Post #50, wow.

Last night had to be one of the most epic runs I've ever been on. I checked the hour by hour forecast all day and emailed my running buddy Susan and told her if she was up for it I was in. So, the forecast was basically light rain and wind except for the hour or so that we'd be running from Woodland back to Crossroads. For that one special hour we would be challenged with heavy downpours and wind gusts of up to 60mph.

We drove into Boston and the rain actually seemed to be letting up a little - oh Mother Nature, you're such a tease. We got to Crossroads and there weren't that many people there. I was surprised, I figured people were more hardcore than that, but I was wrong. As we stood around waiting to see if more people would show, everyone debated run the hills or just do an out and back shorter run. For me it wasn't even a debate, I drove all the way down from Lowell, I was running the hills. Trouble was I don't know the city that well and I needed someone to follow so I had to convince a few other people to do it too.

I got a small crowd of willing participants and we exited the bar confident that we were the most badass people there. Boarded the T to Woodland and got halfway there and the T driver (is that what they're called?) announced that the train was going express to the last stop and skipping Woodland. SUPER! So, we hopped off the T at the last stop and hopped on another T to go back one stop to Woodland. FINALLY, we got to Woodland and started running. Within the first half mile we were all thoroughly soaked.

The rain only seemed to come down harder and harder as we ran. We were running into a headwind the entire time. There were rivers of water flowing through the streets and overflowing drains in the streets that looked more like decorative fountains than drains. We splished and splashed through it all. Avoiding the puddles was futile, the rain was coming down so hard my feet were waterlogged and it made no difference if I ran around the puddles or through them.

Amazingly, despite the insane weather conditions, I felt unstoppable. I got into a comfortable (relatively speaking) rhythm and just floated over the hills and down through Brookline into Boston. Perhaps my feet were actually floating. Who knows, but I felt great.

Finished the run at a decent pace and got dry clothes quickly out of the car and headed into the bar to change. I stripped off all of my wet clothes and put on my camo moose and deer fleece pants from Disney (originally bought them on clearance at a Target in Orlando to use as throw away pants, but loved them too much to part with them) and my favorite hooded sweatshirt from after my first marathon in D.C. (it was 75 and sunny, but I was shivering so I bought it off a street vendor for $20, it was the only one he had). I think the plastic bag with my wet clothes in it weighed 20lbs. and I probably could have wrung out a gallon of water from my soaking wet stuff. It may take a week for my shoes to dry out, but it was totally worth it.

Anyone else that decided to do the whole run instead of wussing out and doing a shorter out and back, wear your badge of badassness proudly today! :)