The Boston Marathon (Spectator)

On a Monday morning with too much homework to catchup on, I decided to head into Boston to witness the Boston Marathon. I had googled a little bit about how to get there, and left the rest entirely on my assumption that there was going to be so many people to indicate where it was going on and roadblocks to funnel me to the right place.

As I got closer to the epicenter of the finish line, police in their neon yellow vests started showing up in clumps of three, always gruffy, hands in pockets, talking to one another. Closer still, the whistling and cheering and screaming became obvious, giving shape to the palpable pain in the air just watching the runners strain against their sinewy lean limbs. Everyone’s hands were holding on to a rough off-tone bell, the kind that sounds dull and flat like a cow bell, and they shake it vigorously at every approaching winner like leaves moved by a passing wind. No one knows who the runners are, yet every one of them ran into the embrace of the nearing end and the cheering city. There was a desperation in the air, and I wonder what they have seen in the last two hours, in the last 23 miles, how are they still breathing evenly and striding free from fatigue, how they can end so gracefully. The atmosphere was porous and their pain and grit seeped into me and made me tear.

There were two guys who especially caught my eye, who were cuff-linked with a black wristband and ran to the finish line together. Not one of them were dragging the other along, and they moved in unison cutting through the air. This was a gesture of a small promise they have kept to each other – they will finish this together and will not leave the other behind. Who will be there for each of us when we feel like giving up? Who would be willing, and more importantly, who would we choose to cuff ourselves to? For some reason it moved me to tears (again!)

There were also runners who pushed along a marathon wheelchair with a disabled competitor, such that they cut the air like a pointed rollerblade. With the wind in their hair, I wonder what they must see, to be each other’s support, cutting through the air mile by mile resolutely heading into the extra enthusiastic cheering Boston. How did they get through the difficult elevations? How would they pull each other along?

As I weaved through the crowd, with dogs sitting on the ground uninterested in the commotion, I got closer and closer to the finish line. People were sprinting and running faster and burning alive at the end, through the line, relieved, panting, slightly dazed, caped in their little silver sheets for flags of completion. They were all winners, and winners had a look of intensity, having burned through all their energy and then some, that made spectatorship seem shameful in my softness. One day…Maybe one day…