Running with a friend

Today was the Marine Corps Marathon.
I've been a bit more bike than run this summer so I certainly hadn't logged the miles to have any confidence in my own marathon-capability. But I waited at Mile 23 for a friend and then paced him past the Pentagon and into Arlington Cemetery.
It felt good to be in a race again with so many people and so much good energy, and I remembered how much pain I was in at the Las Vegas marathon when it came to Mile 23. God, I don't remember a single part of me that didn't hurt. So I felt a bit guilty to be so fresh and running with all these wounded bodies. It was one thing to stand on the side for an hour, clapping and whistling and calling out encouragement. It was quite another to step into the fray and make a mockery of the shin splints and the aching knees. I saw one overweight old man putting in quite the effort in spite of a bleeding nipple that had rubbed itself raw against his white T-shirt for the previous 4 hours.
"Hey," I told my friend. "Tell you what..about a half mile from the finish, I'll sprint on ahead so I can snap your picture crossing the finish line."
I thought it was friendly and nice. But he groaned.
"That is the meanest thing you could say to me," he said. And I guess it really was. But he finished, and that was good. Plus, I brought him ibuprofin which is a god-send when your legs feel like hell.

This evening, I worked on my Dutch - particularly the past participle of action verbs. So now I can say, "Vandag, Ik heb met mijn vriend gelopen" instead of perpetually using the present tense: "Vandaag, Ik lope met mijn vriend".

Also, I wrote (Ik hebben geschreven vijftien pagina's vandaag)  I'm up to May 2013 now. Peculiar to remember the strangely pivotal moments that changed everything. "If it bothers you so badly," said John. "Just open Pandora's box."