V for Vanity

As I previously affirmed, this post is going to be about running. Not running for the purpose of running, but how it connects to various facets of life, and how it is remembered after the fact – the waves of impressions that it leaves after the initial splash.

Specifically, I’d like to reflect a bit on an experience of running. Not experience of running, but an experience of running. The ‘an’ is important. Writing about experience of running in a general fashion would be rather dull, and simply would not connect well to anything. This is about a singular experience of running.

It is natural, methinks, that regardless of what you believe, if you are assured of it, then your experience will underscore it, your personal empirical evidence will suggest it, and even the strongest tremors will serve to strengthen it. (Or destroy it completely.) Some would argue that it is because of our individual preconceptions, our logical presuppositions, that our beliefs can be strengthened regardless of our situation, and I find this largely true. From the standpoint of logic, if you start without presuppositions you can’t prove anything. You are left in an ‘objective’ position, though a completely useless one. What I am getting at, albeit roundaboutly, is about running, and about running intersecting with faith. A different person, with different beliefs (we all have them, even if it is the rejection of them), would certainly explain it differently and arrive at a conclusion disjoint from mine. But here is my story.

Last Sunday – the last one in July, that is, I had an inkling to hike up to Doi Suthep (specifically, Wat Prathat Doi Suthep – the temple on Doi Suthep, the mountain, but everyone abbreviates it). It was one of my trip goals to hike up to it, and I had a fleeting hope to run up to it by the time I left Chiang Mai. But my treadmill runs hadn’t reached 9 km yet, and this was 14 km, uphill the entire way (800 m elevation gain). So my current plan was to start at the bottom (there is a small temple there that marks the beginning – from where people make their pilgrimages, and from where the University students hike to achieve spiritual merit and luck for their year) and start running. As Barney Stintson describes a Marathon, (loosely quoted) “There’s nothing to it. Step 1: start running. There is no step 2.” But I wasn’t to that point of confidence in my ability run up the mountain yet. My plan was to start running, and then when I couldn’t, start walking. Then maybe I could try again right before I left Chiang Mai and get farther. Gai and Faeng dropped me off at the bottom, and drove up to wait for me at the top (which is good, because I certainly wasn’t going to run up AND down).

I start running. The first km is okay, though it mainly consists of finding a good, slow pace for the mountain, and working out all the kinks. It’s basically the warmup (I am not one of those individuals who stretch before I run – and I have some words for them, but not now), so I take it slow and steady, and by the end of it, my knees and ankles and back are not aching (I have problems with them occasionally, especially my knees, and was a bit afraid they were going to act up today), and I’m ready for some running.

And what a joy! After a month and a half of treadmill running, it is so great to be outside running where there is so many things more interesting to look at than Thai subtitled movies. The road winds up the mountain, cutting through jungle, which happens to give plenty of shade, though it is the late afternoon, so I don’t have to worry about that so much. There is a nice breeze, supplemented by my good pace, which has picked up a bit since the beginning.

After quite a while, I get rather, well, lonely. Running alone. And in my yearning for companionship, God starts up a little conversation. Not much, just a couple of running tips, but more than enough. Tighten your abs a bit. Take longer strides. Pull through the entire step, don’t just bounce. Slow down here. Speed up there. Raise your hands towards heaven. What??? Raise up your arms! Um… I don’t think I’m getting this right. Kind-of weird, yes? And people will see me, what will they think? Well, I guess I’m alone on the road right now. Okay. So I raise my arms up, my head up, and run. And I’m running faster and with more energy, focusing forward. And worshipping God.

This was one of those few and far between spiritual “mountaintop experiences” (the phrase itself did develop from actual mountaintop experiences, so don’t bemoan the pun) in my life. I would not say that they are the mainstay of my faith, which actually comes more from daily interaction with God. Not in the sense that I am praying to God, but that we are in dialogue together. I am not usually the initiator, in any case, and certainly not in this case. The mountaintops, as is seen throughout Genesis and Exodus and the story of Israel, is when God shows up and says “I am the Lord”, and people respond. Not to mention the joy and ecstasy and peace that is a result of this.

And unfortunately, the latter is often what we look back on in memory. The joy and peace and ecstasy. We yearn to have that again, but actually meeting God is secondary. We want the drug. And I think partly because of that, those experiences are far between. God would rather us yearn for relationship than yearning for some ecstatic experience. In memory, everything gets fuzzy, and the things that the most important at the time seem to become insignificant, and those that are less important pollute the memory. And so I felt it necessary to write before I had forgotten the important parts. The Israelites would make pillars of stones so that they would not forget. And yet they still forgot, repeatedly. Hopefully, I can maintain some true memory. But I’m guessing that is probably just vanity.

I got about halfway up the mountain, and came to the realization that I was halfway up the mountain. And hadn’t yet died. Well, that was certainly encouraging. So I kept on running. I figured (and was probably right) that if I stopped at any point I would be done, so I kept running. Continuing my dialogue with God, I found a good rhythm, and my running was good, so we starting talking about other things. Life, and the beautiful view of the city, and how loud the jungle sounded out here. Further in and further up.

About 3 km before the temple, I realized that I actually could finish, and that is when the pain really started hitting me. My legs were aching, I was really, really, really craving salt, my lungs always a step behind, and I could feel my pulse pounding in my hands. And as the crisis comes, the prayers and words multiply. The intermittent conversation becomes a deluge of words and emotions and even graces my vocal chords. God calls me to raise my hands again – which is quite hard, and my arms tire quickly – but I respond and do so. And I can once again fully fill my lungs with air. Sweet oxygen! But it isn’t enough for me. I want more – I want some assurance that God is there. Not just words – this hurts. So I pray for rain. And well, God humors me, some dark clouds roll in, and it mists for a few minutes. Ha! Well, I did truly start laughing. I should be content to have what I need – and that little bit was enough.

The very end – the 309 or 307 steps up to the temple were the hardest. By a lot. My lungs burned, and my legs wobbled like jelly, cause jam don’t shake like that. At that point, sentences were too much. Speaking was too much, and my prayer became two things: Help! and Your will. I tripped a number of times going up the steps, and even ran on all fours for a few of them. And, after I had nearly given up hope, with my own energy failing, I was given the extra little bit to reach the top. And the top was amazing.

Happiness, Joy, Peace, Ecstacy. All these I can use to describe what I felt at the top. But they wouldn’t really describe it well. Shalom? In the true Hebrew sense of the word. God’s peace. All the pain and straining up to that point had been forgotten in what came after. And that is a good reminder for all of us who strain forward. The pain is momentary. Focus on the things that truly matter.