On the way to church on Sunday we drove south on Mur-Len past the old Dillon’s (now Price Chopper) and the beautiful row of pin oaks that lines the street there next to the store. I relayed the story to my family how four years ago in October I was running along there one morning when plop, out of the sky fell an acorn that bounced off the sidewalk in front of me. I caught it in natural running motion without even a hitch in my stride. That run was after the 2005 Twin Cities Marathon which was something of a debacle for me.
By the time I got to TCM my hamstring had been acting up for a month or more and race day was windy! As we came around a few little lakes during the middle part of the course bearing straight into the predominately east wind I knew I was used up by mile 16. When you’re feeling bad at mile 16 of a marathon it is going to be a long morning. By the end I had taken several walk breaks and came in with one of my slowest times. Aside from the wind it was a cool and beautiful fall morning throughout, and the finish in St. Paul was wonderful even though the race itself had been a brutal slog.
So two or three weeks later when the acorn bounced perfectly into my hand I wondered if in some way there might be in it a reassuring message from the Lord. My dad always says that every blind hog finds and acorn now and then. Could every injured runner now and again find the grace for healing and another good race? April 2006 finally came around and the Lord granted me the strength to finally, on my third attempt, run a good race in Boston – and not only a good race but a personal best at that. In Boston. Nice acorn. Thank you, Jesus.
Which brings us back around to the present. I have been struggling in life and running for a good couple of years now. A nasty hamstring injury kept me out of Boston in ’08. Worse than that I missed Boston in ’09 because of a torn ACL and the subsequent reconstructive surgery. Also lost a couple of jobs roughly in that stretch of time. A lot of stuff just has not seemed to go right. Nevertheless, God has provided employment and a new baby girl from Ethiopia. She alone is the most amazing gift and her coming to us is like a breath of fresh life into our family. Still, on the running front, I am sad. My knee recovery is going very slowly and I am sad that fall is here and I am not gearing up for a marathon as I have done every fall for the last 6 years. But as God’s grace would have it, I have a wife who really listens to me and hears my heart.
She spent Sunday afternoon out praying and reading her Bible. She said she really needed a spiritual re-charge and some time alone, and with a new baby in the house I really understand that. But besides just re-charging herself, she came home with a present for me! She brought me a running book. And she passed on to me another running book. She said she listened to my story about the acorn and she knew how much I was missing running. (I mean running hard runs and long runs, not the little 4 milers that I am now constrained to doing no more than 4 times per week). She understood.
I am going to read these books for sure. One is about a runner who survived the genocide in Burundi that spilled over from Rwanda back in 1994. The other is about a guy who loves running and writing but never had the guts for a long time to really strike out as a writer. The books, even if they turn out to be terrible (which I doubt), represent an acorn that bounced right up into my hand. Who gets to have a wife like this? I am thinking, almost nobody. I am blessed indeed.
Over 43 now, with the clock ticking, and due to my knee my body unable to train at the high level I would like to, I am now stuck with wondering if my fastest marathon is now behind me forever, and that’s a bit hard to swallow. But maybe, just maybe, might I again find the grace for healing for one more great race? God knows. The rest of us will have to stay tuned.
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