The Waiting Game

Currently I’m sitting at LAX Terminal 1 waiting for a flight.  I got here early as I was checking two huge bags and wanted to avoid traffic driving down.  So instead of sitting in my car trying to navigate the city streets, I’m sitting in a Southwest Airlines faux rich Corinthian leather chair.  I say this because the Los Angeles traffic has really taken a toll on my psyche of late.  And that’s brought to mind my second marathon I ever did.

In 2004, I ran my first marathon.  It was at the inaugural event in Salt Lake City, UT.  I picked that race for two reasons — I liked that it was the city’s inaugural event just as it would be my first race.  And it fit my schedule,  I had decided as some weird New Year’s resolution to start training properly for a marathon on January 1st and the Non-Runner’s Marathon Guide I bought on Amazon said it should take four months to train for the race.  Salt Lake City’s event was at the end of April.

I finished the race and thought that was that.  But my brother expressed a desire to run a marathon and I thought it would be fun to train with him.  So we settled on our then adoptive hometown of Los Angeles, CA.

And here’s where the traffic discussion intersects with the stray thoughts of memory that consumes the waking daydreams of the itinerant nomadic air traveler.  Because it was during this race that as Steve and I ran the streets of LA that I realized both how deceptively sprawling and easily navigable Los Angeles could be … At least on foot.

2005 03 06 -- Los Angeles Marathon Official Pics Two Shot Running Closeup

I can still recall the dawning of that realization as we pounded the pavement and ran from Downtown LA out toward Santa Monica and back.  This was the “old” course before they rejiggered it with their now quite popular Stadium to the Sea course that starts at Dodgers Stadium and ends near the famed Santa Monica pier.  The “new” course better highlights the city and its landmarks.

But as a then pseudo-local, I kinda loved the “old” course. It was a street race, taking runners along routes that I had sat stuck in my car for literally hours on end.  And for the first time ever I realized certain streets connected in ways nearer than I’d imagined.  It was also the first time that I realized I could run to certain areas faster than I could drive.  That’s how bad traffic can be in Los Angeles.

In the eleven years since that race with my brother, I’ve rarely forgotten that feeling.  And that realization of freedom, of navigating the world on foot at times faster than by machine, hasn’t been limited to the TMZ, which only recently I found out means “Thirty Mile Zone.” This 30 mile circle demarcates the shooting locations around Los Angeles that the studios aren’t required to pay crew travel costs.

Just the other day, Steve and I were headed down to Costa Mesa, CA, to see If/Then, a musical written by a guy Steve knows.  We were stuck in traffic and crawling.  And at some point, unprompted by me and seemingly out of the blue, Steve asked me if I could run to the theater faster than we were driving.  Only the did I notice we were passing signage saying we were 26 miles from Costa Mesa.  I admitted I couldn’t run there and be on time for the curtain rising.  But as the mileage slowly decreased and the clock ticked ever forward, I have to admit there did reach a point where I could have run there and made it in time for the show.  Space, time, and distance are all altered concepts after running.  Boundaries and limitations shift and bend, like light passing through a prism.

The prose is getting ever more pretentious; I’ve been sitting here too long.