Angela Kelsey

Marathon

Where does one begin to write about what happened in Boston yesterday?

Should I even try? Maybe it’s better to stay silent.

This morning I read this post by Caitlin at Fit and Feminist and this one by Susan Orlean at the New Yorker.

Yes, of course. I know this. The only way for me to write about this is to write what I know. Tell my stories.

I ran  Grandma’s Marathon in 2001.

I spent most of the 26.2 miles by myself, and at my five-hours-plus marathon pace, my place was toward the back of the pack.  But the crowds along Lake Superior were still there for me.

Contrary to what I was experiencing at home at the time, I was lifted up by support and exuberance and, well, the  love of complete strangers.

Somewhere around the 25-mile point, a woman spectator offered me a piece of orange jelly candy. I gratefully accepted it, and with that slice of sugar for fuel, I went on to cross the finish line.

I cried this morning when I thought of the spectators in Boston yesterday, injured in body and spirit.

The marathon depends not only on the runners, but also on the spectators, there to cheer people they loved and people they would never meet.

I probably will never qualify to run in the Boston Marathon, but someday I will go to watch and cheer. And I will take orange jelly candy.