Going solo at the movies

I just saw "Capote" at the movies tonight. The gf's away in NYC and I decided to head out for a Saturday night at the cinema.

I love going alone. I love the solitude of a large theatre sitting dead centre. Being alone at the movies feels like dedicated time to just being. It's permission to get in your own head and not think about the world. Or to think about it in ways you don't have to qualify or translate for others.

One thing I abhor at the movies are these trivia screens that run in a horrid loop before the movie. Now, the idle chatter throughout the cinema often comes back to answering the questions on the screen..."Oh, that was Brad Pitt in that movie? I didn't know..." Who the fuck cares?

Much better to have a blank screen with muzak piped in. Nothing to do then but talk amongst yourselves. And listening to that is always far more interesting than anything a cinema slide can offer.

Nonetheless, it hasn't destroyed my love of solo cinema. I find I can lose myself utterly in a good film. Bad films I just fall asleep. Made that mistake going alone to some horrible flick with Ben Kingsley. Some murder/thriller that didn't thrill or murder enough. I woke to some shriek midway through the movie and decided to finish my nap at home.

So I went solo to Capote tonight. I really loved the film. You get a great window into the writer's world...or at least, Truman Capote the writer. We really are a deceitful bunch. I always recognized that in myself. And you hear that of other writers. But to see it played out in such convincing detail in the film, I don't know whether to admire the trait or take a bath.

I was envious of his dedication to the research for the book. Six years with a single story. I don't know if I could do it. I've had stories I've dusted off and tackled again, but I've never tackled one story consistently for so long. I really need to learn that dedication. To stay with a project when it's starting to throw up road blocks. I can be quick to park it and walk but I really need to wrestle it through the kinks. Every time I have done just that, I've been rewarded. It's just an annoying, painful part of writing.

I much prefer when I sit down and presto! Magical pages in 30 minutes. That rarely happens and when it does, the pages don't stand a test of 24 hours.

Okay, I'm nodding off. It was the late screening and it's now 1:30am. I just ordered "In Cold Blood" online - impossible to find at stores in Vancouver. It's one of those books I've always wanted to read but never have. It's a list that spans centuries and just keeps growing and growing.

4 years earlier

After the Victoria Marathon, I had one objective. We arrived back at the hotel...rather, I hobbled back...I hopped online and immediately registered for Boston.

And I waited. Now after a few weeks, I received official confirmation. I'm registered for the 110th Boston Marathon on April 17, 2006.

I still can't believe it, really. Almost 4 years earlier to the day of that race, I entered my first official race. A recreational runner, I was invited to join a friend for the 2002 Vancouver Sun Run. A 10k race. I had no clue what 10k meant in terms of running. Was that far? Was that stupid far? I just had no clue. But what the hell? We joined a training program and I took to it fast.

Every morning before work, I was up in the dark, slogging thru snow to get in all my training runs. I surprised myself. I loved the solitude of running. I loved hitting the road on my own in the quiet of the morning. But more than anything, I loved that I was doing it towards a single goal. Run a 10k.

Being my first race, I had no clue what represented a good time. I looked up the winning times from past years...under 30 minutes. Okay, so I'll be significantly slower than that. But how much slower? An hour? I asked experienced runners and they offered up reasonable goals for me. Breaking an hour seemed to be the consensus. That'd be a good goal. So in the back of my head, I decided I must shatter that goal. I thought I'd go for sub-50 minute. Ultimately though, I had no clue. I'd never run the distance.

The day arrived and that was a thrill in itself. There's something truly humbling about being in a race of that size...Over 45,000 participants jammed a 6 lane road in downtown Vancouver. Looking behind me, I was in awe of the mass of colour all ready to lumber thru 10km.

The horn went and I made my way towards the finish for my first official race time: 45:59. Just enough to claim a 45 minute 10k!

From there, I was hooked. I began tackling as many 10k races as I could manage. I moved on to half marathons and realized the extra distance actually felt great in my legs. Like I was just getting started. After my 3rd half marathon, I had my eye on marathons.

Marathons were the magic pinnacle. If there was any race to tackle, it was the marathon. A test of so much more than just your physical strength. The marathon challenges what you're made of.

