Can’t remember when I haven’t been able to sleep like this. Sleepless in Scranton. Well, Moosic. Moosic, Pa. In a Courtyard Marriott, a cul de sac mall where that evening’s carb meal choice, Bella Trattoria, settled on K and me like an alien/scene in “Men in Black.” Instead, it’s the larded-up special at a slice palace, 10 p.m. Saturday and we got the place to ourselves.
Which may explain why my first thought when I saw the corpse was to think I'm having a bad-food delusion or sleep-walking. I’m in my gear (new insoles, taped-up right ankle, thanks Dr. Mollica!, but no PAINKILLERS!, damn, I should have insisted), when I walk up to my car at 5 a.m. for the drive into downtown where I’m told I can get a bus to the starting line. In the hollows, it’s gotta be close to freezing, so no way am I asleep, can’t be, so sure enough that’s a spit-polished-shined shoe at the rear of the car parked near mine in the hotel lot. And, yep, a body’s attached.
He’s wearing a tux from what I can gather in the dimly lit lot. I’m shy to get too close, but from where I’m standing at the Courtyard Marriott, in Moosic, Pa., in my marathon gear and warm-up clothing, I’m staring down at what’s gotta be a stiff. If not, he will be soon.
My first jog of the day is to the front-door entrance where I rouse the night manager from an interior office (sleeping?) and tell him that I think he should know there’s a body in the rear parking lot.
“Oh,” he says. “Well there was a wedding last night” in a way that seemed to say, “What? Only one? And it’s October, buddy. I mean if it was January I could understand your concern.”
“Could be, though, if he’s alive, someone should wake him. The sun will be up soon.”
“Not in a while yet, actually.”
*
As I blind-drive to downtown, I forget about the corpse. Like most corporatized zips, there are no helpful directional signs. M, K and I resist GPS (Where is the adventure in that?). I drive-feel my way to I-81 North, and then to my exit, and into town, where as near as I can tell I’m the only breathing soul in Scranton, home of “The Office” and the first electric streetcar, so it’s fitting that I find Electric City Parking, a faux-Deco structure on Spruce, where I take the street exit and I see a cop car, which I try to flag down but he must have just gotten the call about the corpse because instead of stopping to help, his sirens start whaling and lights flashing as he zooms away.
The school bus that will take us to the starting line makes me think of what it must’ve felt like when workers were being bussed to the mines. The cold mingled with our hot breath fogs the window glass. Nothing to see. Wipe the windows and in no time they’re Vaseline-smear again. Nervous chatter all around, as the bus grinds its way over hill and dale and through town after town, eventually stopping at a high school at the top of a ridge where, as our early-bird bus arrives at what seems an hour after we left Scranton but it’s not even 6 a.m., a pom-pom squad is there in full regalia hopping up and down and cheering as we scurry past in the frigid air to the warmth of the school.
*
In no time, it seems, the forefoot pain is back. A light pressure first, but then shooting pains in the middle of the forefoot. I shift to back-heel strike, to mid-foot, even toe-sprint, and it feels better for a time, even goes away for what seems like a mile or more. Then it’s crushing: sharp, wincing pain.
Unlike Pittsburgh, there are no regular time clocks. Mile markers at every third mile, and a clock at the half, and I’m 1:41; with most of that downhill, I’m wondering what I’ve got left. How in the world can I make thirteen-plus miles in this kind of pain.
And, you know, I don’t know how I made it. Perhaps it was the old fella in Archbald in a coat of many colors, scruffy white dog on a leash, the man squeezing what looked for all the world like Harpo’s rubber-bulb horn, talking to himself. The water and Gatorade volunteers, of course, out there in the freezing air, never failing to make you feel a little stronger as you struggle by (particularly if you’re struggling). Two sheaths of Shot Blok Clif Bars (Flavor? There’s a flavor?) I eat as I go. The generic painkillers I find on a table at about mile 21, where I down three. The high fives from children, the 25-mile marker blast of The Boss and yeah, it’s corny, but “Born to Run” and I manage a high-legged sprint for a bit before the pain is back with a vengeance.
I said it before, the tune “Rebel, Rebel," it was there at the start and at the finish too. The memorial song for my childhood friend, D. But K. She was the one who sealed the deal, whose face I couldn’t wait to see when I tell her the story about the corpse. Kate at the finish line, screaming “That’s my dad!” when they announce Larry O’Connor, Brooklyn, because at Steamtown, for the final 100 yards or so, a chip-sensitive pad delivers a name-readout for the emcee to read, but K, she didn’t need to hear my name on the loudspeaker, she saw me coming down the hill, racing as hard as I had all day, because there it was. I could hardly believe it. The time: 3:33. Boston, here I come!
Next: Running for Your Life: After the race is over
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