I was late.
Not on time. Late.
As in “Late, late.”
Despite last night’s ramble, I was late to the bus.
My alarm went off as scheduled, I was all ready to go and then… well, when I looked at the directions, I realized my AirBNB is just a block or so away from the finish line… meaning if I drove to the Rice Eccles Stadium I’d just have to walk back there after the race and drive my car back… to the finish line? That seemed really dumb… so I thought why not just walk to the shuttle buses at Rice Eccles Stadium? It’d save the walk back AFTER the race and the drive back amidst the road closures for back-of-the-pack-but-no-less-amazing-marathoners. The one hiccup is that it was going to take a bit longer to get to the stadium.
I thought the buses were going to start shuttling runners at 3:45 AM… and if I walked, according to google maps, I’d get there by 3:55/4 AM with no problems. Except it turns out 3:45 was the LAST bus going to the start line.
To be fair, I wasn’t the last person on the last bus… but I was pretty close.
And in my defense this is what is listed on the marathon’s FAQ webpage:
On the 30 minute or so bus ride to the start, this white-haired, grizzled man was chatting with a 20-something woman next to him. He was saying that the last time he ran this race was in 1975 and it was a “real quad burner,” warning the woman that “this is gonna hurt.. Big Time.” The woman said what I would have said, “After 43 years, you still remember the pain from the run?! That’s… a little worrying.” He laughed it off saying he’d run 70 some marathons and it had taken him that long to come back. I could tell he was only making her more nervous. I wanted to say, “Oh, 70 marathons? That’s cute. This is number 397 for me. Tell you what, junior, my quads hurt now but so what? And ma’am, you’ll do great. One step at a time, and after a lot of steps you’ll be done. But take it one step, one footfall, one moment at a time and don’t worry about it. We’re all in this together.” But I didn’t. I kept my mouth shut. I hope she did okay.
Spoiler Alert: Despite the pain (more on this in a moment), I did.. okay. Yeah, yeah. It hurt the quads… or maybe my legs were already screaming out in pain and this was just one more straw on the camel’s back, ya know what I mean? But I did it. And that’s that.
Anyhoo, even on this “last bus,” we got to the starting line with 50 minutes to kill before the race started. So although I was late, I really didn’t miss anything. Maybe this is why so many folks shrug off meeting times/deadlines; maybe time is a construct and more of a suggestion than a rule.
Here then are some photos from the starting line mill-about.
The sun was just starting to break through the night and wouldn’t really be shining on us until probably mile 6 or 7… but the horizon was illuminated in that great pre-dawn light. Is there a thing such as “pre-dawn?” If there is, it looks something like this:
Maybe pre-dawn is just, ya know, night.
I didn’t take a lot of photos along the way, choosing instead to just try and focus on the run itself. I was hurting… still am in fact. My legs were on fire, remain on fire, are going to remain on fire, as if screaming out in pain would somehow convince me to stop, just stop, and give them a break from the expand and contract, contract and expand, jostle and jangle of motion and resultant locomotion pounding the pavement… It was quite literally pounding the pavement as each footfall sent ripples of force and pain reverberating through the muscular and skeletal systems.
Thus, I tried to just keep running even when confronted with a few hills along the way. Even shuffling half-step jogging was better than slowing to a walk or Good Gravy, Marie! actually stopping to catch my breath and recover. I thought if I ever did stop running, my legs would stage a Les Miserables-ian style barricade and try and force the issue. A general strike seemed likely and I had no strike busters or scabs to carry me on. Thus a strategy of perpetual motion.
As I was running I did think about 2016. Why was that on a Monday? Calendar wise that makes no sense — In two years, without a leap year curve ball, the 24th of July should’ve moved two calendar days. How could I have run on a Monday? The answer came to me as if in a dream. I have to assume the town protects its Sundays for LDS and other Churches. The Salt Lake City Marathon for example is a Saturday event. So when Pioneer Day falls on a Sunday, they must “observe” it on the following Monday. Indeed, I vaguely recalled as I was running that when linking to the prior year’s race, it was dated July 25th, not the 24th, which makes me think I have made posted all kinds of inaccuracies and errors on this blog. Could it be something on the internet hasn’t been vetted properly? Could we even imagine a world wherein the internet might be (gasp) wrong?
I’ve ruined everything.
***
As I approached the finish line, the race announcer said I was the 26th marathon finisher. I guess there’d be no free car lease for me… though again as I was running I thought what I’d do if I won that thing. I don’t need a car… and certainly not one driven from Salt Lake City to my home. Hell, by the time I got it home I’d probably already be topping out on the allowable lease mileage. So while pondering the unlikely scenario of winning a car, I thought I’d ask if they could donate it to Meals on Wheels for a year, or to a family that needed a reliable car for work/childcare/etc.
The Alanis Morrisette-ian irony of this is that when I printed out my results I was actually 45th overalll… which means I missed out on the car by 4 slots. Hell, I could’ve ambled to the side of the road just before the finish line and waited out 3 runners to finish ahead of me. Makes me wonder if that race announcer didn’t have a sweetheart deal with somebody a bit farther back in the pack. Everybody wants a Hyundai Kona, am I right?
***
I’ve spent the afternoon playing tourist in Salt Lake City. I’ve been here a few times; in fact, my very first marathon was here in 2004. But I’ve also used SLC as an airport starting and ending point on more than a couple of occasions. So I thought I’d been around and around to all the Roadside America “must-sees” and “worth a detours.”
But two on the list stood out as need to sees. I’m pretty sure the first one I’d done before but the second was new to me (though it’s been here awhile).
My first stop was at the Pony Express Monument, a tribute to the 18-month transcontinental mail system that was revolutionary… until it wasn’t thanks to the telegraph.
I wanted to go to shoot a terrible re-enactment for my brother; he and I have always been fans of Kevin Costner’s post-apocalyptic epic The Postman (1997). So there’s this:
And then there’s this:
Still, color me unimpressed that this ISN’T a tribute to the movie.
From there I returned to an intersection from the marathon as I don’t think I quite got the shot right. Here’s a private road I found utterly terrifying, a road that sparked my heretofore, unbeknownst to me, horror movie pitch.
It’s the story of a sadistic dentist (wait… is that redundant?) who lures his patients to his home office and performs… deadly dental procedures. The tag line is: “He Is The Root Canal of All Evil!”
Obviously after such a stop I needed to head to the Utah State Capitol.
Sure, sure. There’s government work being done here… not a lot…
…but this shining beacon on the city’s hill also houses a famed statue honoring Philo T. Farnsworth, the “father of television.” The statue has made the rounds in the building, from hall to hall, floor to floor. It’s currently on the fourth floor overlooking the atrium… albeit the state legislature recently passed a motion to replace him with one honoring the first female State Senator, in Utah and in the country, Martha Hughes Cannon.
It seemed like the right note to go out on for Pioneer Day.
But now I think I’m going to need some more of these.
