india again

more incomplete glimpses that maybe i should have figured how to tie together before i posted them separately, but oh well.

yesterday i hid from delhi.
i stayed inside like some over-entitled wealthy white person paying
$18.50 for air conditioning and luxury when all i really need to get by
is 6 dollars on pahar ganj.
i went out once.
and dust, tuktuk drivers, incessant honking horns, fruit vendors and children poking me in the breast to ask for money
not to mention 120 degree heat
just didn't tickle my fancy.
sorry great mother india.
sometimes my love for you is unbearable
it hurts my heart, it thrills me and makes every cell in my body smile
and i spend all my time trying to figure out when i can get back to you
and your mountains
and all the sun-withered faces
and other times i hate you.
you make me crazy, feel lonelier than ever
even in your sea of beings
and i wanna' ask for all the arms of kali
so i can scream, plug my ears, give you the finger and
stand weapon in hand and say en guard! all at once.

but its always worth it.
the smells-spices incense shit urine
flavors of dust dirt and bodies
and i am always heartbroken and eager to leave
when i board my lonely flight home. 

india

an incomplete glimpse continued.

i forgot how one of my favorite things was being a passenger in an indian taxi
on the breath of chaos that-for once- isn't mine.

and when i sit on the train to chandigarh
lookin' out the window
the sides of the tracks are saturated
with a colorful confetti of garbage
cows, pigs,
and people chatting over their morning shits.
i can see how thick the air is with
smells, pollution, and
heat that at 6:30am hits you like
-well i don't know-
i want to say 'a ton of bricks'
but that just seems hackneyed at this point-
but its true.
its different-humid.
so unlike the fire-prone-desert-meets-mountain-land
that i come from.
here, you might not remember that the sky is blue,
but you hope it is.  

quick update

i forgot how much i love to be in the passenger seat of an indian taxi or any vehicle in india with an indian driver. thrilling.
being gluten free has gotten old really fast what with all the naan and samosas and various biscuits and momos (tibetan dumplings) at my finger tips.
catching a bug in india at 13,000 feet that has me running to the bathroom for 24 hours and violently wretching into the toilet at 4 in the morning and so uncomfortable that i can't lay down is one of the worst feelings in the world-
and totally worth the view and the noises and the himalayan air.
teaching yoga scares the shit out of me- i feel unworthy of it.
waking up and going to sleep with the sun feels really healthy (surprise!).

this has been such a whirlwind and feels a bit like a dream.
i am taking notes
and photos
and am excited to share.
much love.    

for all the times you tucked me in

i remember when you would crawl into the bottom bunk with me some nights
and you would let me talk to you about
my ten year old woes
and how i couldn't say "i love you" enough
and how "i love you" didn't actually seem enough
and how recently i still wanted to crawl into your lap
more than anything.
and how sometimes when erin crawls into mine
it feels similar and safe
the way it did then.

so thank you for winding up all the music boxes
and letting me play hookey
thank you for letting me sleep in your bed when i was sick
and all the ice cream sundaes.
thank you for the elton john evenings
and sundays where we listened to 'breakfast at tiffany's' on repeat and ate dinner together.
thank you for all the musical instruments that i played to no avail
and always just letting me sing.

if i was there right now
i promise i would sing you a lullaby
in hopes it would be better than buzzing lights
and pain in your knee.

and 'i love you' still doesn't feel like enough.
so thank you for teaching me how to smile.

feel better mama.

your watch brought me comfort this week.
when i was lucky enough to lay my head under the sound of the night hawks
and weary tired blood-shot-from-crying-eyes could finally gaze up through the lace of the ponderosa branches.
i could hear it on my wrist.
tick tick tick.
and remembered that there is life outside of this.
there is comfort other than my solitude in the darkness and the duff
comfort of arms and legs intertwined and smiling lips
and kissing lips.
and laughter.
oh right.

thank you for letting me borrow your watch.
it helped me keep track of myself.

