Crushed

Disappointment would be an understatement. I’m starting to wonder if God really, really doesn’t want me to run the Boston marathon this April for some unknown reason, and he’s having a hard time getting it through my stubborn little head. When I get my mind set on something my heart gets set on it too, and trying to change that would be like trying to change the shape of a cement block with your bare hands. Well, the shape of that cement block, which used to look like my heart has been changed due to circumstances beyond my control, and it now looks like a thousand pieces of cement dust. It’s been crushed.

If you looked in my planner you would see a “don’t forget” sticker next to an all caps BOSTON MARATHON REGISTRATION!!! on the day of October 18. If you’re thinking you’ve just discovered the reason for my crushed heart as described above, you’re wrong. I didn’t forget. I would have to have accrued brain damage before I would forget that day. It had been in the back of my mind for exactly a month since I had qualified on September 18. In fact, I had to restrain myself to NOT talk about it since I figured Scott had heard enough about “Boston this, Boston that” the past year as I trained day in and day out. The hard part was over, and it was really, really hard. Let me tell you. I want to cry right now just thinking about how hard I worked for that marathon time. I know, I know. Get to the point.

On October 18th I woke up early knowing that I had to wait patiently until 8:00 a.m. for the registration to open, but I was too antsy to sleep any longer. I had Boston (My baby. I know it probably gets a little confusing) fed, dressed, and ready to go with me down to the business center by 8:30 a.m. I had butterflies excitingly fluttering about in my stomach as I got on the computer and typed in Boston.org. The registration form automatically popped up. I entered all my information in and hit submit. My information was cleared, and it didn’t take me to the next step, so I entered it again and the same thing happened. I called Scott and we figured the site was having technical difficulties. I called my friend Jenny who was also trying to register, and she was having the same problem. I figured I’d wait until night and try again to see if the technical difficulties had been sorted out. After all, I didn’t HAVE to register that day, it was just the first day that I COULD register. When I went back that night and typed in boston.org I felt a little sick to my stomach when I saw that registration had been closed. I quickly told myself that it was only closed for a short time while they worked out the technical difficulties. There was no way it could have reached it’s cap of 27,000 runners in one day. It took over two months last year for the marathon to reach it’s cap.

The next day rolls around and I get a call from my friend Jenny telling me she had bad news. She said she had just been to the Boston marathon website and read an article about how everyone was shocked at the record breaking time that the race had filled up. I didn’t believe her. I honestly didn’t. I was in denial. Something had to be wrong. She must have read it wrong. There’s no way that 27,000 people got on the very day registration opened and signed up, especially when it took over two months to fill up last year. I called Scott and told him what Jenny said, hoping that my techy husband would come up with a techy answer to my problem and tell me she was wrong and that the registration system had a major flaw. I just needed something, anything to give me some more hope because mine was starting to dwindle, and I didn’t like that feeling at all. As much as I’m sure Scott wanted to give me a magical techy solution to my problem, he couldn’t change the facts. The little piece of hope that I was desperately holding on to turned in to tears as I listened to Scott read the articles posted on the Boston website over the phone.

As bad as it hurt, I refused to accept it 100% until I talked to someone from the Boston marathon association that flat out told me I didn’t get in. I spent the next few days obsessively calling the registration office, getting the answering machine saying the inbox was full (I guess I’m not the only one that got my heart flattened). When someone actually answered the phone today I was so shocked I almost didn’t know what to say. To make a long story short, she crushed all my hopes and dreams of running the Boston marathon this April, every last bit, as nicely as possible. I even asked if there was a chance they could let me in to the 2012 marathon. The thought of waiting until 2012 almost killed me, but at this point I would take anything. It turns out that the cut off date to qualify for 2012 was exactly one week AFTER the date that I qualified. The only other option she gave me was to send an email and add my saga to the thousands of other emails and maybe, just maybe they would read my email. And if they did read my email, then what? I’m sure it would sound just as whiny and pitiful as all the other emails.

The only other smithereen of hope I have is trying to get in to one of the spots reserved for the people who raise thousands of dollars towards certain charities. How in the world does someone raise thousands of dollars, especially in this economy? If I was in my right mind I wouldn’t even give this a second thought, but if I can push through hours and hours of pain, maybe I can find a way to earn thousands of dollars. We’ll see. Maybe I’m being too stubborn. First, I get the flu the week of my marathon for my first attempt at qualifying, then I qualify, but this crazy thing happens.


Life isn’t fair. That’s for dang sure. I’m trying to find any bit of positive I can in this trial, and I take a little bit of comfort in the fact that I did the part that I could control, which was qualifying, and I have to accept the fact that I didn’t get in due to circumstances beyond my control. That’s life I guess. As much as we want to be in control of our circumstances, and as perfect as we think we have things planned out, we aren’t in control, and maybe our perfect plans aren’t as perfect as we think. Sigh. It’s so hard to admit that, especially right now when the disappointment is still so fresh and thick I could cut it with a knife, but deep down I know it’s true. It still doesn’t change how incredibly bad I want to run that marathon this April though.