Motivation.

It's really strange to be home while one of your parents is in the hospital; it means the time in their house has an emptiness to it.  We spend the day at the hospital and then Dad and I go home and he checks the messages on their answering machine and we go through the calls, most of which are for Mom, though not all of them know that she's in the hospital.  One of the calls this week was from the wife of the former pastor of the church we went to in Youngstown checking in on Mom and reporting that her husband had just had a heart attack.  This was hard to hear with all this other stuff going on; the good Reverend was quite a nice man and had been like a mentor figure to my father. 

I've been awful torn about going out and running, it seems like there's always something I should be at the hospital for, and it's hard to find the motivation to pick a new running course in a town that I'm unfamiliar with as far as running goes.  I have run though and the course was kind of a natural for me because all I did was pick a landmark that was familiar to me and then head for it.  I picked the High Falls and it works out that that an out and back is about 8 miles, and that's just what I need  now.  You can see my course by clicking here, though my newly calibrated watch tells me it's longer than what the Google thinks it is.  The section along the river is pretty good, but the genius urban planners here didn't make it a priority to preserve that trail all the way along the river, so I did have to run through the city for a bit of it, and downtown Rochester isn't as friendly or nice as Comm Ave or Beacon Hill.  Sunday's run went just sort of OK, but I made it through fine.  I planned to run the same route in the morning yesterday, but various things pushed that to the afternoon.  

Around 1:30 or so yesterday Mom complained about being too hot, so I stepped to the back for the room to see about setting up a fan for her.  I looked up from wrestling with that to see a Man standing at the door to her room.  He was probably in his 80s, dressed sharply in a blue blazer, shirt, tie and khakis, and had an obvious energy to him that made him seem much younger.  He was clearly waiting to be invited in which I did, and in three short motions had crossed the room to where my mother sat, dropped to one knee and was holding her hand before I knew it.  I was surprised by this partly because of his speed, but also because I had no idea who he was!  He knew Mom though and mentioned Becky, Dad and I as though he knew us.  I introduced myself and we shook hands, but he didn't give his name, so I asked him who he was as politely as I could.  He looked me straight in the eye and responded:

"I'm Chuck Stratton," and coolly turned back to my mother.

"The Reverend Stratton?"  I asked in disbelief.

He turned back to me, "Yes the Reverend Stratton, just let the ramifications of that sink in." 

I did.  

This was our pastor from Youngstown who I hadn't seen in 15 years or so, and who I had assumed was lying half-dead in a bed somewhere else in this hospital.  My father and I both tried looking him up but couldn't get the lady at the front desk to tell us he what room he was in, damnable privacy laws.  

"Wait, I thought you had just had a heart attack?"  I said to him.  He glanced away as though he was deflecting bullets with nigh-invulnerable skin and said:

"I did have one.  About three weeks ago.  I'm fine now."  He sounded as though he were the Black Night saying "It's merely a flesh wound" when his arm had just come off.  

After that he said a few more things to Mom, we introduced him to the Deacon of my parents new(er) church who was in the room and he was gone just as quickly as he had shown up.  Leaving me floored in his wake.  How did this man who had had a heart attack seem younger than the man I had looked up to all those years ago?  

When I told my Dad about it he likened the experience to the Disciples seeing Jesus after the resurrection.  I don't know about that, but I could see that this man was unstoppable, and it filled in me a desire to be the same.  After my Dad showed up I went for my run, adding a half mile to it despite winds here being in the 35mph range.  

I don't know how being here for my Mom will affect my training, but I am going to try to be unstoppable.