A Weeklong Challenge in Search of Adventure and Purpose

On Monday, May 25, I started a weeklong virtual challenge that feels like something I need right now, not just as a runner whose goal races have been cancelled but as someone who needs to regain motivation and accomplishment along with optimism.

The Limitless Vertical Challenge encourages participants to accumulate as much vertical gain by foot as possible from May 25 – 31. I’m giving myself the week to prioritize going up and down in the mountains and then recovering afterward to be ready for the next day. It seems escapist and perhaps selfish, but it’s also a consolation since the stage race I planned to do in May, the Mauna to Mauna Ultra, was cancelled.

I welcome the time on the trail to grapple with some hangups and malaise involving identity, aging and anxiety—you could call it a low-grade midlife crisis heightened by the pandemic we’re collectively experiencing—and I hope that whatever unfolds over this week will boost my confidence.

I won’t reveal a performance goal here, but I’ll try to share some details each day on social media. I got back on Strava for this week, to log the progress, so if you’re curious to see, you can follow my Strava postings here. (On Day 1 I did 8700′ of elevation gain in 29 miles; today, Day 2, I did a little over 8400′ in 22 miles.)

I will, however, reveal my psychological goal, and that is to spark a sense of adventure—a sense of exploration mixed with challenge—and to figure out what meaningful and purposeful pursuits, beyond coaching, I would like to do in the coming decade.

I also hope to strengthen my relationship to running. Running has felt so ridiculously challenging recently that I wonder if I should identify as a hiker instead. Running in this thin air, living at 9000 feet and surrounded by 13’ers, never feels particularly easy even when adapted to it, but lately I struggle to run without walking breaks even on flat terrain. My achy lower back and stiff upper hamstring make my stride more shuffling than flowing. My lungs seem shallow and begin to burn and wheeze after a few hours if I breathe too hard on a longer run. Two summers ago, I was diagnosed with bronchospasm and likely exercise-induced asthma, but an albuterol inhaler doesn’t help much.

Getting sick in March with a mild unconfirmed case of covid-19 set back my fitness and confidence in ways hard to describe or quantify. I doubt the illness affected my lung tissue in any lasting way, since I only had a mild cough and low fever for a few days (unlike my husband, who developed a life-threatening case of pneumonia from the virus), but who knows?  I feel as if I aged several years since March, and I feel the need to nap every afternoon now.

I’m getting old, I think, followed by, don’t think like that!

Wanting to feel younger and productive again

I stopped blogging and journaling with any regularity this spring because my mind slipped into a stupor following Morgan’s illness (as detailed in this post) and the life-changing circumstances of the global pandemic. The sudden turn of events involving the kids moving back home, his business struggling and then his frightening health scare put me into crisis/caregiver mode. But by mid-April, when these circumstances became a new normal, I started to feel increasingly disoriented and aimless.

Plus, my confidence shrank after abandoning a couple of writing projects. Composing a paragraph began to feel as stiff and slow as my running.

First, I shelved a memoir I had been developing because unearthing and examining stories about my parents and grandparents felt too confusing, haunting and scattershot. Then, a few months ago, I switched gears and summoned the focus to develop a proposal for an ultrarunning-themed book that would cover an area not fully developed in my first book. I submitted it to a publisher that I believed would be the best fit, given their line of books on running and other endurance sports.

I received a reply in early May that the publisher is not considering any books for the remainder of 2020 and then “will continue to evaluate the feasibility of publishing any new titles in the future,” because “audiences are looking for content to be distributed through digital channels.” They asked, could I turn my book idea into video or podcast? Um, no.

I felt like a fool for launching a book idea at the onset of an economic depression, when the publishing world, like everything else, is struggling and in transition. I slipped into a funk where I lacked motivation and confidence to get anything done, and I wondered, “What do I do now?”

Meanwhile, around this time, a photo popped up in my social media feed as an archived memory from four years ago. The date was May 11, and I couldn’t stop thinking about that photo and all that has transpired since it was taken.

(May 11, which was two weeks ago, also sticks in my mind as the only day it rained this month. I know this for certain because I’m tracking the precipitation and watching the weather forecast. As if the pandemic didn’t provide enough fear and uncertainty about matters out of my control, I’ve let myself become anxiously concerned about the oncoming drought and fire season.)

