Running on Empty

by Marshall Ulrich

  In the afternoon, just after my marathon nap, the entire production crew gathered at the RV. Kevin Kerwin, Kate’s husband and the documentary’s director, interviewed me, which I can say I handled with more grace than when I’d talked with the reporter. It’s to Kevin’s credit, though, as his questions were better, and he gave me the opportunity to talk about how important Heather was to my ability to finish this run, about how I wasn’t just some empty shell of a man moving down the road, but that I needed nurturing that could come only from her.

  This was, I thought, the last I’d see of the documentary crew, as time had run out—their contracts had all expired, unfortunately. Kevin, Rick, and Kate would be there to get footage if I made it to the finish, but everyone else would go home. Dr. Paul, too, would be leaving the next day because he had professional obligations.

  So I said good-bye to the production crew. Good-bye to Paul. Good-bye to my pride, while we were at it, as I was having trouble even walking because of back pain. I just kept telling myself, Only a little farther. At the end of the night, I was fairly chanting, Not much longer, not much longer. Just one more mile.

  How often had I said that on this road? How many times had I pushed myself to go one more day, travel one more mile, take one more step? But isn’t that the way of any endeavor, of any trial, of any life? Instead of wearing me out, those words propelled me forward.

  Besides, the countdown was on. No longer did I feel as if I was on a treadmill, running with no end in sight, emptied of reason and purpose and passion. Now I knew—I could feel it—that every stride took me that much closer to the doors of New York City Hall, the end of the road.

  When we ran through the town of Jim Thorpe, named after one of my childhood heroes, it felt as if everything was coming to a fitting close for me. My father had admired Jim’s achievements, too, remarked about what a phenomenal and versatile athlete he was, to have played football, baseball, and basketball professionally and to have won Olympic gold in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon. The champion’s humble beginnings and his love and mastery of multiple sports impressed me as a kid, and I felt a certain kinship with him as an adult. I liked that he hadn’t limited himself, or thought of himself as achieving success in only one sport. Like Jim, my dad had been an incredibly versatile man, constantly willing to try new things. He’d been a doughnut maker, a butcher, a store owner, a dairy farmer, a pet food manufacturer, and later the president of the National Farmers Organization. He wasn’t afraid to do anything, and was good at everything he did. No doubt he liked the challenge of jumping into a new profession every ten years or so, just to make life interesting. I wished Elmer could have been there to go through Jim Thorpe with me, and in a way he was. I no longer felt so alone. It was as if every person who had contributed to who I am accompanied me, anyone who had ever encouraged or challenged me, all those who had loved me, the children who’d followed our progress from their classrooms, the men and women who’d climbed with me, run with me, paddled with me, walked with me in any way—they had come with me. All of them were a part of me, and I was a part of them.

  The crew was filling out again. Mace had come back, as had Elaine and Taylor, and my friend Tom had joined us. When Mace and I crossed over the Delaware River on day fifty-two, Taylor and Elaine met us at the end of the bridge. We were in New Jersey now! The second-to-last state, and the skinniest of them all. With a little over eighty miles to go, we were knocking down the miles. My God, this might, just might, happen. We’re going to run out of land soon.

  Not without one last wrinkle, of course. My back was in knots, and I was moving at a snail’s pace. With Paul gone, we did our best to get over it: Tom stretched me, Robert used an electro-stimulation gizmo, and Heather brought me Chinese food. Bless them all! My back was recalcitrant, though. It had had enough these past two months, and it was ready for me to quit. But we kept going, moving slow as molasses.

  Welcome to New Jersey!

  “The Garden State”

  Arrival date: 11/3/08 (Day 52)

  Arrival time: 1:30 p.m.

  Miles covered: 2,983.0

  Miles to go: 80.2

  That night, our last of this long effort, we stayed at the Triumph house. (Seriously, that’s Tom’s last name, and we stayed at his family’s place in Mountain Lakes, New Jersey.) It was the first time we’d been in someone’s home since leaving our own nearly two months ago, and Heather said it was comforting to her, to be out of the RV and the hotels, as a guest in a place where people led normal lives.

