Why my mom started running in her fifties, what made her stop, and the joy of watching a parent discover a new part of their life.
Mom was in her fifties when she took her first run. On a winter night in Minnesota she ran to the snow pile at the end of Farrington Circle beneath the yellow streetlight. 500 feet, give or take a few. She walked back home.
Mom’s workout attire for the run: business casual. Corduroys, a sweater over a white blouse, winter boots, and a parka.
I think of her first run regularly, often while I’m running through Oakland in the early morning. The story has long been a part of the family canon. Any forgotten details have been covered by the senses of memory undetected by chronology. For one, there’s little doubt her pre-run snack was a sip from a can of warm Diet Coke and a few chocolate chips from the yellow Tollhouse bag forever ripped open on the counter just to the left of the kitchen sink. Her corduroy strides zipped out in the cold as she passed our neighbors homes — first the Henches, then Bergersons, then Collettis and all of the rest. I can scribble a picture of every house and every bare tree.
I’ve been a runner since college, nearly 20 years. Most of my five siblings are runners, too (respect for always holding out, Tony). I’ve got the sibling marathon count around 45. Mom and Dad were at many of those races. She’d be on her tiptoes at mile 21 of the Twin Cities Marathon, straining to spot one of us coming up Summit Avenue. We’d get in the Suburban after the race, and she’d be energized, thinking aloud about why she was on the curb cheering, not running. Eventually, she gave it a shot.
Recently, Mom told me that, long before any of us ran, she would be introduced as Monica, mother of six. The number of her children was the most recognizable part of her, and she would have to convince herself that she was still Monica, separate from us. And then there was the part that had been unsaid in Mom’s presence but no doubt discussed — that she was the mom of six who’d had been really sick. Throat cancer.
Both distinctions — the one said in front of her and the one discussed when she wasn’t within earshot — pestered her for years. Two mosquitos in a tent. No one has ever loved being a mom more than she’s loved it, but goddamn, she was…