so i pull out the opened aging bottle of port in my closet
i uncork it
and i don't bother getting a glass
and the familiar thought swells up in me again
'its time to go'
this oh-so-familiar feeling-sorry-for-myself-side says
nothing ever goes as planned
smiles fade
laughter stops
lets get outta dodge.

and another-less-familiar-side says
it's okay to slow down
and curiosity can go a long way.

not to mention there is always music playing in the background.

bob dylan sings me to sleep tonight
harmonica and all.

and i think about those words:

"strong women will encourage and awaken the potential
inside of you" he said
"make you wanna be a better man-
an intimidating prospect."

and so i giggle as i crawl into my bed and wait.

is that what is happening here?


my dog is the only male i have to get mad at these days.
and masturbation is a proud and honest fool.

the whiskey compilations III

the sun hasn't gone down yet
and the ice is already clinking in my glass
because i like to sit in my own shit
and self medicate
and feel sorry for myself
and i am so god damn tired of all the alone time
a little company would be nice
my bed is so damn cold at night.

oh whoops.
i am sorry.
did i leave a mark on your heart?
mustabeen the whiskey talking again.

here, let me unzip my jacket.
is that where my heart is?

you got a smile that can leave a mark too.

i'll just wait
here.

and i am sorry that my bed is so small.

i heard my first hummingbird today.
i swear it sought me out.
flying by all quick-like.
leaving me questioning.

and then i remembered that i saw pain in your eyes.
and i am so curious about your hesitation.

and thinking about it doesn't help.

so now the whiskey leaves my lips wet
and my tongue full of wit and fire.
and i would love to roll another cigarette
and just sit
with you.

its like this.

its like cleaning out my closet.
making space for new things,
clothes
different blankets
new feathery accessories.

its like a conversation between old lovers
in this lifetime
the last
or the next.

its like riding my bike in the full moonlight
and listening to gritty tunes in the honda toaster.

its like your best friend telling you to shut the fuck up
and being called out on being mopey.

its like free lunch and good company and two hour long cups of coffee.

its like a conversation that probably should have happened two years ago,
and now not being the right time,
and feeling sorry,
and knowing that apologies for truth are, for lack of a better word, stupid.

its like heartbreak happens once a day,
and that's beautiful because it means you are loving something or someone so much your heart could break over it.

its like coming back to an old job, and having it feel new and utterly different,
and its like having a job that lets you howl at the moon with boys on a journey that they won't know about for a few more years.

its like dancing with a pink boa
and making new friends
and acceptance and rejection and movement and healing.

its like getting a job offer in one of your favorite places,
with one of your favorite people.

its like it all works for once
its like all the pieces fit together.

its like finding out how i well i lean on myself and
how i love to love.

yeah. its like that.

springtime of my loving.

its official.  spring time has laid its blue sky hands over our lil' mountain town of durango, caressing us all into transition... time to bloom ladies and gentleman! welcome to (as i borrow words from robert plant and jimmy page) the springtime of my loving.  winter has finally thrown up its white flag of surrender- despite its rather measly attempts to keep us inside this year.  everyone is out and about-adorn in big grins and flip flops and skirts.  i just stepped outside to help coach little adorable children in petting my dog, and it seems that my heart is stuck in this warm place.  was florence right? are the dog days really over? couldn't be.  how could i possibly be comfortable in my body? how could i possibly be comfortable in this place where i feel happy and secure in my heart?  i'm excited to go in the field you say? its all so new.  perfect timing-spring: new beginnings, opening and closing of doors, finding moments of elderhood and feeling like a newborn all at once, the ending of one lifetime and beginning of another, old and new friends coming out of the cracks in the sidewalks to remind me of my roots, and what i lost and what i found.  i think i might be more than a little grateful to be alive right now.  it all just proves what an ally time is for me.  i got to durango, and immediately freaked out because of all the change and differences, and almost moved away.  "but mountain bike season is about to start," said my body, and "i feel at home here" said my heart, and "i don't care," said my irrational mind, and "stay for a second, relax, settle," said many voices of reason that i am so lucky to have in my life, "you are strong, it is going to be okay."  and so here i am- sitting in my favorite coffee shop, watching the sunshine from inside, tracking, keeping my ear to the breeze, basking in my lil' love affair with myself for just a moment.  and thus ends this episode of 'here is my heart on a platter for you to munch on.'
much love.  

still searching.

