This week has been busy for me, and for all the wrong reasons. Unfortunately, my mom passed away early this week, so I have needed a good deal of TCB (takin' care of business) time for the rest of the week. The service was Friday, so we drove up Thursday and stayed at a hotel in my hometown of Windsor Locks, CT.
Friday morning I decided to try a 100% run outdoors, something that hasn't happened since my accident one full year ago. I had a very good treadmill run Wednesday and it helped alleviate some of the stress associated with losing a loved one. I thought an early morning Friday run before the services could do the same thing. I was fairly familiar with the lay of the land, and I knew it was pancake flat and relatively close to the hotel so if I had to abort it wouldn't be a long walk back. Everything seemed to fall into place.
I was planning on a 25-28 minute run at roughly an eleven-minute pace. If things go well, maybe I could bump it up to a half-hour, or go for four kilometers. I decided to warm up on the hotel's treadmill, so about three minutes on that, and then out the door. A quick walk around the hotel to get the GPS to kick in, and off we go.
The hotel's parking lot led into a Dunkin Donuts parking lot, then I headed south on Old Colony Road. This road sort of separated the business side of the airport (Windsor Locks is home to Bradley International Airport, the main terminal for the Hartford/Springfield area) with the residential surburbia that I was raised in. Feeling very good at this point, the pace was right about where I wanted it to be. I took the first left unto Ash Drive, and suddenly I was transported back in time to a high school or college training run.
My pace slowed somewhat, as my thoughts drifted back about forty years. "Palm Drive? That's new." "Didn't Mary Ann Ingari live on this street?" "Didn't Pete Wrable on this street?" "Didn't Judy Van Schelt live on this street"? "Through the park to Elmwood Drive, or cut through to Denslow?" At the end of Ash Drive, there is a playground/baseball field where I cut my little league teeth and I decided to cut through and surprise a group of dog walkers. "Cornwall to Andover," plotting my route with a few fewer memories of friends addresses, so after a brief detour on Trinity (oops, dead end) I find myself about halfway home on Southwest Ave. Pace, slow but consistent.
I cross Elm Street unto Woodland Street, a long side street that parallels Elm Street. Now I am starting to feel like I want to finish. I hit three kilometers a short distance onto the street, and I know when I finish up on this street, I am almost done. My thoughts seem to drift to the sixties architecture of the houses and the postage stamp playground on the north side of the street. Almost there.
I turned back unto Elm Street for the home stretch. I decide to call it quits at four kilometers, so after passing the condos on Windwood Drive and the clinic my mom used to take me to when I was a kid my Garmin beeps and I come to the end. 2 1/2 miles, 29:22 for a time, which was a pace of 11:43. Hey, you have to start somewhere. Why not your hometown?
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