Pain and joy.

Two weeks ago I ran 8.5 miles. Last week I ran 9.5 miles. Today I ran 10 miles. Right now I'm eating beans and rice and HOT.

All of these things are a little new, and they all give me this incredible endorphin rush.

With my long runs, about the last mile or mile and a half, I reach a point where my legs and my body generally are really done -- exhausted. But I know I'm not going to stop -- I have to finish the run. And the incredible thing is, I know I can keep going.

I'm not injured; my blood sugar is fine; my body is healthier, possibly, than it's ever been whilst running. So all of those things make keeping going an option for me, when a lot of times in the past, I'd reach a similar exhaustion point and not be able to keep going. When we first moved to Salt Lake, I signed up for a marathon and got to about 10 or 11 miles and had to call my husband to come get me because I couldn't get home. I was too exhausted.

But the last few weeks, when I've reached this point, I can't think of a time in my life when I've felt more exhilaration. It's ... measured. Because I'm exhausted. But I'm at the edge of what I know my body can do. Pretty soon, it will be something my body has never done before. And there's nothing like that. It's amazing and motivating and inspiring and I always have all these interesting thoughts I'm sure I'm going to remember and write down and which I very quickly forget and have never written down.

Maybe someday soon I will write them down. Because I think I'm addicted to running a lot of miles now.

(Ok, eating spicy beans and rice is not quite like the running high. But it is also it's own kind of exhilarating, and I think it's not a coincidence that I had what I would call my first ever joy-filled endorphin rush from spicy food (it was kadai paneer) in the midst of a significant mileage increase. Understanding the joy of pain.)