Its Valentine's Day, and I find myself sitting alone in my room, with not much more than a couple of dogs to love sprawled out on my bed.  My room is filled with things that I am too scared to unpack.  Did I really want to commit to being in Durango for a year? I am just not sure.  Good things are happening though.  There is no doubt, magic is unraveling right before my eyes, the same way the Animas Valley lays out its red carpet for the mountains to the north.
I just spent about half a week in the field, working my Jedi mind tricks and allowing students and parents to stroke my ever-forming ego.  For lack of a better adjective, it was awesome.  It is true, the desert has indeed been calling my name.  My urge to rub my face in the red dirt below my feet has finally been fulfilled, and my heart has finally released its lamenting song as I slept beneath a waning moon and watched the sunrise on a sandstone outcropping; my favorite place to watch the sunrise; a place that gives the words, expansive skies, a whole new meaning.
(You will have to excuse me- I have been attempting to add grammar to my blog, (hence the capital letters) and am just not so sure of the correct usage of the semi-colon- currently looking for a class to take to solve this issue and/or open to cheap tutoring.)
I have indeed had a love affair with the desert.  The pinion and the juniper trees have swooned me into wanting only the smell of sage on the breeze.  But alas, I cannot shake my feeling of wanting to go; wanting to keep searching, jump in the car I don't have, and keep driving further west.  That way, I can make sure that there is nothing over there that contains the answers.  Because while I did find answers, I didn't find the answer buried under last autumn's maple leaves, and while I did find answers, I didn't find the answer in the depths of the sweet warm pacific, and while I am finding answers, I am still not finding the answer in this bosom of plenty where the mountains and the desert meet.
I guess the important thing is, I have started singing again, and there is no one around to tell me to stop.  

wedding, roots, and milagro.

