From Fat to Phat

Nine years ago I was forty years old. My weight was 325 pounds. I wore size 30-32 jeans. A normal dinner consisted of two bags of groceries. A flight of stairs left me winded and sweating.

Today I'm five months short of fifty. I weigh just under 200 pounds. I wear size 16 jeans. A normal dinner fits on one plate. And in tomorrow I'll be participating in the Napa to Sonoma Half-Marathon as I head my way to October and the Portland Marathon.

There's a lot that happened between the space of those two paragraphs that led to so many changes, and in coming entries I'll probably fill out what's in that space but for the time being let's focus on what's at hand...

Tomorrow. Half-marathon. Me. Last night I had a series of dreams, not about the race but weird stuff that all fell under the common theme of failure. My first waking thought was "I can't do this. I'm going to fall apart by mile 10" and that's when a moment of true panic set in. And then I remembered something I read recently in Runner's World Magazine..."for some of us coming to this late in life, the real victory isn't in crossing the finish line, but that we even got up to the starting line." I have to remember, given where I've come from and what it's taken me to get here, crossing the starting line is nothing short of a miracle.

But still, I really hope I don't fall apart at mile 10.