Ironman 8: Tuesdays with Whip-Its

I was about sixteen when someone introduced me to whip-its. Small tubes of nitrous oxide that we released into a balloon and inhaled for a high. It felt extra ordinary to be using this. I was naive enough to think that doing this like this wouldn't hurt me. Seeing everyone else do it made me feel like it was easy and fun.

I wondered if I was led into this compeition. Nine of my friends signed up for Ironman, shelling out over $450 a year before the race took place. Tempted by the challenge of this local race, how I could I pass it up?

I was in the best shape of my life. At race day, I had completed ten marathons and three ultra marathons relays. My success story was there when I quit smoking and became a distance runner. My daughter whispered to me, "I teach you how to swim," when I told her why I didn't sign up for Ironman.

Where was I to go? Which way was up from this point? No one could tell me what to do. There was only clear new objective that stood before me. This new objective was the Ironman. My friends and training partners trained and completed this race. There were a select few who boasted of their extremely poor swimming skills. This seemed like the obvious next step for an experienced marathon runner.

Contemplating this challenge, I feared the water and what it had in store for me. Swimming was/is something that my family never liked learning. My parents never really swam and neither did we. We didn't feel any pressure from friends to join them nor did we strive to fill in this gap in our athletics. Maybe the lack of peer pressure led me to dismiss swimming.

Now triathlons and swimming had presented itself as something I could accomplish. I saw myself being able to finish this race in horrible condition but beaming. Consciously, it was not a bit visual leap from a marathon finish to an Ironman finish. Little did I know that picturing yourself (in itself) did not get you there.

Seeing my friends inhale all whip-its made me think that I could be that happy too. Their grins and silly talk, they laid back on the bed so amicably. I wished to be that way. I accepted all invitations to take hits that night.

Every time I took a hit, I got this dizzy feeling. My head felt like it was floating and my eyes going in and out of focus. Every breath was cold and refreshing like I had eaten the biggest Altoid of my life. High off my hit, I turned to one girl and tried to make out with her in front of about six people. She pushed me off and screams then laughs. My eyes focus as the high wears off and I see her laughing at me. My hand wipes over my face as I get back to being who I was. I get up off the bed and walk out of the room and leave her to laugh into her hand, working hard not to look at me.

Being sixteen was hard. Finding out what you really want is just about as hard. It's about growing up and seeing things as they are. Letting go. But how do you let go and leave things as they are? As the girl laughed, I wanted to tell her that I was sorry. I wanted to also tell her that she's being rude. She knew that I opened up and made a huge mistake. She kept laughing. But I had to walk away. How do you let that go? How do you walk away and stay proud of yourself? Maybe you can't. Maybe you carry that for the rest of your life.

When I got to the top of Timber Lane to cheer on my friends, how do I stay proud of myself? All the niceities aside, conversation is cheap but believing that it's ok to go up that hill and cheer takes resignation. Like leaving that girl to herself laughing with my friends, I had to resign myself to run away and find out how to just move onto living my life. Getting up there, I felt like I had called in sick to work but showed up to the company's happy hour. Like the girl was still laughing at me.

Timber Lane was fairly desolate. One of my friends had a father who came into town from Conneticut and he was there waiting for bikers. All I told him was that I couldn't finish the swim. We brought out folding chairs for ourselves. More people arrived in anticipation of the bikers. We waited for them to come by us.

Jeni didn't want to ask any questions and I didn't want to explain what happened out in the water. It was hard enough for us to be out there. This was obvious by the way that we couldn't gain eye contact with anyone. Anonymity was something we had the privilege of using. We were spectators along with the hundreds of others who lined this, the highest point of the Ironman Wisconsin bike course.

January 16, 2007
Amy,

Is it me or are Tuesdays extremely unique? They're not given a nickname like "hump day" or part of a phrase like "Somebody's got the case of the Mondays!" Tuesdays are in a league by themselves. When I worked at the UA Movie Theaters at the Loyal Plaza, Tuesdays were "Buck Night". Every movie cost $1. Not sure if you remember this fact. It was completely insane and I would dread working that night. It was a Tuesday when 9/11 became part of our vernacular. And every year, Mardi Gras takes place on a Tuesday night (and into "hump day").

Tuesdays fly under the radar as a day when big things happen. Today (Tuesday), my daughter turns eight. Legally, she's allowed to sit in the back seat without a booster seat. That's no big deal for you and me, but for my daughter Franny, she thinks that she's a big girl when that hunk of plastic wrapped in cushioning is taken away! She was so excited for her birthday that she woke up at 4:00AM to tell Jeni and me that it's her birthday. Jeni told her that it was an exciting day and asked her to get into our bed and go back to sleep (Jeni told her that it would give her more energy for her big day).

I decided to get up at that time. The gym was opening at 5AM and this was my chance to get in the pool when no one was there. When I arrived, two of the four lanes were taken. I took a look over at the warm water pool and saw no one there. Swimming the warm water pool is more for therapeutic value, but I decided to get in it and warm up.

Moving over to the lap pool, my legs almost went stiff by the shock. But, I'm finding that I'm able to make a clean 100m. the deep end is still giving me some problems. But I'm finding that the anxiety spells in the deep end are shortening. I have to stay focused on the workout and trust my instincts. It happened today when I trusted my body to make through the deep end.

Tuesdays. Big things happen on Tuesdays, but we never talk about how great Tuesdays can be.

Steve

Comments

[Maggie]

I love the weaving in of the whip-its. Lovely lovely lovely.