Loss

On Sunday, September 13th 2009, our running community here in Omaha lost a mother, wife, and friend.

J was running near Life Time Fitness and died. She left behind a husband and daughter. This is the second time I have opened my email and received this type of news.  Two years ago a friend died while running the Collegiate Peaks Trail Marathon near Buena Vista Colorado.  Now I descend again into what David Whyte calls "The Well of Grief."

I talked to J for the last time on Saturday night at an Endurance Club party. She was excited for a half marathon she was going to do and had made great progress toward that goal. Her husband is an excellent athlete and was so proud of her. He is currently injured, so we were joking with them saying that J was the real runner in the family now at that it would take her husband months to catch back up, if he could at all. 

J was a beginner, but never gave up. Running is a hard activity to pick up because on the first few runs it can seem almost impossible that it will ever be enjoyable.  I remember when she showed up to the track workout for the first time. Runners can be pretty obsessive about technical clothing and shoes, but she didn’t care about the gear. She came in cut-off sweats and these really glamorous movie-star sunglasses, and slowly moved around the outside of the track, pushing herself a little harder each week.

She reminded me that with a positive attitude you can achieve a goal, even if at the beginning it is hard to see results. Running can be frustrating at times and is like any sport in that regard. My 20 mile run last Saturday was frustrating because my legs gave up the ghost at about mile 17 and I ended up finishing a lot slower than I did on my first 20 miler. I have said that time is not my concern when running, but improvement is, and even though I finished the run I admit to some momentary disappointment in the idea that I had seemed to have moved backwards a bit. My memory of J reminds me that it really does not matter how fast you are and that the point of the journey is not to arrive, but to do. It is in the doing that we are changed, and she was changing.

Her husband offered to help me and Catherine move about 48 hours after having met me for the first time, and is such a good man.  He owns some Subway stores and they get robbed all the time.  He smiles when I ask him about the latest robbery and says, "no one was hurt, that's what's important."  He has such a great attitude and loved his wife very much. This evening was the viewing and most of the running club was there. She was a scrapbooker and we got to look through several of the albums she created. We all signed a Team Nebraska bib and gave it to her husband.  Life Time Fitness has given us the backing to organize an annual race in J's honor and we will start on that next week. 

I pray for the family during this time of grief and pain. In the Psalms the writer says “though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…you are with me.” To me, right now, the important words here are “through,” and "with me." The writer is telling us that the valley is not endless and that there will come a time when the sun will come out again and we will emerge from the canyons of grief. The author is telling us we do not go through grief and sadness alone. In this instance I know that grief is being met by our running community with love for Steve and his daughter, but this fact does not make the process any easier.

Goodbye J. You are missed by all of us.