I woke up at 11:22pm, totally disoriented. I looked around to get my bearings: okay, I'm sitting--I'm in a car. It's pitch black outside (and the stars are magnificent). And I'm so fricking cold. It takes my brain a minute to catch up and remember that it's Saturday night and I'm in the crew car. Lauren is running the Stagecoach 100 Mile Ultra from Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon. Our crew car was parked at the Russell Tank Aid Station, and we had gotten there a few hours earlier and had walked down the path from the parking lot to the Arizona Trail that the runners were on. We marveled at how disoriented we were walking maybe 100 meters from the car in that absolute darkness--how were the runners doing this? As it turns out, they were also confused about which way to head on the trail after stopping for a few minutes with their crew, and had to be pointed in the right direction. It's all part of the challenge.
Okay, so this is where I am, but it's 11:22pm? At 9pm, Chris, Lauren's partner, had changed and gotten ready to jump in and pace, if needed. I was going to take a nap so I could drive and navigate, and Chris was going to head down to the trail around 10pm to wait for Lauren. It's so dark that it would be easy to miss your runner going through, so he was heading down a little early to wait for her, and then they would come back up to the car to get what she needed. I didn't fall asleep until Chris left the car at 10pm, so when I woke up at 11:22pm and got my bearings, I also got flooded with a big dose of worry--it's an hour and a half later than he thought she might come through. But job one when you're crewing an ultra is this: keep your f**king cool. Things not going as planned is baked into the whole thing, especially once it gets dark, and it doesn't do you, or your runner, any good to freak out. Until necessary. Which is usually never.
So, I took a deep breath and I waited.
Should I go find Chris? I could try that, but I might miss him. But they'd wait for me at the car if I did. But I don't have the keys, and I think the car will lock automatically after a few minutes. If that happens and I don't find Chris I'll be locked out and cold. I think I'll stay put.
I kept my head about me and looked at the stars and waited, and, eventually, the back hatch of the car opened up and there she stood! It's cold, it's dark, it's about 11:45pm (I think!), she's run almost 70 miles, she's got blisters on her feet, and she's beaming.
"Diane, guess what?!!! I saw a mountain lion!!!"
What the actual hell?! She's excited? "Diane, I found $1000 on the trail! Diane, my blisters magically disappeared! Diane, they installed lanterns for the next 30 miles!" These are the things my little scaredy cat (no pun intended) brain could embrace. But Lauren stood there radiant and stoked, despite the cold, the dark, the dangers, the challenges...This is what you sign up for when you take on an ultra, but not every athlete embraces this.
I started laughing, because what else do you do? This is one of the things I love about Lauren. She stood there while Chris switched out her nutrition and headlamp and told me the story of the mountain lion encounter, ending with they are just so beautiful! That mountain lion was just reflecting Lauren back to herself, as far as I'm concerned.
I met Lauren three and half years ago at a running camp in Austin, TX. We are both quiet in those situations, both observers. Not surprisingly, we found each other and had an hours long conversation the second evening. We became fast friends; kindred spirits find each other. And we've gone on like this ever since. We've supported each other through injuries and surgeries, through big transitions and hardships, and we are each other's cheerleaders when life delivers victories.
And this is why I'm up all night in a crew car. As much as I love the challenges of crewing, and I do LOVE crewing, I would not choose to freeze my nuts off or drive alone on unmarked forest roads for just anybody. But I'd go to the ends of the earth to crew a race for Lauren. And let me confess, it's not as generous as it may sound. I get tenfold in return what I give when I crew for the people I love, and this experience with Lauren was no exception. Not only was she kind and thoughtful before, during and after the race, but her approach to the whole experience (my god was she organized!) and the grace with which she carried herself through those twenty eight hours is something I aspire to. Her quiet resolution to see something through has the perfect balance of grit and flexibility, and her curiosity and awe at everything from how do we manage these blisters to that mountain lion I saw by myself in the dark on a trail was so beautiful is a privilege to be near.
Let Lauren's example rub off on me just a little bit, please is my new prayer.