But on May 11, 2016, as this photo shows, I felt very different. Uncertain like now, but optimistic and goal-oriented. I want to regain the feelings and mindset I had in this setting four years ago.

Morgan and me on May 11, 2016, on our new property.

The photo shows Morgan and me sitting on the table at the center of land, six miles outside of Telluride, that we can call ours. We had just arrived from our home in California to live here for at least four months out of the year. Snow still covered the slopes of the mountains that cradle the mesa and form giant V’s of canyons with streams that drain into Deep Creek.

We had closed on the sale of this lot at the start of 2016, going into significant debt for the first time in our married lives. We didn’t know how we’d live on this spot, or whether we’d move here permanently. We didn’t know what we’d build and weren’t sure how we’d afford any of it. We had purchased an Airstream trailer to park near that table and live for an extended period, and we still had to figure out how to get electricity and plumbing to the trailer. We just knew it felt right and full of potential.

The wild, open piece of land gave me a sense of belonging and connection to my dad and his ancestors, who had been ranching and working in the area since the late 19th century. My father had bought five acres of ranch land across the road, and I had spent childhood summers here, playing and exploring on these acres. Returning to this spot to settle down made me feel more young than old.

A photo of my dad, 10 years before he died, with my kids on the same table shown in the 2016 photo.

We were so happy on that day in 2016—we were dreamers.

We felt the way we did back in August of 2009, when we took a hiatus from our normal lives and careers, pulled the kids (then ages 8 and 11) out of school, rented out our home, and spent the school year traveling nomadically around the world with no set itinerary. We traveled cheaply and limited our belongings to one bag each. We had faith we’d figure it out as we went along, and we did.

That long-term travel, like this property purchase, were grand adventures insofar as we didn’t have a clear plan and didn’t know what the outcome would be, but we embarked on the journey anyway. Adventuring is inherently optimistic. You’re not sure what will happen, and you know it won’t be easy, but you believe that whatever comes to pass, it’ll be worthwhile.

My kids, Colly and Kyle, a decade ago mid-May 2010, somewhere near Lugano, Switzerland, during our wild ride of nomadic travel. We hadn’t planned to go to Switzerland when we left home in August 2009 but detoured from Italy to road trip there.

Four years later, I can say those were the two best things we ever did, that year of extended travel and then buying this land.

What next?

In early May of this year, right around my 51st birthday and the one-year anniversary of our permanent move from California to here, we set up a family photo shoot to capture this special yet unsettling season, with the kids back home, brought about by the coronavirus.

Morgan and me and the home we build next to that picnic table. Photos by Melissa Plantz

These recent photos capture the in-the-moment joy and celebration of our family’s togetherness, and our health and home. But they also belie the melancholy I’ve felt since the start of spring.

I look at those photos and think, I am blessed; I’ve got everything I need and could want. So what’s my problem?

Objectively I realize that the pandemic has left me feeling more vulnerable and pessimistic than ever. I try to snap out of doldrums by reminding myself that we are so fortunate. Morgan recovered from the virus, and his business got a loan that enabled him to retain his staff, so we’re weathering the economic hit. Our daughter, who just graduated from college, has a good job lined up to start later this summer, unlike the majority of the class of 2020. We live in this beautiful place.

But the uncertainty and sadness of it all—the lives lost and businesses shuttered, the young adults hopeless about their future, the toxic and divisive politics—is depressing the shit out of me and sapping my energy to do much of anything.

I’m not sure what else I’m called to do, but I feel I should be working harder and making more of a positive impact in our community and beyond. I don’t want to feel the irrelevance that comes with feeling semi-retired and overly comfortable. I want to find something beyond running or coaching—or an extension of those pursuits—that helps others and makes me feel more hopeful and satisfied.

When I faced big life transitions at age 40, during that year of travel and career change, and a decade later when we left California and built a home here, I approached those transitions with a mindset of “gotta try new things” and an optimism that I’d figure things out along the way. That is the adventurous spirit I’ll try to rekindle this week on the trail.