Memory Lane

Two weeks out from this year's Chicago Marathon and I'm back on the roads again.

Today, to get to 21 miles this week, I logged 6 around Thornton and South Holland here in Chicagoland. I decided to run into SoHo for a change. Normally, I stick to a nice route that goes around Kell's hometown of Thornton and takes me through some woods.

This time I was feeling a bit sentimental and wanted to run through the town I grew up in. From Kell's parent's house to the house where I spent most of my childhood is almost exactly 3 miles, making for an easy out-and-back.

The photo (thanks Google maps!) is of the park that sits next to the culdesac where my old house stands. I did one loop around the park, running by the baseball fields where I used to practice and the playgrounds I spent so many hours on. It was fun heading down my old street and seeing what had changed and what little things were still the same.

My old house still had the same rickety shed along the side that my dad put up -- broken door and everything! He also put up this small strip of pickett fence on the front corner of the house to "hide" the garbage cans. Yup, still there. I was cracking up. My friends' old treehouse, where no girls were allowed, still stands a few houses down, too.

I actually took a break at the 3-mile mark to walk around the end of the culdesac before heading on my way. I noticed a neighbor in the house next to my old home pulling back some curtains and peering out at me. Probably seemed weird to have some random dude running on his street. When you live on a street like that, it's rare to see anyone who doesn't have a reason to be there. We always could tell when a car made a wrong turn onto our block. Everyone knows everyone.

As I was walking by my old house, a woman came out with a couple of kids, looking at me funny. I smiled, said hello and said I was just taking a run down memory lane -- that I lived on this street a decade ago and happened to be back in the neighborhood. She smiled back and said OK, but still was looking at me like I was some whacko. As to avoid anyone calling the cops on the strange runner guy, I headed on my way.

As for the run itself, my left foot was a little sore throughout. I've had some minor pain on the underside of my foot at the base of the two toes next to my big toe. Pounding the pavement so soon after a marathon might be the cause, just overuse. I also switched back to a pair of shoes that have 400+ miles on them, which could have contributed.

My other pair of Saucony's are still drying after a fun run I did a few nights ago. It was pouring rain, but I didn't let that stop me from heading out for a quick 3 miles. I got drenched, and had a blast. At a certain point, I no longer cared about running through puddles -- that's how soaked I was. I'll take a day off here to let my foot rest and to let my the shoes with fewer miles on them dry some more. Might have to take a blowdryer to them.

That's all for right now. Just thought I'd add a quick update, as well as some photos to the blog. Kelly and Hayden and I are planning on heading back to Toronto in early November, so it'll be back to running north of the border, where it's a bit colder than here. I'm thinking of sticking to 3-6 miles each time for a while, so I might just stick to the track/treadmills back home.

Who am I kidding? I'll probably get out the winter gear and run through the snow like I did all last winter. Sometimes those are the most memorable runs. Today's certainly ranked up there.