I've officially gone cray cray!

Ten years ago when I lived in New York City my sister trained and ran the NYC marathon (more than once!). I remember her coming in from a sixteen mile "training" run and I thought she was loco! Running is SO boring!! And who runs more than a couple of miles?? Kill me know if I ever do that.

Well, sharpen your knives because I am running the NYC marathon this year.

What does this have to do with writing? Nothing, really. Except everything. Running keeps me sane and some of my best story ideas, plot twists, and characters come to me when I'm running. There's something meditative when I'm on a run and suddenly my mind starts filling with ideas. It's like someone is downloading these things into my head while I'm in this relaxed state.

Watch out!! Crazy girl running!

Watch out!! Crazy girl running!

But let's get back to how the hell I got here.

I used to run a mile or two on a treadmill in the gym. Now that IS boring. I don't care how much you love running. Then I moved to LA where fitness is a way of life and I had friends who were runners. Like real runners. Like who ran not one but several marathons. And triathlons. And Iron Man (yeah, I don't think I'll ever be THAT cray cray). 

And one day I said, what the hell, I'll run a 10K race (6.2 miles- yes, the .2 matters). I had no idea what I was starting...

It was in Brentwood and not the best course (it loops, so you run the same 3 miles twice) but I LOVED it. I loved the social atmosphere, the high of the race, the swag before and after and the party feel of it all. I'm a party girl (or I was before kids...now she only comes out about twice a year), so when I realized how much like a party it all was AND it kept you healthy and fit AND the high lasted way longer, I was sold.

So here I am, ten years later and I'm running a marathon. Which isn't even that crazy if I compare myself to the runners in my running group (an awesome group that is just as much about running and fitness as about partying it up - so of course, they're my kind of peeps.).

A marathon is a training run for some of them. No joke. They'll do thirty mile runs on the weekend to prepare for a 50 mile race or 100 mile race or Iron Man (if you don't know what that is, let me just say that the LAST segment of the race is a full marathon. And there are two long swimming and biking segments before you do that!)

So here I go. My training for the 26 mile race has begun.

But keep a look out. Because in a future book I will definitly have a running group as a main part of the story and it will be inspired by the fun and crazy runners, cyclists, and swimmers I'm surrounded with every week on this truly crazy adventure I am now in. So really this whole running-a-marathon is just research. Six months of running mile after mile after mile for the love of my art. 

Okay, not really...but kind of.