  Tom ran me a hot bath and then helped me into it, holding my arm and steadying me as I sank into the water, my back throbbing. As I slumped into the tub, I wondered if I’d have to crawl into New York City. I knew one thing, the grand masters record was mine—I had smashed the old time, and I could take up to twenty-eight hours to get to the finish, if I had to, to break the masters record, too. Less than fifty miles to go. For now, I felt like the luckiest person in the world. My dream was within reach. This would end tomorrow, I was sure. And tonight, as on so many nights before, there was an angel in my bed.

  12.

  Running Out

  Final Day

  For more than two decades, I’d been running. Sometimes I’d run away from things; sometimes I’d run toward them. This day, what drew me forward was the promise of reaching New York, our last leg on this long, long road.

  If nothing too extraordinary occurred, I’d own this son of a bitch.

  “This is going to be ugly, pathetic! I’m going to have to walk all the way to New York—this is not how I imagined it at all.”

  At 5:30 a.m. on what was supposed to be our final day, my back was killing me, and I was in pieces. Yet again, Heather soothed me.

  Tom had gotten up before us, and he came upstairs to let us know that he’d already arranged for me to go to a chiropractor friend’s house for an adjustment. Grateful, I followed Tom to his SUV. We slowly hoisted my body into the passenger seat, and I winced as he helped me sit down, my leg and back muscles in spasm, tensing and protesting. Like I said: pathetic.

  On the way, I was thinking about what wonderful friends we have in Tom and his wife, Therese. Who finds a chiropractor to treat you in her home at six o’clock in the morning? Tom, that’s who, because he has exceptional friends of his own. When we arrived, she immediately went to work, positioning me on her table and using a strange instrument, something with a small plunger that tapped my misaligned vertebrae back into place. Would this really work? I was accustomed to chiropractors bending me like a pretzel and then, without warning, snapping my back or twisting my head. This was a lot less jarring, and I wasn’t sure I could even be contorted into the right position for a snap or a twist, but it seemed a rather gentle approach for such an intense problem. She was calm and confident, working her way along my spine with that little clicking device, and after about ten minutes, she had me turn over onto my back, measured my legs, and proclaimed that she was done.

  That’s it? That’s going to get me to New York?

  Rolling onto my side, I slowly slid my legs off the table and dangled my feet toward the floor. So far, so good. Carefully, I scooted off the table and put my feet down. Ouch. My feet hurt. But wait a minute. If I’m noticing my feet instead of my back, that’s an improvement. This morning, I hadn’t even thought about my feet until then. Now, moving across the room, I felt very little back pain. Walking down the stairs and out the front door: even less pain. We thanked the chiropractor and said good-bye, Tom helped me into his car, and we drove to his house. I helped myself out of it when we arrived.

  “Holy shit, I think she cured me,” I said under my breath. Then louder, with emphasis: “No kidding! I think she cured me.”

  I grinned at Mace, who was waiting anxiously to see how I was and to head out on the road with me.

  “I don’t want to jinx anything, but I’m telling you I think she cured me.”

  We grabbed our gear from Tom’s house and headed back to the stakeout po
int. I’d put on my long-sleeved Capilene shirt, one of my two favorites, which I’d been wearing every day since Dave Thorpe had bought them for me back in Indiana, and which had been laundered for the first time the night before. (Thank you, Therese!) Those shirts and the matching long underwear had been indispensable the last six hundred miles, as they were the only ones that really worked in the rain and cold, so I’d refused to go without them long enough for them to be cleaned. In fact, like that seemingly eccentric bunioneer all those years ago, I’d worn just my long johns through most of Pennsylvania. To the brand’s credit, they hadn’t gotten too terribly offensive—the fibers stayed relatively odorfree, as Heather had hung them up to air out every night—but I appreciated what Therese had done. As everyone knows by now, I love clean laundry.

