I didn't go anywhere this weekend.

After filling the summer with flights from grief (literally), I cancelled a New York trip to see the USA National Track and Field Championships and attend a Foundation board meeting. Stayed home to coach the long run, watch the Tour for hours at a time, and sit on the porch with a good book. Maybe crack a few beers….

I received my lottery results for the London Marathon this week. The memo line said simply "Are You In," which reminded me of an old joke about sex but also got my heart beating fast. It sounded so promising. As I opened the message I truly believed I had beaten the odds and scored a coveted bib for the 2027 race.

Apparently, I like people.

I went to the Angel-Red Sox game Friday evening with longtime pal, John Burns. Great seats. Violated my pledge to not attend another Angels' game until Artie Moreno sells the team. Those seats were just too good to quibble about. Took solace in the bare-chested fan group shouting "Sell the team!” from the upper decks. I hear you, brothers.

I left my phone in John's car. Another casualty of grief is forgetfulness, I am told (I've been researching. It's a real thing).

Greetings from Rhode Island. I'm on the road again, this time to see my oldest son. He and his wife are spending a month in nearby Newport and my plan was a quick weekend to catch up. Fly Friday, hang out Saturday, catch a late flight home Sunday.

But planes will be planes.

Got back from Poland on Tuesday. The flight was almost twelve hours and my lie-flat seat wouldn't recline but I made my best of the time by re-reading The Norwegian Method. It's a science-based approach to training distance runners. If you read my Substack yesterday, you'll know how much I cherish data-driven training. This fact surprises me more than anyone I know because I'm normally an impulsive make-it-up-as-you-go individual.

I cannot see the Baltic Sea through the French doors opened up onto my hotel balcony. It is only one hundred yards to my left but there is a small forest between here and the broad sandy beach. I'm near Sopow, the leafy suburb next to industrial and charming Gdansk in northern Poland, where shipbuilding cranes silhouette the horizon like enormous metal storks. There is also a running path between the Hotel Lival and the forest and then the Baltic. It is leafy and well used by walkers and parents pushing strollers, and is most of all, rather lovely….

I went to Disneyland yesterday. A gift from my son. He was working and I would get to see him in action. Got there just as the park opened then dashed to Space Mountain and used the single rider lane to avoid the hour-long line. The guy next to me in our little rocket was very enthusiastic that our journey on an interstellar roller coaster was the best possible way to start a day at the Diz. He was very vocal and chatty, which I did not mind. What struck me was that for the first time in a very long time, the person next to me on Space Mountain was a total stranger. Calene used to scream through every swoop and bank. Scream. I'm glad my new buddy did not do that. "I'm going to do it again," he told me as we jumped off, whereupon he sprinted back to the single rider line. 

I ran errands yesterday. These are new to me. It was always Calene's role to run errands. Oh, I made the occasional Lowe's run but I never set foot inside Costco. It's not that I refused to run errands (a visit to Lowe's also means a quick stop at Selma's for a Pliny because they share the same parking lot), it was just part of our division of labor.

But now I know how to pick up prescriptions, every aisle in the grocery store, and the importance of upgrading the Costco membership for purposes of early morning admission….

Track season came to an end yesterday. I followed up my final high school track meet of the season by driving to UCLA and watching a professional meet with my friends from the USA Track and Field Foundation. I even got to hand Parker Valby her big fake check when she won the women's 5,000. That's what she called it. I liked that.

The shower in our Mammoth condo has the coldest water. Comes right off the mountain as snowmelt and blasts out of the faucet like a river of ice. A solid minute of that, followed by a quick turn to the right and instant hot water makes for an invigorating way to start the day.

That's not the only reason I'm driving to Mammoth tonight. The Southern Section track and field finals will go until 5:30 and then it's four hours up the mountain. I need to get away for a few days, go someplace where I can think and pray. Get the perspective that only distance can provide. This past week was just plain rough and I need to escape.

I'm going to church today. Haven't been in months, even before Calene passed. I don't really know why I'm going, to tell the truth. The worship music goes on too long, the message will be solid but my mind will drift, and it's a solid twenty-minute drive each way. Gas costing what it is these days, the trip almost seems like a luxury. But I will be around people and my thoughts will focus as I daydream, hopefully answering the questions troubling me this week. Perhaps I will run into someone I know and we will exchange hugs. That will make the journey worth it. In this world of fist bumps and high fives, sometimes the best thing is a solid heartfelt hug.

I am literally living under a cloud right now. It rained last night and the marine layer still presses down on Orange County. It looks like it will burn off soon enough. The sun will shine and I will head on over to the local to sip a couple IPA's and read a book. I won't really talk to anyone but I like being around the noise. We had our track banquet yesterday and I got several gift cards to Board & Brew as a coach's gift. No time like the present to put them to work.

Woke up late this morning. Scratchy throat. Feeling rundown but not sick. Just needed an aerobic easy day, in training parlance. I define that to my runners as a pace slow enough to facilitate recovery. The dogs needed to go out and the house was too quiet. So rather than putter around in the silence I reached for the remote. Maybe there were some good sports on TV.

Then I remembered: today is the London Marathon AND the Liegie-Bastogne-Liege bike race….

Another beautiful spring morning. Writing on the back deck, vases of sunflowers to my left and right. I am drifting, unmoored. Grief comes in waves accompanied by audible unplanned sighs. I should do something today. Maybe just go for a walk in the woods. I normally knock out this blog in 30 minutes or so. I've been sitting here now for a couple hours.

