The Miles I’ve Traveled

Last year at spring break, the kids headed home with my parents and I stayed at home, thoroughly drugged up, recovering from my mastectomy. This year I packed up the kiddos and we headed that way together. So instead of being stuck in my house, sleeping and watching bad tv, I was running around the St. Louis area and literally, well, running.

I tried out the “new” trails around my home town.  Last year, I was stuck on the couch, and this year, I ran the entire trail that runs along the light rail tracks! At almost eight miles, I’m hoping that will be enough to prepare me for this week’s half marathon. (A pesky knee problem has kept my mileage down, but I’m pretty confident that I’ll be able to power through.)

I was a little bummed to be missing out on all the flowering trees along the trails at home.  Somehow, the view of cornfields, bus lots (yes, there were two!), and the train tracks just weren’t the same.  It was cool to run along the trail, trying to pick out exactly where I was.  I even ran past a softball field where I spent a night each week one summer, with my cousins while the guys played ball.  Fun memories really made the miles pass.

(I wasn’t kidding about the cornfields.  I really had to watch my step to make sure that I didn’t step on a corn cob and twist my ankle!)

Luckily, when I got home, the trees were still in bloom! Some have started to leaf, but there were plenty of beauties like this one from yesterday’s run. From the corn fields of Illinois to the flowering trees of Virginia, I’ve covered a lot of miles in the car and by foot this week. But more than that, I’ve been thinking about how far I’ve come in the past year– from the operating table to a half marathon. That’s a lot of miles to cover in a year.