I wrote these thoughts shortly after completing the ING Amsterdam Marathon — well, shortly after hobbling from the finish line in the Olympic stadium back to the train, detraining at Centraal Station to walk 10 minutes back to the hotel, showering and then briefly collapsing — but trust me, these were very much my thoughts while doing the marathon. And yes, my thoughts were in kilometers, because that’s what I was counting (believe me, I was counting every one of them). These kilometer markers are, by the way, approximations, since  I could barely think straight.

Kilometer 0:  Let’s go!

Kilometer 8: Wow, I’m still cold.

Kilometer 10: There’s a Dutch windmill. I’m running past a Dutch windmill.

Kilometer 15: There’s that damn windmill again. (In other words, we had to run back around it again.)

Kilometer 18: Where did this wind come from? It’s slicing right through me.

Kilometer 20: Marathons are stupid. People are not designed to run 42 kilometers.

Kilometer 22: I’m stupid.

Kilometer 23: Where am I? Alone somewhere way out in the countryside in a foreign country. What in God’s name am I doing here?

Kilometer 24: Thank God. There’s the turn. Now I’ll have the wind at my back instead of running against it.

Kilometer 25: The wind shifted and now I’m still running into it!

Kilometer 26: Who am I?

Kilometer 27: Stop looking at me, stupid farm animals!

Kilometer 29: Who am I going to give all this running stuff to? Because I’m never doing this again.

Kilometer 31: My urine is orange. That means something bad. But I can’t feel anything any more, so it doesn’t matter.

Kilometer 32: If I could stumble over to that gentle slope of grass I could die happily right there.

Kilometer 34: I can chew this pretzel but no matter how much water I drink I can’t swallow it.

Kilometer 35: There’s Coach Jack! At this moment, he is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen!

Kilometer 40: [Jack is running the final few kilometers with me.] I love Jack. We should all be more like Jack.

Kilometer 41:  There are other people I know cheering me into the stadium.

Kilometer 42:  I got a medal. They called my name over the loudspeakers in the stadium. I’m not dead. I have to call my wife.

Back in the hotel room, on the internet:  When is the next marathon?

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 2nd, 2008 at 11:09 pm and is filed under Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.