COVID-19 Footsteps

(April 5, 2020)

I have run many long trail races and on a single track trail in an extremely forested area and there is a peaceful feeling when running through a forest but it is still a race.  While I have no delusions that I will win anything not the total race, not even my age group, I still am a competitive person.  So, when I am running in a race and hear footsteps behind me I instinctively pick up my pace, no one likes to be passed.  Three things can happen at that point; first, they are running stronger then you and pass you and you never see them again. Second, they come close but never pass you and if you never look back, you may never know who it was.  Third, they pass you but never get too far and you end up having better endurance and passing them again.

I have been thinking of these various scenarios as I have been continuing my running during this COVID-19 pandemic.  Because while often I have been practicing “social distancing” while I run on single track trails in my local county park I have also been hearing footsteps. I have even turned my head around on my solo runs to see who is behind me.  While I see no one, I know who it is.  It is COVID-19.  I live in the epicenter of the outbreak in the United States and for weeks I have felt its presence creeping closer and closer.  It is as if the walls are closing in around me.  The people testing positive are closer connections

I pick up my pace to out run the outbreak, but I am not delusional.  I know that it is not a physical race at this point but a mental challenge.  I am training even harder to not let the virus over take me.  COVID-19 is coming for me but I am ready for the challenge.  I have trained to be fit and while that is no guarantee against the disease, I believe a fit person has a better chance of surviving a COVID-19 infection then one compromised.  Yes, I say to those footsteps behind me “give me your best shot! I am ready!”

I turn around on my trail run to see who is behind me feel victorious and defiant because no one is there.  I think that I have scared COVID-19 away.  He realizes that he is no match for me.  I finished my ten-mile run and feel great! I am energized, healthy and ready for anything this new virus can throw at me.  At least I think I am.

When I get home and go to talk to my wife, I immediately can sense a little worry in her voice as well as on her face.  Her coworker, who she just was with, fell sick and was being tested for COVID-19.  We both remain positive however until the next morning when she wakes up sick.  Now we are both a bit worried.  We are able to make some calls and it seems that she meets the criteria to get one of the limited slots for the COVID-19 test.  Now we wait.  We learn a couple of days later that her coworker tested positive.  Obviously, our nervousness dramatically increases but while she is sick, she is functioning.  We are also delegating her to one section of the house.

While I am confident that I can survive a COVID-19 attack I was not ready for it to attack someone I love.  On long trail races sometimes when you see someone in distress you have to stop and help, you become a trail angel.  My race was not now about me but about her and I must be her trail angel.

While I was prepared for physical duties of taking care of her I was not as prepared for the psychological aspects.  First of all, we have for the most part, been homebound for weeks with a sense of boredom permeating the household.  In addition, I could only talk to her from a distance so our normal conversations in the living room were also gone.  The one’s in which we talk about our days and the issues of the world.  Now I would talk to her from the hallway.  We couldn’t even watch a movie together.

In the morning, I continued my regular exercise routine.  I was up early on the treadmill running when something happened that never happened to me in all my years of running.  Tears started to well up in my eyes.  Usually for me running is almost meditative but COVID-19 had disrupted that pattern.  I was worried for my wife and the tears were tears of fear.

Yes, the footsteps were real that I was sensing.  Yes, maybe COVID-19 had caught up to me.  That however does not mean that COVID-19 had won.  No, it just means that the battle had just begun.  

What COVID-19 did not know about me is that I had never dropped out of a race despite being cold, wet, and even one time - lost.  I had finished every race and this would be no different.