so this is the ending to one of the best weekends i have had in a long time.  its sunday, so i can't stop humming a familiar grateful dead song, and its the day after my sister, allie's wedding, so i can't stop replaying the evening over and over in my mind.  girl can throw a party, there is no doubt about it.  in few words, the wedding was fabulous.  allow me to lay out the scene.  two windy dirt roads led us to the little Sleepy Hollow Inn in Huntington, Vermont on January 27th;  a super small, family owned inn surrounded by cross country skiing/mountain biking trails (which may open up the possibility of a summer time visit for me!), and accompanied by a beautiful round barn with huge windows that frame the view of Camel's Hump, the mountain that we all scurried up as little ones, when our feet were growing so fast that we got a new pair of hiking boots every year.  there was an intermittent dusting of snow (which sounds really romantic, and maybe it was more like random patches of ice), and intermittent snow flurries (not to mention the night of rain) to boot. the bridal party- which included bride, groom, moms, dads, groomsmen, bridesmaids, dates, wives, girlfriends, and more stuffed ourselves into the little inn, all the folk who went stag slept three to a room and the couples were assigned little cozy love nests.  the weekend started off with a night of karaoke, and new fun fact about megan-i apparently really love karaoke.  After witnessing a completely out of tune "sweet caroline" and belting out janis joplin's "piece of my heart" and consuming what seemed to be about 25 glasses (they were very small) of wine, we concluded the evening gathered around an ipod and speakers talking about modern timeless music, and what its like to love to sing and not care what people think.  
the next day was THE day.  the day allie has been waiting for, and the day her older sister has been patiently awaiting amid curiosity, excitement and quarter-life-crisis moments.  for lack of a better adjective, and because my head is still swimming in tequila, the day was beautiful; the picturesque round barn was beautiful, the bride was beautiful, the ceremony was beautiful, and all the attendees were beautiful too.   and not only was the wedding chock-full of dancing, laughs, and a very short, lacking in passion, and mildly abusive love affair with milagro tequila, it was also a really beautiful reminder.  a beautiful reminder of where i come from.  i came from that day.  i come from the people who showed up and have always been, and will continue to be witnesses of the lives of the campbell girls. i come from witty sarcastic dry and hilarious comments, from sweet libations in the middle of winter time, and from the lack of shame in what its like to belt it out and shake it on the dance floor.  i come from countless winters in vermont, fireplaces and borrowing my mother's boots to go outside.  i come from my three sisters.  what a blessing.  i come from an extended family that is mostly not related by blood, but by love and unquestionable bonds, and from hair tugs and finger traps from those who are related to me by blood.  i feel most comfortable marching around in the cold in a flannel and ripped jeans, and i enjoy sleeping until at least 8 when its below 40 degrees outside.  woodstoves are one of my favorite things in the world, and so are dads.
so i guess everything that i am getting to here, is a big fat thank you to allie and josh.  thank you for creating and believing in magic.  thank you for taking me back to my roots (somewhere along the way, i lost touch with them).  thank you for introducing me to beautiful new family, and beautiful new friends, and creating a space where almost everyone we know and love could get together again and realize that we don't want to do this just once every 5 years because its too important.  life is too short.  most of all, thanks for believing in love, and having faith enough to take the risk.  it gives me hope and brings me joy.  you are both beautiful.  and thank you for giving me the opportunity to be a witness and a part of it all.
many many blessings to the bride and groom and all of the attendees! love you.
              

first run in about three weeks

hello friend. i seem to have forgotten about you.  i got swept up in what its like to be in new hampshire at the end of january.  long shadows, the sun not peeking its way into my east-facing window until 8am, family time, laughs, tensions, differences, the cold that has always bit me right on the end of my nose and the points of my cheek bones.  but today-as if i had my phone on me for the first time in weeks- you called me, and i responded.  bottled up, used up emotion, energy, muscle memory, and someone else's i-pod helped as well. i hit the ground running.  thanks for calling.  you have seen me at my worst- tears, fears, anxieties sitting on my chest like bullet proof vests, and my best-smiles stretching extra close to my eyes, skipping-jumping-bursting-exuberance.  i have forgotten about you, i have abused you, i have been really ungrateful for all the opportunities you have provided for me, and yet, you're still here. waiting for me. always ready to let me at it.  

it turns out that running in 30 degree weather has its own perks.  its energizing in a different way than the hot sun beating on me, or the moist air settling on my skin-the wet suit of sweat i wore in hawaii.  here, my skin is all dry afterwards, and my lungs hurt a little bit, my muscles and joints feel a bit confused, AND the amount of ALIVE i feel is unlike anything else.  

so thanks again.  thanks for always being there.  thanks for clearing my head and my heart.  thanks for allowing me to notice that there is a sidewalk on the road that i have driven down for the years in a fitful tearful  teenage fury unable to get to the ocean fast enough. thanks for the reminder.

today i ran to the ocean on the other side of the world.  the other ocean.  the cold cold atlantic, that i once ran into and submerged myself in late october, and let. go.  

