I Grabbed My Hat and I Began to Run.

Last week, a friend called to suggest that we train for the Flying Pig Marathon together. It's in May '08, and because I've run some marathons before, I know I have plenty of time to train if I get busy now, but it's been two years since my last one, and I've never felt so out of shape. My girlish figure is gone, and my physique is Pavarotti-esque (from when he was alive, that is). I just finished a 3-mile run; my lungs are searing and my legs feel like lead. I have a long, long way to go.

The last marathon I ran was New York in November '05. Here's that harrowing tale, which I wrote a day or two later.

Looking Back in Self-flagellation: NYC Marathon 2005

My best marathon time ever was 3:55, and it took me over an hour more than that to finish NYC last Sunday. And now I can't find my hair shirt anywhere!

Of course, that p.r. was thirteen years and eight or ten kids ago, so maybe I shouldn't be so hard on myself . . . okay, yeah, I should be. I'd had a pretty good training season -- my legs felt strong and I'd run two twenty-milers that made me think I could finish in 4:15 or 4:30. Perhaps it's time to admit I'm not Ethiopian.

The day started off well. I'd had a fairly good night of sleep in the world's smallest hotel room and when I left at about 5:30 to meet a friend at his hotel, I found the morning dawning free of rain, if a bit warm. We trekked with thousands of others to the New York Public Library where the buses to the start awaited us. The line snaked all over the place but things moved quickly; the New York Road Runners and city officials really do an amazing job.

The ride out to the start on Staten Island was interminable. That's really my only complaint (other than that I think it's a tad unfair that so many beautiful women live in one city). I'd run NY six times before, and the ride to the start had never taken more than 40 or 45 minutes. I thought we were in for a revolt as our bus inched across the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. Aching bladders do tend to put people on edge, don't they?

The Marathon starts on the Verrazano. It almost defies description, the feeling of being out there, looking out into the harbor and, beyond that, to the Manhattan skyline. Even on a hazy day, it was amazing, and everyone out there, all 35,000 plus, were shot full of adrenaline because of it.

I wasn't actually on the bridge for the official start but that was cool. I heard the cannon go off and burst out of my portolet; it took me about thirteen or fourteen minutes to get to the starting line, not bad, considering. I was an orange start, meaning my group started on the bridge's upper deck. (Note to future NYCers who start on the lower deck: run in the middle of the road until you get to Brooklyn. Men will pee anywhere, including from a bridge at the start of a 26.2 mile race and, well, anything that comes down from the top has to go somewhere. It can get windy up there, let me tell you.)

Once into Brooklyn, I quickly advanced and joined the front runners. I found the police escorts a bit annoying, since the motorcycle engines' noise almost drowned out the cheers of the thrilled onlookers. Almost. But I could hear you, my friends . . . oh yes, I could hear you! To run through your borough is to take a quick trip around the world, getting high-fives all the while.

Pop quiz time! Something I wrote in the last paragraph was a lie. Can you spot it?

Eleven miles or so in Brooklyn, then a short trip through Queens. Saw some friends there, all of whom were drinking cold beer -- definitely activity prohibited by the Geneva Conventions.

Then on to the 59th Street Bridge which, for me, was the second great adrenaline rush of the Marathon. Watching the Manhattan skyline approach, hearing the music and the crowd get louder and louder -- really remarkable. Off the bridge, around the bend and up the long First Avenue stretch, and that's when it starts. You see an attractive woman and think, "Wow, she's the most gorgeous woman I've ever seen." But then, seconds later, "No, she's the most gorgeous woman I've ever seen."

And so on and so on for about 45 city blocks. Sure, some may say I'm shallow, noticing the dark-haired girls in all their NY sexiness at a time like that, but you know what I say? I say it's heroic, being true to biology even as my legs felt like lead.

At the 20-mile mark, on the narrow bridge from Manhattan to the Bronx, so many people were walking that running was impossible. It was right about then that my body really started to feel ancient, and I never really picked up the pace after that.

Limping back into Manhattan, I was so far behind my projected time that my fan club had left Marcus Garvey Park by the time I arrived. When your fan club includes little kids, I guess you need to expect the occasional impatience-related meltdown.

Fifth Avenue was kind of tease, especially at the north end of Central Park, but the crowd support was phenomenal, and the avenue and Park were beautiful.

Finally, mercifully, I turned into the Park. Running with a gait not unlike that of Frankenstein's monster, I navigated those last, rolling hills, thinking how good a Coke -- a real one -- would taste after I crossed the finish line, if I could live that long.

Miraculously, I lived to cross that line and collect my medal. I might have been foaming at the mouth a bit when my wife took this photo but, fortunately, that wonderful autumn, late afternoon lighting in Central Park worked in my favor. Shortly after that, I tearfully announced my retirement from the sport.

But you never know.