had to guess, my heart rate had jumped nearly 200 bpm. That’s when you feel like you are being choked and fighting for you life. That is where I was at. Imagine trying to run a marathon with your nose plugged and your air supply is coming through a straw…that’s 200.
I called out to Rick and Steve in between breaths.
“I got to stop and catch my breath.” The rickety fence blocked the crowd’s view from seeing me. They could feel that I was close, but they could not see me. I bent over and gasped. My hands grabbed my now shaking legs. No matter hard I tried to catch my breath, I couldn’t clear a deep breath. The lactic acid that builds up when your muscles are screaming for oxygen started to make its way to my stomach. A subtle nausea fills the stomach prior to the acids arrival. The acid mixes with the stomach content and vomiting occurs. My caloric reserves had been depleted for hours. I was left out of breath and feeling sick.
I had to go.
My now, the crowd was all I heard.
“Guys, its time.” My hoarse voice must have been barely audible.
I continued, “It’s time.”
A last glance at my watch sounded an alarm in me like a starting gun would seasoned track athlete exploding out of the starting blocks of a hundred meter race. I too had 100 meters to go. It was the last 100 meters of a 100 mile run.
I smiled at Sobrina. It was a smile birthed the day before in the significance of her showing up on the hot road when the crowd was me and four pace crew runners.
My watched read 29:34.
Those four digits on my watch told a story.
A story of laughs and tears.
A story of pain and promise.
A story of significance.
As I sit and finish these few words of reflection, I am 365 days removed; almost to the minute.
It promised myself I would wait one year to write about it. I needed the time to heal my head. The run messed up my mind and my body. It made me better. And in some ways it made me worse.
Trauma and Truth.
Some called it torcher. I call it tenacity. I run for a reason.
Let me explain how I got here.
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