It’s better than a mass e-mail

The NYT has a regular feature called “Voices” where they have audio clips of people telling their story of living with or surviving or losing someone to a certain disease. For some reason, the feature on pancreatic cancer from last fall has been coming up in the health section rotation.

Ah, pancreatic cancer. This is the cancer my mom died from 18 years ago.  I think I was about 12.

Although I think about my mom all the time, and I think a lot about the fact that it was cancer that killed her, I rarely consider just what kind of cancer. I have a friend whose mom was recently diagnosed with lung cancer. My best friend’s mom died of ovarian cancer (on Mother’s Day, that jerk). But rarely do I really stop and think – pancreatic cancer.

This feature allowed me to do that. A five-year survival rate of 5 percent. She barely had a fighting chance. And I am guessing research and treatment has advanced in the last two decades, but the pancreas is a tough one, all hidden away, and the symptoms are like so many other conditions. There’s no high-profile campaign against it with celebrity faces or pink ribbons.

Anyway, I don’t want to bore you with cancer stats, and I am not sure I am going to run out and volunteer with a pacreatic cancer organization (but if there is one, I might look into it… that, and early screening). But it did make me reconsider and reflect on a different aspect of my mom’s disease. It also dredged up a whirl of emotion listening to the survivor stories and wishing my mom could have been among the lucky ones.

Everyday, I usually get an e-mail or two from the blog program asking me to approve or spam a comment. Usually it’s spam, so I’ll just go in and clean house, deleting all the pending comments that are inevitably spam.

But lo and behold, I just got a comment (yahoo Maggie!). Just as I was about to click “spam,” I looked closer and realized it was a real live comment. I just  might have a reader or two here.

Not that I have been giving them anything to read lately. Hence, this post.

I drunkenly signed up for a marathon this fall. Let me first explain the “drunkenly” part. One night a couple months ago, we had some friends over for dinner and partook in a few glasses of wine. As the red wine was flowing, we got to talking about running and races. A friend of mine competed in triathlons and had started running again. Somehow – and this part is a bit fuzzy – I became the topic of conversation and was being pressured into signing up for a marathon. I guess it had been in the back of my mind for a while, so it didn’t take too much to be pushed into the idea.”Come on Sara, just do it. If you can run a half, you can do a full.” “If you sign up, you’ll have to start training.” “What are you waiting for, you pansy-ass sack of shit?”

Before I knew it, I had my credit card in hand and was signing up for the Philadelphia Marathon Nov. 22.

So I have since pored over every single marathon training plan known to man and available online. I have scoured the Runner’s World site for their Smart Coach training plan, tips, gadgets, advice. This weekend, I bought a gear belt – a ridiculously cumbersome and bulbous Velcro belt that holds up to four small water bottles and a couple of those nasty gel packs that I guess I will need to start using.

I am up to 8  miles on my long weekend runs and this weekend’s run was spectacular. Don’t get me wrong: running for the most part totally sucks and is painful and boring. But something about it… I ran the half marathon last year as a part of my new thing where I set goals and achieve them. That’s at the heart of this, I think. I am setting this goal that is tangible and perhaps achievable with a great deal of work. I have something to work toward. The act of running itself hasn’t entirely endeared itself to me yet (I still haven’t gotten to that point where I hit a stride and zone out and daydream and before I know have covered 10 miles… Does that really happen?). Maybe it will. Or maybe this will be more about the journey and reaching the goal. Either way, after running for 8 miles – and one day, 13, 18, 26…) I feel amazing – tired yet energized – and can basically eat whatever I want for the rest of the day.

p.s. I promise to write more. Really this time.