Who are you?

I have run the Boston Marathon as a fundraiser for Dana-Farber in 2005, 2007, and 2009. October of these years is always a bittersweet time for me as I turn down the opportunity to run for the Marathon Challenge team two years in a row. As much as being part of this wonderful team is one of the highlights of my life, I could not fulfill my responsibility as a team member if I ran for Dana-Farber every year. I am only partially kidding when I tell people that during the years that I do run that I have three full time jobs, the fundraising, the marathon training, and my normal day job. And I believe it is important to give my generous donors a break. And I not even doing my donors justice by calling them merely generous. Dana-Farber just posted the results from this past years team. A total of $4,025,688 was raised from over 500 runners, with 100% of the money going to cancer research. And out of the 500 runners, I finished tenth in fundraising, with a total of $24,397 . That is the third time I have finished in the top ten. My previous efforts resulted in over $28,000 and $32,000 raised. So my three year total is over $84,000 raised, and I am prouder of that than I will ever be about myrunning.

While I know that it's the right decision for me not to run, I feel I lose a bit of my identity in these non Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge years. I love being known as a marathoner, but I love even more being known as a marathoner who is doing his best to find cures for cancer. The experience is truly incredible, from meeting and becoming friendly with many Dana-Farber teammates, to learning from both patients and scientists at Dana-Farber. I feel a wonderful responsibility when I read the notes some of my donors send me telling me how glad they are to support me. And I feel a special bond with my friends and donors who are battling cancer.

Maybe its because I lived in London during the year the Who release the song "Who are You?" (although I never woke up in a Soho doorway) that I have always used the occasion of hearing it to ask myself just who am I? It's such an easy and nice answer during my Dana-Farber running years. So the adjustment is just a little difficult for me when I have to answer that question without reference to my fundraising for cancer research. And the last line haunts me a little, "How can I measure up to anyone now after such a love as this? "

So here I am, without a fundraising page, having to change the description of this blog, and being somewhat jealous of my teammates who are signing up again. But I will still be part of the junior varsity, volunteering for at least one of the long runs in Boston, volunteering on marathon day at the church where Dana-Farber runners gather pre race in Hopkinton, and possibly helping as a fundraising coach, which I have been before to some Dana-Farber teammates in a year I did not run.

And I will support my friends who are running. Kristen, Brian, Judith and Sarah are just the ones I know are running as of today. There will certainly be more.

Meanwhile, I am taking on another large and important non running responsibility. As of October 27th I am the President of the Mystic Noank library. And that is enough of a fundraising challenge in this economy, and enough of an identity for me to feel ok about not running during my two year term, which would mean that I would next be running Boston for Dana-Farber in April 2012,

unless,

I can qualify for Boston on my own.

Yes, it is still my dream, even if I have been going backwards lately in pursuing my goal. I am feeling I am doing slightly better getting back into a good workout routine, still not pain free in my back and hips, but I am convinced it is an IT band problem, so I have been doing the appropriate stretches and strengthening. When I can start putting in some longer miles on the weekends, I will make a decision on my next half marathon. Of course we have this little inconvenient thing in New England called "winter" or as I refer to it, "time to freeze my toes off." So I might be doing more training on the treadmill. Only Boston is enough to get me outside consistently on dark freezing winter mornings.

I have become a little interested in trying barefoot running, or at least trying the Vibram Five Fingers shoes ( and if I were a good blogger with lots of followers like Kristina, then merely this mention would probably get me a free sample to blog about). But I have this basic question for the barefoot running crowd and their advocates. How do you run barefoot in winter with the cold, ice and snow, not to mention the sand left everywhere by the snow plow trucks?

Well, that is it for now, no actual running stories this post, no pictures either, but at least I was able to vent a little. Thanks for indulging me. And if you were one of my last year's donors, again, a huge thank you.