saturday’s half marathon in the Santa Cruz mountains was a mushy, muddy affair. the saving grace (for the running shoes, anyway) is that after i stepped ankle-deep into squelchy mud near the top of the ridge, it poured down rain most of the way down, washing off the worst of the dirt. we finished in 2 hours 8 minutes, which is a pretty good time considering that there were 1880 vertical feet to climb and then descend, but i suspect that the course was mismeasured (to our advantage). i finished 36th of 71 women.

my running life is a million miles away* from what it was in chicago: the chicago marathon, with a field of 30,000 runners and its hot, flat, urban course lined with a hundred thousand cheering spectators. out here in cali, the running conditions are far more scenic, but also a lot more solitary. plenty of people go out running in search of solitude, but not me. i miss my running companions from chicago. saturday’s race brought me full circle in my running life, since i met up with callie to run, my very first running partner. i’ve known callie since the second day of 9th grade. we ran together on our high school track and cross country teams, and 14 years later we ran our first chicago marathon together. three years later our professional lives have taken us both to the west coast, and adventure running. someday, i’m going to tackle this race. and if anyone is batshit crazy enough to come along with me, i’m pretty sure it’s callie.

*well, about 2133, to be exact.