    

     

thank you

i am at the point of no return when it comes to starting where i left off the last time i signed on to this thing.  for starters, it is 5 o'clock right now and pitch black outside.  that's right, i have left the most remote archipelago in the world and am now sitting in a creaky study in the northeast corner of our country, the seacoast of new hampshire.  its amazing how much lower the light sits in the sky on this end of things... in hawaii we are only about 1500 miles away from the equator, here, the miles seem immeasurable.  i have gone from bikini bottoms and airy shirts to tearing through my 13 year old sisters closet in search of a warm hat, and gallavanting down the streets of cambridge for a pair of closed toed shoes that doesn't cost me a fortune (and doesn't look like the geeky purple pair of tennis shoes i was running in just a week ago in only a sports bra).
yes, it all seems like a distant dream right now.  hawaii.  does it really exist?!  am i really so lucky to have just spent the last three months of my life there?! it feels surreal, undeserved, a mere story i made up in my fruitful imagination.  it was truly a place of healing for me.  so i wanted to write hawaii, the goddess pele, the ocean, the raw black jagged truth that is the energy vortex of the place i just became so intimate with, a thank you note... (these tend to be my favorite ones to write!) so here it goes!
i apologize if i have left anything out. and know, it wasn't all peaches and cream... ha!

dear dear dear hawaii,
where to begin? i feel infinitely grateful to have spent the last three months with you.  to start off i would like to thank you for challenging me.  for cutting up my feet, making me question what it really means to be grounded.  for throwing all mother nature's elements at me all at once; for overwhelming me with emotion; for helping me feel what it really means to be lonely; for sucking me into the womb of darkness, my eternal introspection where my self-critic feels oh-so-comfy and the black dog is fed;
thank you for providing me with fertile yet rocky unforgiving ground for growth.  for retribution from myself and the smoky tortures of my mind; thank you for aiding me in the discovery of distraction and the opening, healthy, hearty, laugh-at-myself-moments.  thank you for providing me with perspective.. for drawing me so far away from all my different families, that appreciation no longer has the same ring to it as it did before, endless gratitude and new eyes are more like it. thank you for introducing me to new family.
new eyes.  thank you for giving me new eyes.  for allowing me to re-discover the magic of snow falling, fire places, and scarves, and what it means to spend the holidays with my sisters; i dont know if i will ever spend another christmas so close to alone. 
thank you for allowing me to swim everyday.  to exist in prayer and meditation.  to be quiet and contemplative without over analyzing.  to be nice to myself.  to begin to learn to know what it means to embrace my big hips and on-the-thicker-side-thighs.  thank you for teaching me the art of relaxation.  of introducing the possibility that maybe wherever i am, really is where i am supposed to be.  patience.  truth.  the mending of a broken heart. 
i promise to keep learning the hawaiian moon calendar.  i promise to keep in touch with family there.  i promise to take what i have learned with me.  i promise to work on coming from a place of gratitude and forgiveness, and to continue practicing what it means to live with aloha. 
please know that i walk forward balancing on the fringe of knowing my own strength and beauty, and i will humbly accept any more challenges you can throw my way.

much love in prayer and gratitude.
aloha,
mc   

a sure sign that you are beautiful ladies!

the other day i had a funny experience while planting lettuce.  my new friend ken, the owner of the farm i am working on, was going on and on about himself... talking about how he is the epitome of cute, and how he has to fend off the ladies, and bla bla bla.  and i dropped all the lettuce i had in my hand, ready to nestle its little roots into the freshly tilled earth, and said, "how am i ALWAYS surrounded by men with exceedingly large egos?!?" at this he laughed, and said, "because you are beautiful and strong woman, and it is hard for the meek, or undeveloped ego to tread among you, how could they feel confident about themselves?" and while i am totally open to the meek and undeveloped egos, i suddenly realized that maybe he had a point.  as hard as it is for me to say that i am strong and beautiful, it was a delicious slice of potential truth. 

so that being said, if you ever find yourself in the back of an old beat up toyota landcruiser somewhere in the middle of the desert behind two men talking so highly of themselves that you are unsure opening a window would help you breathe, think, maybe its because YOU'RE beautiful!

