by Jeanette R. Harrison, MPH
I ran a 5K yesterday. Actually, I mostly walk/jogged it. There was a tremendous turnout for the Famous Idaho Potato Marathon in Boise, Idaho. I participated in the same race two years ago, and the participation was almost double this time. I couldn't believe my eyes when I pulled into the Albertson's Stadium parking lot. There were cars and people everywhere. I stood in line to get in line for the race. The race wasn't my best time. I didn't get a good pace from the beginning. Still, I finished, and that is what matters. My final time was 50:19, and I clocked an average mile time of 16:11, which was pretty close to my goal. My goal was a 16-minute mile or less for this race.
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Famous Idaho Potato Marathon Boise, Idaho 2024 |
I was proud of myself for finishing the race, but I was even prouder of myself for doing it. To be honest, I didn't want to show up that day. I wanted to lay in bed and be lazy on a Saturday. I even made up all of these excuses and rules telling myself, "Well, if this happens, then I won't go." Then, I remembered I told a lot of people I was going to do the race. I felt like I had to do it. I had to get up and do the race like it was my job to do it. On the way to the site, I told myself it was my job to be there. I wrote a book called, Get Your Walk On, after all. How was I encouraging other people to get their walk on if I wasn't getting my walk on?
If I backed up a little further, I decided that I had to do the walk because I paid for it. I signed up. Why did I sign up? I needed something to look forward to. I have felt so deprived since I have lived in Idaho. I feel like my life is a shell of what it used to be. I felt like I needed a sense of purpose. I needed a goal that was more fulfilling than the daily humdrummery. I needed to participate in life more because I spent at least three weekends in a row laying in bed lamenting my life.
I have been lamenting my life because this life is not what I envisioned when I walked my way into a new life almost four years ago. I had all of these hopes and dreams. That I was going to finally get to live the life I dreamed of. I don't feel like I have that. I feel like I am being told to settle for less. As if I am being told, "Jeanette, this is all you get. Go sit in the corner, don't complain, and be happy about it." Fortunately or unfortunately, resigning to less than what I feel I deserve has never been my thing. I do complain, because I have the right to. Even if people think I'm being negative. I get so tired of that word - "negative."
I was upset, and I had a reason to be. I don't currently have a car, and I make barely enough in my day job to make ends meet. I take the bus to and from work. I'm fortunate because the city where I live has a shuttle that takes me to the bus stop in the morning, but there isn't one in the evening because I work later than the shuttle operates. Sometimes, I get a ride. When I am low on cash and I can't get a ride, I walk home from the bus stop. It's about 5 miles from the bus stop to my house. I will tell you that I was super unhappy about having to walk home from the bus. I was really upset about it. One night it took me almost three hours to get home but I was trudging along. I was feeling really down on myself, asking myself where I had gone so wrong in life that I was walking home five miles a night at 52. What was wrong with me?
I was complaining about it to a friend (maybe he's not a friend and secretly doesn't like me), but I was complaining about the walking. It was exhausting walking home from the bus. I was tired. I had worked all day at a low-level job that is an exercise in humility and humiliation for me to do every day. Then, I walk home at night. Five miles. The first part of the walk is a nature walk that I love. The last mile is mostly streets and sidewalks, and it isn't as enjoyable. That's the "I'm really tired" part. That's the part where the blisters on my feet started bleeding, and what kept me going was seeing my home in the distance.
One night, I got a ride home. I decided I wanted to get my 10,000 steps in for the day, and I was happily putting on my sneakers to go for my walk. Same walk. Different direction. Different attitude. Different attitude! Better attitude! At that moment, I took a look at my perspective about walking. I was mad because I was walking home. But, I had walked that walk so many times before. It was my "fun and enjoyable" activity for so many weekends and summer days. Why couldn't walking home be my fun and enjoyable activity in the evenings after work? Maybe I could reframe how I was thinking about walking. That it really was something I wanted to do, instead of a task I had to check off at the end of my day.
I started clocking myself on the way home. I challenged myself with my walking time. I decided I was going to use this as training time. The next day, I signed up for the first 5K I have done in two years. I only sort of trained for two weeks, which is another reason my time was lower than usual. The 5K changed my mindset about walking. I'm encouraged and excited for the next race, and walking is now part of goal setting for me and is back to being a fun and enjoyable activity.
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