A totally normal, run-of-the-mill night as a grad student

I just wanted to document exactly what's happening right now. This is a snapshot into the life of a grad student. (Okay, maybe not your average grad student, but MY life as a grad student).

It's 10pm. I'm sitting in the blanket fort I made eating Cadbury mini eggs out of a fannypack (why are there eggs in a fannypack? Fannypacks have zippers and can therefore be closed, while Cadbury egg bags are not closable without a chip clip, which I didn't readily have. I DID readily have a fannypack. The solution was logical). There is a half-written lab report I'm working on, but it's minimized and the main window is open to a Buzzfeed quiz in which I'm finding out which John Hughes movie I should watch based on my zodiac sign (Breakfast Club, hell yeah). Another window features an article called "Did Beyonce Get Upstaged by Hamburger Helper?" which has a GREAT mixtape all about... you guessed it: Hamburger Helper.

I had one of those moments where you suddenly look at yourself objectively and realize how truly WEIRD the scene is. What the heck am I doing? Gotta write this lab report. Gotta get more than an hour of sleep. Gotta survive grad school.

Check it out, I'm seriously jamming: https://soundcloud.com/hamburgerhelper/sets/watch-the-stove

HALF MARATHON!

4:45am wake up. Wore my running clothes as pajamas, so all I have to do is cram some peanut butter in my mouth, grab the parking pass I printed yesterday, and get the heck on the road.

Paul Simon's Graceland sings me to Denver. Twice through the whole album. For some reason, I start tearing up, maybe from nerves, maybe from stress, maybe it's just the 5am dark and the way I sound so ridiculous babbling along at the top of my lungs to the African parts I don't know the words to. 

But then I'm here, at the butt crack of dawn, earlier than I should be, earlier than the vendors, earlier than the registration tent. It's quiet and cold and I wonder again why I'm doing this. I could be snug in my bed, not putting physical stress on my body, not pushing myself to the brink of absolute exhaustion. And yet, here I am, about to do just that.

12 weeks ago, I sat at the front desk in the clinic, setting goals for 2016. Some of them are wild, some of them easily attainable. I signed up for the Three Creeks half marathon then, planned out my training program. Did I stick to that training program? Ummm, no. 5-6 runs per week turned into 1 or 2 and despite the fact that I worked myself up to 11 miles during those 12 weeks, I still consider anything over 3 miles a feat of seeming impossibility. 

The gun goes off and everyone jumbles into pace. It feels like hundreds of people pass me in the first mile. Maybe it literally is hundreds of people, I really have no sense of numbers. Before I know it, 5k has passed and I feel the first threads of "I'm tired I'm tired" in my legs. I distract myself with people-watching. There's a dude in American flag shorts and huge purple socks I'm using as a pace-keeper. His partner waits at 3 mile intervals to kiss and cheer him on. There's a beautiful black woman with the most enormous hair I've ever seen. She has a booty I could only dream of. These two are my running partners, but they don't know it.

At 6 miles, I'm offered a little shot of goo. Blackberry, or something. I take it and it tastes like flavored snot. I hate it. I take another blub and decide it's not so bad. I take another when I'm handed one. I feel the effects of the sugar-snot hit my body like a wave and at 7 miles, I think I can maybe probably finish. 

At 11 miles, I realize that every step I take is a new record, a new furthest-distance-I've-ever-run. I take stock of my body: slightly sunburnt (should've put on sunscreen), pretty dehydrated (forgot my damn running belt), feet sort of aching (but no blisters, HALLELUJAH). Now more than ever, it feels like a reality: I'm going to make it.

I've lost track of my running buddies somewhere around 11 or 12. They both decided to break the run-walk-repeat pattern we had going and just walk. I secretly cheer at the small victory of pulling ahead of the people I'd been cross-crossing with the whole race. Crossing the finish line feels good. Like, 12-weeks-of-hard-training-felt-worth-it good. 

I found myself wondering yesterday whether fulfilling my half marathon goal would feel like an accomplishment. I put so much pressure on myself with the expectation that I'm going to feel amazing after reaching a goal, and then I'm disappointed when it doesn't feel like as big of an accomplishment as I expected. But this feels pretty big. This feels like the appropriate amount of big for the amount of work I put in. I'm glad to have done it and proud of myself for finishing... I might sign up for another one. :)