Injury & Recovery, Wandering & Purpose

Since I am starting over I guess I should give a little account of myself since my last blogging attempts back in 2008.

Running wise, I must admit that I started slacking off immediately after the marathon in 2008.  Drifting without purpose I participated in a short Triathalon in the Fall of 2008 (which I did not really train consistently for).  I ran a little on and off for the the next couple of years running with a team of 11 other runners in a 200 mile relay race across Central KY call the Bourbon Chase in the fall of 2009 and then again in 2010.  With out the camaraderie of my M&H team mates, I found that I just did not have the drive to push myself through training.

During that period I became much more involved in soccer coaching and began to spend more time developing coaching skills and learning the game.   This I found was a passion that I did not need much help in maintaining.

On January 5th of 2011, in my attempt to continue my soccer skill development, I found myself trying to compete in indoor soccer as if I had been training for it.  In fact, I was greatly out of shape, overweight, and basically acting the fool.  Planting my left leg in the turf, trying to take a shot that I had no business attempting, as time expired in the half…my left knee objected to my foolish attempts at returning to my youth.   Snap-crackle-pop!  ACL…gone,  MCL… torn,  PCL…torn, both meniscus…torn.

Well, I finally had a purpose…learning to walk again.  March 9th, 2011, under the skilled hands of Dr. Pete Hester, part of my patella tendon became my new ACL and a little trim and a few stitches to the meniscus and I was on my way back.  Enter Mark Kluemper (Physical Therapist extraordinaire).  March 10th, (give me a break, can’t I wallow for full day!)  Nope! Muscle atrophy had already shrunk my quads and calves to half the size they had been and atrophy does not take a break.

I will not bore you with the details of the road back to the road.  It is the road before me that is the topic of this page.  There are definite running goals before me, but that is not what I hope to gain from this adventure.  The two years of drifting without purpose can never again dominate my life.  My purpose is to make everyday, a day with a purpose in itself. A  consistent daily effort to fight the atrophy that has so easily over taken my life in the past.

So what is up next for the old Maraman?  What ever it takes to run with the footmen that cross my path today, and what ever it takes to contend with horses that are on the way.

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