November 10, 2019: Gaby runs the Big Bear marathon

November 10, 2019. A 3:48 finish for our Bruin, on a beautiful course, with a great running partner and support team.

Checking in our Gaby's marathon run Saturday morning revived memories of my 1981 Kansas marathon. Walking 4.4 brisk miles this morning only further reminded me of how much I miss the flexibility and capacity needed to run effortlessly for a dozen miles and, with real training and effort, to complete a marathon. I miss those days badly, much as I miss many elements of my younger days. I miss the simpler times of Eden, 1958-1969. Before the internet, before personal computers, before social media, before hundreds of television channels, before expensive tickets for concerts and sporting events, before silly arguments about global warming, global cooling and/or climate change, before priests were too often viewed as pedophiles rather than as inspirational men, before multiple oil crises.... these were all much more manageable times. Of course, at the time, I probably wanted more than anything for time to pass quickly, to grow up, to gain independence, to get out of a small town. Only today, our new home in Harrison is closer to that small town than I have been in fifty years and even moving back to Eden would not have been a non-starter for retirement, even if I know full well that most of what I now revere about Eden is long gone.

I miss the opportunities I did not take while I was in college. I was timid, unadventurous. A lot of it had to do with having very little discretionary cash, having to work multiple campus jobs to afford to say in school, and having poor time management and study habits. I wasted so much time. I lingered way too in the dining hall at dinner. When SUNY Binghamton closed in May 1970 after the Kent State shootings, I often think that this deprived me of closure for my freshman year. I slid into my second year and by the end of fall of my junior year I was floundering without really realizing it, as I had also slid into a relatively comfortable social niche, where classes and exams were more the price I paid to enjoy all the other elements of college life, including intramural sports, dances and movies, nights in the pub, killing time in the dining hall, mooning over (today it might be called 'stalking') -- and pursuing -- girls. The discretionary money I earned with entrepreneurial efforts around showing post-theatrical feature films on campus I quickly spent on taking friends out for an evening, often at the infamous Sharkey's, home of the three-for-a-dollar spiedies.

So all I can do is enjoy those memories, not convert them into regrets, and appreciate all the good decisions and investments of time that I did make. I'll never again have two real hips or the capacity to run effortlessly, but it might be worth trying to get some professional advice about exercise after 65 -- for more joy of life.