ending with excitement

this last week has been really beautiful and grounding.  it was my first christmas away from my family, and it some ways that felt really relaxing and stress-free, and in other ways, i really really missed them.  oddly enough, none of my sisters went home for christmas, except for the one who lives there, so it was a very different experience for my parents indeed.  christmas is always a hectic time for the campbell's (which seems to be the across-the-board-experience for most people experiencing the holiday seasons with their families) so i am hoping that since all of us have a year off, we will come to really appreciate being together in years to come.
christmas eve we decided to hike to where the lava is flowing.  kiluaea is one of the most active volcanoes in the world and it is forever birthing this crazy island, and at the moment it is spewing hot magma lava all the way down to the ocean.  so a couple friends and i made it there for an epic hike on christmas eve.  it was quite the experience.  it started off pouring rain with a consistent headwind of probably about 20 mph, relatively brutal, and then cleared up for a while, allowing us to make a good chunk of the hike with dry weather.  we watched the sunset over the black pahoehoe lava.  pahoehoe is the smoother kind of lava from flows that happened years ago, so they are all dried up, and this is what we hiked on for the entirety of the time. this place made us all feel as if the whole earth was pahoehoe lava, black and barren; it becomes all you can see aside from the cliff that drops off into the ocean and the hillside that the flowing lava brandished its thousand degree signature.  it was like taking a trip to mordor and back, except this time we had to hike back out, there were no giant eagles to swoop down and save us.
at one point we were face to face with all the elements, rain was spitting all over us, and we looked down, and could actually see the glow of lava flowing between the cracks of the earth we were standing on, as the wind howled a most mournful song.  it would get extremely hot in places like this, and we would go in search for more solid ground.  it was crazy to actually feel the earth forming beneath our feet, i mean literally the ground did not feel solid, and for certain, it wasn't.  eventually we hiked onward through the night, constantly searching for solid ground, a little stability to place our feet, and rest our hearts and minds.  making it back to the road that led back to the car felt like a god-send. it was a most un-grounding experiencing, and at the same time, i was super grateful  to have made the trek there and back with good company, and experience all these elements that are made by earth.  it was a good reminder of how small and relatively insignificant i am as a human, and in some ways, how utterly powerless i am to the ways and the forces of the world, and how important it is to show respect to the ground i tread on, because by-god i am grateful it is solid.

this week the farm has been so mellow.  i feel so grateful to have had the opportunity to live and work on the farm.  life is so simple.  talk about finding zen and peace in the simple things, "chopping wood, carrying water." i love and will truly miss my little life and routine i have going there.  i work all day,run, make dinner, tea, and maybe a treat, process macadamia nuts, dry bananas, and am in bed by 9:30! only to rise again at 6:30 and watch the world turn light every morning.  AHH! i love it.  i needed some grounding quiet time, and i have received it.  it reminds me that i would love my life to be like this at some point, with added community, and maybe a bit more action here and there, and a few people to share it with, and definitely no lettuce.

i am taking off for molokai on monday.  i am doing a workshop with the ho'ea initiative.  they do a lot of wilderness awareness workshops, that often include tracking, nature awareness, cultural awareness, and some other primitive skills.  i am excited to go and see how it feels to be involved in something like this.

i am continuously trying to figure out what the next step is for me.  is it school of some sort? more travel? a perfect job hidden somewhere? a diamond in the rough.  i feel really ready to put my energy towards something that is sustainable for me and that i feel passionate about.. but what could this be? i am trying to stop searching so much and just relax into whatever my life has to offer me right now, despite pressures from my parents, my sisters, and pressures from myself.  because they are undoubtedly there.

either way, i am really excited for this workshop.  i am excited to go to boston and see rose.  i am excited to be around my family.  i am excited to go to allie's wedding and watch her put her faith in love.  i am excited to go back to durango and work for open sky again, and sleep outside.  i am excited to maybe buy a house plant-probably a succulent of some sort but a house plant nonetheless.

i love being excited.

