Why I Run: Reason #3

I was commenting on a run the other day with some of my running buds. I hadn't wanted to do it at all, but I knew that if I didn't run, it would be just one more reason to hate the day - I had just found out that a friend of mine had died, and was stressing over all kinds of personal stuff to begin with, so it all combined to make me feel like hell on toast, and it was really hard to force myself out the door at all.

My friend Margie, who blogs over at The Marathon Year, said something along the lines of, "A run can redeem a crappy day. That's reason number 42 why I run."

So naturally I wondered what the other 41 reasons were. And then started thinking about what all MY reasons were. How many would be on the list? Should I rank them in order of importance or just the order in which they occur to me?

I sat down yesterday and began writing out my list. They're numbered, obviously, but I'm not going to write about them in order. I'm going to write about the ones I want to write about, when I want to write about them.

So, Reason #3: Because I'm going to eat the Cadbury Mini Eggs.

I'm a foodie. Not even a snobby one; I like almost all food. I like diners and I like haute cuisine - diners more, actually, since I tend to not like a lot of rich, buttery foods. I eat my weight in Chinese food and I have dreams about donuts and basically I Eat A Lot Of Food.

I also have more than a few body image issues stemming from my childhood Fat Kid identity and lingering overall self-esteem issues. So sometimes running really is just a means of weight control, nothing more. Food and what I've already eaten and what I'm hoping to eat in the future is sometimes the only thing that gets me out the door. It's a reason for when all the other reasons fail me.