  In the van, I was so excited about being close to the finish and able to take full strides that I laughed out loud. I actually stood a chance of running into New York City. Who would have thought so just an hour before?

  This will be a good day, a very good day, indeed.

  At about 7:45 in the morning, Mace and I headed east on Highway 46. Running! I couldn’t help grinning as I thought about how blessed I was, not only to be moving again, but also to have all these friends along the way who’d helped me, and to have Mace by my side right then. Nothing ever felt too serious or insurmountable when we were together. Two of his favorite sayings, when things get really tough, are “It’s all just a test,” and “Calm down, calm down, calm down,” comforting words to hear when things are in the toilet. Thank God he didn’t have to say them anymore today.

  As we loped down the road, my friend Sister Mary Elizabeth Lloyd, who lives in Morristown, New Jersey, appeared up ahead. I’d known she might come out, but it was a real pleasure to see her, and I felt honored that she’d take the time to stop by; her presence brought peace, joy, elation. She rambled along beside us for a while, her black habit flapping in the cold air, and we talked about the long journey behind me and what lay ahead. I told her about the near miss with the two cars, and how we’d doused my leg with holy water right before it all happened. We chatted, as we always do, about her life’s work, the women and children she serves. Over the years, I’ve raised money for her order of sisters, the Religious Teachers Filippini, whose motto is simply “Go and teach,” but who are in constant motion, doing the real work of peace and justice. Sister Mary Beth has also gained some acclaim for being “The Running Nun,” since she uses the sport, completing marathons and fifty-mile races, always wearing her habit, to raise awareness for their causes. We stayed together for about a mile, and then she went her own way. We wished her well, and Mace and I headed through a small town.

  CROSS-TRAINING: RELIGIOUS TEACHERS FILIPPINI

  Running the length of the United States was grueling, to be sure. But the pain I endured was nothing compared with how some people suffer every day. According to the United Nations, in Ethiopia alone, 470,000 children are orphaned by AIDS every year, creating families led by children under the age of eighteen. Many of these minors, suddenly the heads of households with other children to clothe and feed, lack the skill needed to provide for themselves and the others in their care. All of them struggle to survive. Many don’t.

  These impoverished children need the basics: water, food, clothing, and shelter. They also need schooling and opportunities, when they’re old enough, to learn a skill or trade so that they can improve their conditions. The Religious Teachers Filippini provide all of this and more to children in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Siblings are kept together, housed in a hostel, and given the essentials. Mature boys attend the Christian Brothers school in town, and mature girls stay with the sisters and learn to set up and run their own restaurants or sewing shops, or to embark on a career in business and technology, or to become nurses and teachers.

  Heather and I have seen for ourselves the amazing work these sisters do both at home and in other parts of the world. We’ve traveled to Eritrea and visited the cities of Asmara and Tukul to tour the schools and women’s empowerment programs that they have created there, and to the Muslim village of Hamelmalo, where the sisters built a clinic, in part with funds I’d raised for them with my Mount Everest summit and Badwater races. We feed each other: Remembering the women and children we met there, and at other mission sites, has kept me moving on many occasions, especially at Badwater. They provide perspective and give purpose to my steps, when what I’m doing helps raise money for their cause.

  The sisters live their motto to “go and teach” by providing education and the basic necessities of life to children and women around the world. Their schools and programs are supported only through grants and donations, which are distributed to mission sites. They work to promote the dignity of people who might otherwise perish, who live in some of the poorest countries in the world and also here in the United States.

  The traffic on the streets was getting heavier, so Elaine, Therese, and a friend of hers were scouting the road ahead, while Heather, Taylor, and Brian stayed close in the van. This was exciting! The increase in traffic told us we were getting closer to the Big Apple. But we were hardly all business. Spotting a toilet someone had left on the sidewalk to be picked up by sanitation workers, Mace and I stopped dead in our tracks and, like a pair of teenagers, had to play around with it. He sat down and posed as The Thinker, and Taylor snapped a photo while I stood by and laughed my head off.