Here we are. The Long Run is finally in stores everywhere. It reads like a conversation between friends during a long run…

I'm settling into this solitude thing. The trick is not to be alone. Not all the time. I've seen three Springsteen shows in the last ten days. Coached practice every day. Headed over to the local with a book just to be around noise. I'm recording podcasts about The Long Run — no need to tell all of you that it comes out this Tuesday. Pretty sure I've stated that one too many times in this space. I also recorded a great interview with NPR's Morning Edition yesterday. Day Two of the Arcadia Invitational track meet is going on as I write, though I won't be attending. I didn't go last night either. When it's a choice between driving two hours each way in traffic and then fighting for a parking spot or watching a live stream before a roaring fire, I will take the computer every time. I know this breaks the thing I said about not being alone but I've only got so much emotional bandwidth. Getting back from Springsteen at midnight twice this week put me in no mood to make yet another drive to LA.

If you are in Orange County (California) in a couple weeks, know that I have a signing at the Aliso Viejo Barnes & Noble on April 25 at 1 pm. Give a little talk, sign a few books, pop to the brewery around the corner for a small after party. It's in between Boston Marathon week and Orange County Marathon week, so running will be in the air. It's also the start of track and field's postseason, meaning no lack of running/runners/strategy discussion.

A lot happening between now and then.

I am in Long Lake, Wisconsin at my college friend Dan Brown's hunting camp. The docks have been pulled out for the winter. A thick coat of ice still covers the surface. I flew in after coaching at The Ten Saturday night. One of my girls broke 5:00 for the mile for the first time. Got up at 5 the next morning for the drive to LAX. On the way, I saw a shadowy figure on the darkened tollway and swerved at the last minute. It was an owl, of all things. Enormous. Gray feathers. Flew away just in time. I have a thing for large birds of prey. Hawks, falcons, golden eagles, and owls. I would have been devastated if I had killed it. There's been quite enough death in my life recently.

Laid my sweetie to rest on Friday. I hear there's war with Iran, gas prices are soaring, and March Madness is in full swing. But I've been in a different place these past three weeks since she passed. She's all I think about. I haven't practiced my guitar or worked on my Duolingo French. I walk. I run. I feed the dogs. Keep the house clean, always using Windex to clean the counters because she thought that was important. I'm not hungry often, which is a first. I'm careful with my alcohol because I don't want to become a cliche — that guy who loses his wife and goes off the deep end.

I got away last week. Got a dog sitter and took off. Spent some time in solitude to clear my head. Long walks. A few dinners with friends. A couple really nice runs. Carried a notebook wherever I went so I could make notes for the eulogy. Then I wrote it in a single two-hour session, a few thousand words to define a life that deserves two thousand pages.

I called my sister Mary late last night. I was on the back porch drinking IPA and playing guitar. She couldn't talk. "I'm in a casino," she said, whispering as if no one speaks loudly in a casino. "I'm walking into a concert."

Before I could ask which band she was seeing, we said our goodbyes. I dearly love my baby sister. This morning she sent me a video from her seats, Chris Isaak singing "I Can't Help Falling In Love With You." Typing those words now, I feel the actual title should be tighter. I'd make it tighter. Too many words. Dilutes the impact. But you know the song. We all know that song.

Sunday morning in the backyard. Six weeks and two days until The Long Run hits stores. It's going to be 90 degrees today. Now might be the best time to hit the trails and log a few miles before it gets too hot. But I'll ride the Peloton instead. Weekends are when the electric bikers and horse people crowd O'Neill. The solitude I crave is nowhere to be found. Weekdays I have the place to myself but Saturday and Sunday is for the masses.

My barber made small talk during a recent haircut, asking me which sports I favor. We proceeded to talk about the end of football season, the sorry future of the Lakers and LeBron, and a little bit about the Angels just to agree that the owner sucks and needs to sell the team.

We did not talk about the Olympics — the best thing in the sports world for sixteen days every four years. Some people just don't watch the Olympics. To them I say: you don't know what you're missing.

We're eight weeks out from Pub Day of The Long Run. The marketing campaign is heating up. The publicity campaign is on the move. I've got a signing set for the last weekend in April at my local B&N. It's happening.

Shortly after the 1908 London Olympics, gold medalist Johnny Hayes and would-be gold medalist (he collapsed and was disqualified for receiving assistance) Dorando Pietri engaged in a match race to settle the score. Just two men. Racing neck and neck for an entire marathon.

Inside Madison Square Garden.

With devastating weather stretching from Dallas to New York, many of you are stuck in the house. Here are a few ideas to alleviate cabin fever. Read to the end for a big surprise.

We were wrapping up the Saturday long run. The creek is high in O'Neill so we couldn't get across. What was meant to be ten miles turned out to be a little less than seven. But I threw in a few hill loops ("slopes") on Twisty and a hard uphill tempo Mesa finish. What we lacked in mileage we made up for in quality. I didn't love it but I was OK with it. The slow build as we approach track season means more emphasis on flexibility to prevent injury. Better to do too little than too much.

Calene had a CT scan on Thursday. You know your world is surreal when CT scans and PET scans are business as usual. I have become a waiting room connoisseur, knowing which have the best chairs and plugs for my laptop. We were running a little late so I dropped Calene off and went to park. By the time I got to the imaging center they'd already taken her back. I sat down and began to write. It was just me and some other guy across the room who was speaking loudly into his phone, using a foreign language I did not understand. I have been blessed with the ability to write anywhere, shutting out distractions as if they didn't exist. I credit being a detached introvert for this skill set.