Thank You Prospect Park Track Club. (Updated with poem)

Last night was our annual award celebration. I've been on a kind of role lately, getting awards for stuff I like to do. Last year they even came up with a new category. I could go to the meeting because I was in a wheelchair and all but suddenly I was the Most Inspirational member of the club. It did not please me. I did not want to be inspirational. I wanted to be out of that damn wheelchair.

I mellowed a bit in the past year. And I was also privy to a little bit of the nomination process. I got myself taken out of the loop because I think I just want enough awards. But I thought I might've gotten one anyway. And then thinking about it I knew I couldn't stand up and say thank you without falling apart. So I paired this document. I was ready to hand it to our club president in case I got called up for an award. It says

Please read everything on this page

If someone else is reading this it because I was too choked up to speak

I wanted to say that I truly hated being given the award for being inspirational. I hated it. I didn’t want to be inspirational, I wanted to be a mediocre mid-pack runner.

But now I appreciated it to keep the school because the person you more than I ever thought I would.

I appreciated the same way I appreciated the cheers of the crowds on First Avenue. They were cheering for me even after the winner of the race was in the shower.

It means a lot to me that people care. I had no idea how much that would mean to me

This morning really sucked. I had to drag myself into a government office to be told no one to help me, that I had to call a national number. Then spend over an hour on hold to get nothing accomplished. I got home in time to have lunch and then go over to the Y to work out. When I can, I warm-up by running laps on the track. I worked my way up to to 5 200 m laps. My goal was to run a mile on St. Patrick's Day.

I got on the track with my leg still tired from Saturday's 7 miles of walking. I figured I'd see if I could go 5 laps like I did a couple weeks ago. But once I did 4 laps I decided I needed to go for it. I needed to burn off some of that negative energy I accumulated this morning. I decided to go for eight laps. ONE MILE. I was running, knees up, arms swinging heal toe, heal toe. I was running so slow that I stop listening to my splits. It was taking me so long that the person reading my splits had to stop and go to the bathroom. But, I was running.

After the seventh lap I felt pain in the places that never felt pain before. But I knew that paying would stop as soon as I finished the next lap. However, fatigue comes at me in new ways and I was a little bit concerned I wasn't gonna make it to the bus to get home. But I really didn't care, that was far away in the future. I was alone on the track for the eighth lap, but I heard the cheers of my teammates and my friends throughout the running community. I heard the cheers of the million people

First Avenue, cheering for me even though the winner of the marathon is already in the shower.

But what did disappoint me about my awards dinner is that I didn't win the poetry competition. So here is my entry............................

PPTC RAP*. 

I saw a guy at the gym

wearing a turkey trot hat.

I told him I was part of the crew

that helped arrange for that.

He said he liked that race

because it keeps him from getting fat.

Then he said “You must be Michael Ring

and you’re on your feet, that’s my favorite fact.”

*To the tune of White Lines by Grandmaster Flash