Having run most of my first races much better than I expected, I set a bold goal for my first marathon...qualify for Boston in my first race. I "trained" for the race. I ran 3 times a week and hit most of my long runs. It was a lacklustre regime but I still felt reasonably strong.

Not surprisingly, I ran strong in the first half and then burned out at the 19 mile mark. I somehow managed to finish with 3:37, a very respectable first marathon. But I was depressed. I'd missed my goal.

I then spent the next year tackling marathons, trying to hit that one mark...a 3:20 Boston qualifying time. 3 marathons and a year and a half later, I've done it.

And it's Boston in april..

Boston Qualifier, Part 2

Click here to view Part 1.

I was now approaching kilometer 35. In general, the whole course was marked in kilometers, but every 5th mile was also marked. I'd been looking forward to kilometer 35 since the start of the race. This was where I'd see Jennifer waiting and cheering me on. If I needed her anywhere for support, this would be the place.

So nervous about hitting the wall and battling myself, I fed Jennifer pithy inspirational phrases to call out to me, small thoughts that might help me focus when my mind was fading and complaining.

I curved round the corner and spotted her a block away under the drug store we'd agreed on. Several runners ahead shuffled past her and she, the lone spectator at this corner, cheered them on with gusto. I watched her, waiting for that moment she'd spot me. Closer I got, still she doesn't see me. She's waving at the runners. Some wave back. I can hear her clapping now and still she doesn't see me. Then just as suddenly, her eyes lock on me and I feel even stronger.

I glide past and she runs alongside me for several feet. She calls out, "Dig deep, baby! It's supposed to hurt! You're stronger than you think!" It made me smile. I had no reason to dig deep. Nothing hurt. She'd come through for me. Maybe that was part of the trick. Maybe I ran so well because I knew I was so well prepped for mile 20 and beyond. I knew Jen would be there to push me on. And just knowing that set me at ease, made me ready. I don't know, but I like to think so.

I'm so confident in my race, I tell her oh so casually, "see you at the finish at 3:18" and then I'm off again.

Here is where I ramp it up. I'm going to hit my time and see how much more I can do. Every runner ahead of me becomes a target. If you're in bright colours, you're on my hit list. The little guy in the orange shirt, 100 meters ahead of me. I don't charge. I just select and then methodically stride my way towards him. Any other runners I pass along the way don't matter. Only the target I've chosen. Once he's behind me, I pick my next victim. And so I continue through the remainder of the race.

On one of the final stretches of the course, I'm approaching a long, unending hill that several people have warned us about. And like everything else in the race, I stride my way up continuing with my hitlist of runners.

In the final mile (only at this point did they forsake the kilometer markers and only list the last mile...odd), I cranked it up, shocked by how much energy I still had. I charge past a blur of colours, bright yellow, red, blue, blue. It hits me now that not once since the 25 kilometer mark has a single runner passed me.

The crowd is now thick, the cheering growing. I pass the Laurel Point Inn and suddenly hear my name in a loud, shocked voice, "Kevin! Go, Kevin! Go!" And again as I approach the finish, another voice close to me. Friends, but I have no idea who.

I run through the finish, fighting the urge to hit my stopwatch. I've had far too many photos of me staring down at my watch as I cross the line.

And even at this moment, when I can release everything, where I can let everything fall apart, I feel good. I've just run the best race of my life. I savour my time. 3:13:48. 19 minutes faster than my previous PB.

Jennifer is the first face I see. She's had a cold for a week and we've avoided each other with the race approaching. Now I find her and kiss her through the chain link fence. We're off to Boston in April.

Boston Qualifier, Part 1

It was at kilometer 27 of this year's Victoria Marathon that I knew something was different.

Exactly one year earlier, I was in the Okanagan trying to qualify for Boston at the Kelowna Marathon. The day was perfect, the weather just so. The course was flat, and I was injury free and ready to run. I needed to run it in 3 hours and 20 minutes. My previous best was 3:37...I needed 17 minutes off my PB. We weren't talking shaved seconds here. I had my work cut out. But I was ready.

Until I hit kilometer 27. This isn't the traditional "wall" we all hear about, but this is the spot where you'll start to notice the wall is soon approaching. And so yeah, on this flat, perfect course, I got smacked on the 27k mark and knew I had a major chore ahead. From there it just got uglier, and uglier...and uglier.