untitled raw

sometimes i feel like i write best first thing in the morning... my head and my emotions are clear, and i feel super in tune with everything when i watch the morning light turn from blue to grey to spotty-sunshine.  right now i am feeling split open and raw.  i heard somewhere that you need to share yourself with others so that others can live, so i felt it necessary for some reason to share with everyone this morning, because i love all the people in my life... so this is out of love for everyone... including myself.

untitled

here i am sitting somewhere over the rainbow listening to john prine and crying
the sun rises in an iridescent violet
and sets in a magenta goo... dripping itself into the ocean

for days and months
i have been singing about how 'you're gonna make me lonesome when you go'
thinking bout how 'i see you in the sky above, in the tall grass, and the ones i love'
smiling when i do

but fearless love takes a toll.

so here i am
redirecting
figuring out how i can borrow words of others
to keep feeding the love i have for myself.

and that takes a toll too.

i just keep praying to the moon
knowing that it always comes around to cast its moon shadows all over the place again.

rainbow weather I

so today is one of those times where i feel like i almost can't pinpoint exactly what i want to write and i feel like could write so much because it has been so long since i last posted an entry and thus i have no idea where to begin and at the same time feel like i could go on forever. hmmm... deep breath maybe?

the marathon.  what an experience.  i was a true witness to the battle between the body and the mind.
the race started out in the dark... after waking up at 2:45, we all hopped on a school bus at around 3:30 in the morning, and were carted to the starting line.  nerves awry, hearts pounding, stuffing in that last bit of "clif-blok" to get us through the first couple hours we lined up next to eachother, holding hands... the five of us seemingly blond in a sea of japanese people.  the exhilarating feeling of being the minority and being at the start of a 26 mile race was soon catalyzed by a firework display that marked the start of the time.  tears rolling down our cheeks we began to make our way slowly to the start. unsure of what the next six hours of our lives were going to look like, unsure if we were gonna stick together for the whole of it, unsure what was to happen next.
and then we were off- funneled through the starting line like lil' coffee cherries starting off their process of making their way into your cup...  and after mile two i was without all the loved ones i came to honolulu with.  i was all alone, and yet surrounded by a sea of people, ebbing and flowing around me.  there were moments in the morning darkness in which all i could hear was the sound of 28,000 people's feet hitting the pavement around me.  it was our morning heartbeat, propelling us forward through the darkness, and through all the stoplights, changing on their own accord.  and then i watched the light turn blue, and from their i could see little splashes of sun making their way onto the horizon as people reminiscent to fans, started to make their way through the cracks in the sidewalks to cheer us on with all of their might!
the light brightened, and i thought about all the people back at home, and in hawaii that i love... mile 13.1 passed and i came to the conclusion that i had actually been training for a half marathon, not a full 26.2 mile marathon.  but still, despite the pain in my knees, and the sharp pain in my right hip-flexer i kept on.  determined by something other than myself to finish.   my mind went through its usual array of insults, as i knew i would be the last of my friends to make it across the finish line, and my body felt like it was starting to deteriorate into the pavement with every lift and fall of my feet.  but still i kept on.  and then something changed.  around mile 18, when i knew i was over the hump, and all at once felt sure that i wouldn't make it another step, something in my little mind's eye starting saying, "you can do it meg, you can do it. don't stop, you got this" and i kept on and on and on for 8.2 more miles, and realized that it was my mind telling me not to stop, encouraging me further and further, even though my body surely couldn't make it, not one more step... and i came to the last mile... my pace actually picking up underneath my torso, my arms getting into a larger swing until i was once again surrounded by these "fans" cheering me through the last couple steps, and i broke out into a full sprint to the end... and then walked to a spot in the grass and collapsed, somehow found by three other friends, in the same amount of pain, happy to see that i had finished, and ready to get a free shiatsu massage.  its funny because my mind quickly assumed its normal role, "eh i'm not sure that was good enough meg, your time is a tad embarrassing, don't walk around too proud.." but now i am telling that part to shove it, i finished 26.2 miles in 5hours51seconds, and well, i am proud.  and that being said, i wanna do better next time... :)