Next Rest Area, 26.2 Miles

I can’t believe that I’ve just completed my second week of preliminary marathon training.  Ten minutes of plodding running followed by five minutes of desperate gasping for air in which bugs and other unsuspecting airborne creatures that couldn’t escape the vortex created by my desperate wheezing contribute to my protein intake for the week.  Now I know why nature abhors a vacuum.  It upsets her delicate balance as I rob hundreds of spiders and bats of their breakfast. 

While I did not start training with the intent of losing weight, I thought that dropping thirty pounds might just be a fringe benefit.  Wanna know how much weight I’ve lost?  None.  Not one ounce.  Mr. Dingo says this is because I’m gaining muscle, that water weight from sore muscles will eventually disperse, yadda, yadda, yadda, blah, blah, blah....  Thank you, Charles Atlas.  He suggested that I go by measurements instead.  So I dug out the tape measure expecting to be pleasantly surprised.  I was surprised all right.  Do you want to know how many inches I’ve lost?  This   much.  See that teeny space between “this” and “much”?  Yep, that’s how many inches I’ve lost.  Thank goodness we have a tape measure with hundredths of inches on it or I might have missed the incredible improvement altogether.  It boggles the mind, doesn’t it?  It’s not fair.  I’ve changed my eating habits considerably.  On most days, I can go at least fifteen minutes without eating a candy bar.  And not one Twizzler today.  Not one!

So, someone please tell me when the weight should start melting off.  Right now, while the grass along my running trail is still wet with Spring rain, everything is alright.  Come the hot, parched days of summer, when everything green hoarsely begs for water, it will be a different story.  The sparks thrown off by the rubbing of my thighs will cause wildfires.  You’ll hear about it on the news.  “Well, it has been a very hot summer, but these are the first wildfires Central Park has ever known.  Back to you in the studio, Ernie.” Maybe I should alert the authorities now so they can start monitoring the water levels in The Reservoir.

Speaking of water, I thought that eating properly would be the most difficult part of marathon training but it’s not (I say as I wipe the grease from the fourth hamburger I’ve had this week from my keyboard).  It’s the peeing.  I have a bladder the size of a postage stamp.  In the two weeks I’ve been training, I have found every bathroom and port-o-potty on my running route in the park.  If I have the slightest sip of water at any time prior to my run, I’ll have to pee before I get to park entrance.  Running only makes it worse and all I can think about is the next pit stop.  What am I going to do in Florence?  I’m sure that the running route is not going to be lined with a Starbucks — a tiny bladder’s best friend — every fifty yards.  If Florence is anything like other European countries I’ve been to, I’m going to have to carry a pocket full of change to use the public loos.  Do they make running shorts with pockets that big? I am worried about how much change I will have to carry.  I will be the next wonder of the world.  Like the Great Wall of China, you will be able to see me from space. 

Or, even worse, I will have to resort to using adult diapers to make it through the race.  I have this image of myself being interviewed at the finish line by an Italian news crew speaking to me in broken English:

Reporter: Missa Dingo.  How does-a persona go from-a being a-thirty pounds overweight-a to a- winning la Firenze Marathon in only a few-a months-a?

Dingo: (Smiling brightly as the camera pans close, her waterproof makeup perfectly intact and her too-white teeth causing a momentary sunspot on the lens.) Depends....

Well, wildfires and pit stops be damned, I’ll get across that finish line!  Maybe not first or second or fiftieth.  Maybe the clowns on their stilts and the old people with their fancy prosthetic hips will finish before me.  I will be there though, at the very same finish line the one-man band with his accordion and the drums on his back and the cymbals between his legs will have passed only hours before.  I may not be there with bells on, one-man band will have taken all of them, but I’ll jingle the euros in my pocket like castanets.

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