2 kilometers later (that's right...just 2 kilometers that felt like 10 miles) I knew Boston was off the table. Now I was bargaining with myself for a personal best. And I was feeling sick. My head pounding, my legs slogging through molasses. I peered far off for every kilometer marking praying I'd made a mistake and it was actually kilometer 42 coming up.

My poor girlfriend was waiting at the finish watching all the Boston qualifiers trot their way across the line. My confidence was obscenely large so she, naturally, was convinced I was rounding the corner within seconds. As the clock rolled onto 3:19, AC/DC began to blast through the speakers drawing all runners within earshot: "Thunder! Thunder!"

Back at kilometer 33, I shuffled a feverish pace haggling with myself. 'Okay, walk to that lamp post and then start running.' 'Yes, sounds good.' 'Hey, you were supposed to start running!' 'No, no, I thought you meant the next lamp post'.... and on it went for another 9 kilometers.

In the end, I dragged my sorry ass over the line in 3:41. No personal best. And definitely no thunder.

And now, here I was a year later at kilometer 27 again. But something was different. I felt good. I mean I felt really good. In fact, kilometer 27 was sitting on a big hill I'd been warned about and here I was striding up it and maintaining my pace.

Now I didn't want to get too ahead of myself. 27 isn't the wall. And there's still another 10km after the wall. This race was far from over. I'd tuck my thoughts away and save them for when needed...at that 20 mile mark: the wall.

Kilometer 27 turned into 28 and 29. This section of the run floated by like a dream. When thinking back on the entire race, I still linger over this section. It was all magic. The crowds, the trees.

Without a doubt, Victoria is the most beautiful marathon I've run. It was my fourth, so I'm hardly an expert on the runs of the world, but this one stands out for its beautiful route.

In all the races I've run, and from what I've heard of others, the routes invariably travel through some section of town that serves one purpose...tally up those 26.2 miles. It's usually some long stretch of a whole lot of nothing that you run through, turn around then run back. Spectators tend to avoid these areas so you're usually navigating the tedium on your own.

Even Vancouver, one of the most beautiful cities in the world (and yes, I've been to a number of cities around the world) manages to drag itself through one section of town worth skipping.

Not Victoria. Every turn a new neighbourhood, every hilltop lined with cheering spectators. It feels as though you're traveling through 26 distinct neighbourhoods. Likely because you are. It's the movie version of what the perfect marathon would be. It's happy. It's enthusiastic. It's desperate to see you do it. Just because you deserve it.

Was it just me thinking this? I don't know, but I was definitely feeling the love as I cruised through mile 20. Before I could register it, I was breezing past the dreaded wall. I'd maintained my pace up to this point and was consistently striding past runners clearly wrestling with their own demons.

And now, as I passed mile 20 I knew this race would be mine. I knew Boston would be mine. I could feel it. No need to be cautious with my thoughts. I let myself take it in. I'm going to qualify for Boston. I'm going to finish strong. I'm never going to stop once through the whole race.

In every marathon up to this point, I've had a terrible finish after the wall. It's been an ugly meltdown I've battled every single time. Walk half a mile, run a mile, walk, run straight to the finish. It's a mental battle of epic proportions. It's during these last 10 kilometers of a marathon that you really feel the power of your mind. You want to go on and it's throwing up every alarm telling you to stop. 'Don't take another step. You CANNOT do it. Stop right now.' It's humbling just how powerful your own thoughts can be against yourself. No matter what I tried, I was never able to overcome.

I was starting to question my own mettle. Maybe it just wasn't in me. Maybe I just didn't have the fortitude to push myself beyond my limits. Clearly, I could never be a secret agent. I'd spill every state secret at the mere suggestion of Chinese water torture.

For Victoria, I spent my final week of training preparing for the mental challenge. I visualized the race. I visualized mile 20. I created catchy mantras to repeat to myself as I ran through this dark corridor of the race. Whatever it took, I was going to run the entire race without stopping once.

But here was mile 20 and I had no battle awaiting me. No mantras I was clinging to. Checking my watch, I realized I'd easily arrive at the finish in 3 hours, 18 minutes. 2 minutes under my Boston qualifying time. That single thought gave me a boost to my already charged body.

I was really going to do it.

To be continued...