  On we went. It was warmer now, in the mid-sixties, and I was wearing shorts and my Capilene shirt. We had to dodge cars at intersections, and we ran around people, laughing at things that normally wouldn’t be funny at all. Listening to Mace’s commentary along the way was all the entertainment I needed to keep me in high spirits. I was floating on air.

  Somewhere along the line, I’d gotten word that the production crew had decided to stay on without pay to see me finish. Now, how fantastic is that? This day was turning out to be better than good. Great things were lining up like cattle in a chute.

  Around noon, I stopped to ice my foot and take a short nap. Ever since I’d first injured myself, we’d stopped multiple times a day for this routine of icing and rest. Today was no different, despite the intoxicating feeling of being near the finish, as the pain had crept up in intensity, as usual, and the swelling intensified. My foot injuries, I thought, had a silver lining: They reminded me that, no matter how tough or impervious I may imagine myself to be, I am imperfect, fragile, scared, and vulnerable, just like every other person on this planet. No matter how unique any of us wants to believe we are, all of us hurt, suffer, and feel sadness. Some of us are just better at covering it up.

  We moved through small towns and seedy neighborhoods in New Jersey, crossing confusing intersections without missing a beat, mainly because the crew was on top of the route. Therese’s friend, not a runner herself, jogged ahead of us to show us the way up a ramp that crossed over a busy highway. Elaine, waiting at another intersection to point the way, grabbed my shirtsleeve just as I stepped out into the road and pulled me back, and whoosh! A car whizzed by right in front of me—another close call, and if Elaine and Mace hadn’t been there with me, I would have walked right in front of the car. It felt safe with the people I loved around me; they were protecting me, had been protecting me for a long time.

  As we approached Fort Lee and the George Washington Bridge, suddenly there was Rick with that big camera on his shoulder. New York City was still out of view, so it surprised me to see him there, but he guided us through a few tricky turns and up onto the bridge, running the whole way with that heavy HD video camera; that thing weighed about seven pounds, so it was as if he was running sprints with dumbbells, but Rick was in good shape and up to the challenge.

  Mace stayed back to let me trot alone across this bridge over the wide Hudson River, and I savored the experience. Within minutes of setting foot on the trestles, I saw Manhattan for the first time, off in the distance. Unbelievable! The great buildings jutted up into the horizon, a postcar
d’s skyline. Goose bumps broke out on my skin, and warmth flooded my entire body. It all seemed terribly far away, but when I considered how far I’d come, suddenly it felt as if I could reach out and lay my hand against the cool walls of the Empire State Building. I’m here! Rick sprinted ahead for a shot and filmed me as I passed him, then repeated the process many times. It reminded me of my footsteps all across the United States, one after the other, over and over again. Just a few more hours and who knew exactly how many more of those footsteps, and I could stop. I COULD STOP. So close to the end now, I was happy to be running, and gratitude swept over me, an amplified echo of my feelings atop many of the mountains I’ve climbed.

  Welcome to New York!

  “The Empire State”

  Arrival date: 11/4/08 (Final Day)

  Arrival time: 4:29 p.m.

  Miles covered: 3,050.2

  Miles to go: 13.0

  Inching ever closer to the skyscrapers ahead, I moved forward in amazement. Had I really come all the way from coast to coast, from “sea to shining sea”? Had we finally run out of land? It didn’t seem possible to me now. I had been running for such a long time that it just didn’t seem conceivable that it would ever end.

  Down a corkscrewlike walkway, we came into Manhattan and Riverside Park. The crew greeted me, and it felt as if I’d just stepped onto another continent. The green grass, the trees’ leaves exploding with color, and the sounds and smells of the city filled my senses. I’m here, now, and life is good.

  Only thirteen miles to go.

  A group of more than half a dozen runners joined me around Ninety-ninth Street. They seemed as elated as I was, and they ran with me along the path in the park, listening to some of the stories I had to tell. And yes, it was Election Day, November 4, 2008. We hadn’t planned to finish on such a historic date, but it looked like that’s what would happen.