The clock strikes 2:54:40 and I wobble over the line clutching my knees for stability and find them completely uncooperative.  I crumble into a pile of Quadzilla upon the Houston pavement.  Two race volunteers scrape me up and so begins my monster walk toward a water station.  I got feet.  I got calves.  I got nothing in between.  I got hips.  I got hands to grasp this water cup- oh shit- I got hands to grasp another water cup.  ”Somebody might want to clean that up,” I mumble and stumble on, “I can’t bend.”

I follow the other zombies into a food line corral that meanders like the Mississippi.  I manage a stork stalk walk past something that looks like scoops of mashed potatoes.  I don’t know what it actually is, but would it not be so damn Texan to serve mashed potatoes at the end of a marathon?  I am sure there is BBQ in here somewhere, but right now I just want that diet orange soda that I see right there that one- oops, she took it.  There- there’s another one- ah- she took it!  My jaw drops open and out flutters almost in a southern twang as if I think this will earn me points- “Can I get a Diet Orange Soda?”  On second thought, I take two and stick them on my quads.  Now I granny walk with my invisible walker propping D.O.S. on my F.U.Q’s.

I still really have to use a restroom.  I had the nature rude rap for the last 10K, but I declined every passing port-o-pot because I knew that if I went in, I would never come out.  I mean it would be all cozy in there with a bench and paper and perhaps a little hand sanitizer- Home Sweet Home.  I wasn’t quite sure how I would manage to bring my bottom and a toilet seat to connect.  Hmmmm, this would be a great time for a Stand-Up-Shit-Box-Shower invention.  Yep, big seller at post marathon parties.  Huge.

Connecting with my family, my daughter immediately notices the sparkling head band.  ”Where did you get that?” she asks doe eyed and adorable.

“At the expo,” I answer, “And I got four more all for you!”

“Go get them,” she orders in a rather future Devil Wears Nada voice.

“Now?” I slur and suck at my D.O.S.  She nods slowly while her big eyes lock into mine.  Gulp.  ”Not gonna happen baby girl.  See they are stored half a mile away and that means I would have to walk a mile.”  She stares.  I could try to explain to her that my quads just gave birth to a bouncing baby marathon and that the fucking epidural didn’t work and the thing weighed 254 pounds, but her glassy eyes told me my sob story wasn’t welcome.  ”Want a sip of soda?”

“Yippee!” She slugs.  I realize I want another soda.  I dead man drag my needing a bathroom ass back over to the food court.  I pass ice cream and yogurts and bananas and more mashed up stuff.  What’s with all the soft foods?  Marathoners have teeth!  It’s quads that we don’t have!  Quads!  Ahhhh, I can see the soda when suddenly I am stopped.

“Mam’ you’re gonna have to re-enter the food line,” he points like Babe Ruth to the out field, “Oooover there.”  The actual soda is less than 15 feet away.

“I just want a soda?”  AHMUYGAWD- am I going to cry?  Wait.  Sniff.  Yep.  I am going to cry.  Two grown and grown oversized men stare at my hobbling body and my eyes mist up.  ”I just want a soda.”  I ignore them and walk through the exit.  I am a rebel.  Shoot me down, but that Diet Orange Shit in a Can is mine.  I grab two more and slink out past them with D.O.S. pinned against my quads.  I walk and I walk and I walk and I think I travel twenty feet.

Here I find a flight of stairs that runners must walk up, traverse over a small bridge, and then descend a second flight of stairs.  Genius!  All of us lemmings are bottle necking into the stairs.  I watch the lady in front of me turn around backwards to make her ascent.  Another lady sort of crawls up the stairs using her arms as much as her legs.  The older gentleman in front of me turns to give me a comical grin as if to say, “Look at these suckers.”  However, all I got is “Dude don’t look at me, I am a sucker.”  The marathon- she took me out on a hot date- got me all excited – and then dropped me off at the door with a bitch slap.

Eventually, I find myself an ice bath and some alcohol.  One of these two elements seems to help a lot.  I find that if I sit upright perfectly still and do not move anything except my arms that I feel completely normal.  There is absolutely no evidence of any marathon.  Unfortunately one of these two witch doctors also makes you have to use the bathroom and the toilet is really good at scolding- “Tisk tisk, enjoy yourself running did you?”

“Why yes I did.  Grow some handicap bars will ya?”

Night descends and I find that I cannot sleep due to extreme quad pain.  I wouldn’t say it was so much as a burning sensation- like skewered meat roasting over an open flame, I mean that would be overly dramatic.  I would say it was more like my quads were massaged in honey and then grizzly bears found me.  Needless to say, I need more ice.  I search the freezer for sacrificial frozen food to belt to my thighs for a good night.  Now, if your name is Frozen Brussel Sprouts, you pretty much should know you’re gonna be the lamb to the slaughter.  There I sleep with icy sprouts.  Sorry Mom.

Eventually, I had to fly home.  My airport walking is why they made those Jetson moving belts.  Some mechanical engineer was flying home post running a marathon and thought, “Damn, this ground should just MOVE.”  My daughter sort of sweetly dances all around me sending waves of panic that she might accidentally bump me and send me tumbling down.  I consider flagging down a cart- but- that would mean that I rode in a cart.  I mean I am young, I am fit, I am not supposed to be in a cart!  Dumb sucker that I am therefor spent twenty minutes tip toeing down long corridors checking in with agents to make dead sure that I was going the right way.  ”B6 is this way RIGHT?”  i.e. Don’t dare tell me that I walk all the way out to Kansas to find that I went to OZ because do you see Ruby slippers?  No!

What do you see?  A pathetic excuse for a vertical human being teetering along in running shoes.

“Did you survive the marathon?” A gentleman asks me.  Hmmmm, what gave it away?

“Barely,” I laugh.

And here sits the sweet stiff taste of earned pain.  That’s the best kind.  It heals.

2 Responses to “After Burn”