By Emily Higgins McDevitt
I am a Runner.
My name is Emily Jane Higgins McDevitt, I am 56 years old, and I am a runner. I am also many other things. I have also been many other things. But through it all, all six decades of which I have had the pleasure of living on this planet, I have been, and I am, a runner.
The statement "I am a runner" can be interpreted in so many ways and means a little something different, unique, and special to each individual who claims, "I am a runner." As well, and I will elaborate, it can also mean many different things, at any given moment, to the same individual.
Six decades. That is a lot of running. Sometimes, it has been a lot of not running. But even in times of not running, I am, still, a runner. And I think, for me, sitting here at my computer writing this blog, that is the single most important thing that I have learned about myself and running. No matter what transpires in my life from here on out, no matter what has transpired, no matter what anyone else thinks now, then, or in the future, I am a runner. Before I even realized it, before running became the one single thread that would weave its way throughout the twisty turny curvy bumpy road that is my everchanging life, and I could look back and identify it as so, running was there.
“Before I even realized it, before running became the one single thread that would weave its way throughout the twisty turny curvy bumpy road that is my everchanging life, and I could look back and identify it as so, running was there.”
Growing up in Presque Isle, Maine, a child of the 60s and 70s, I ran wild. I am the fourth child of four, with a gap of 8, 10, and 12 years separating me from my siblings. My parents were older, especially for the 60s, having a baby at 39 (Mom) and 37 (Dad). They had been there, done that. I was, as I always proclaim, NOT a mistake! I was very planned, and I was to be a Daddy's child (girl, boy, it did not matter), I was to be the child that he would have the time, after having established himself as the town doctor, to help raise. I had other ideas. I was stubborn, independent, and unruly, and I loved growing up in a town where I could take off and run, bike, skateboard, whatever mode of forward movement, at any time, anywhere, and I did, often, and for long distances.
By the time I entered my second decade, my Dad had discovered long distance running and wanted nothing more than to do it with his youngest daughter.
Despite my teenage girl embarrassment, I ran four miles with my father in March of 1980. I was 15, he was 52, and it was our very first run together.
But I, being a typical teenage girl, wanted NOTHING to do with my sweaty, tight short shorts and tall cotton socks wearing father as he embarrassed the heck out of me running all over the streets of Northern Maine. But then my boyfriend started running, and that was a horse of a different color. I had always been athletic, playing softball, basketball, and volleyball in middle school, but I had never run for the sake of running. At first, I did not love it. Who does at first? But it did not take long before I was comfortably running out of town and into the potato fields, dirt roads winding up and down the rolling hills of Aroostook County. I believe this was the beginning of my true love of running. I can still smell, see, hear, feel those runs. I was 17 or 18 years old, and I was alone, and I was running for miles. I would run in every sort of weather, and I would run really far. It was freedom. And I was good at it.
As a 17 and a half year old, I had fallen in love with running, and I am pictured here, about to win the last cross country home meet of my senior year at Presque Isle High School in October of 1982.
One of the things about running that I love the most is how it has directed my life, usually, without my realizing it, ever, or much later. These days, I look back on the years and find myself saying, "If not for running, I never would have…" and the first of this phenomenon occurred in my third decade of running, leaving Maine, and going to college. I had never heard of, nor considered, Boston College until my running boyfriend was recruited by the school, and a teammate from my Maine AAU cross country team, which traveled to and competed in the Nationals my senior year, told me she was going to Boston College to study, and run, as well.
In November of 1982, unknown to me at the time, at the Maine AAU state qualifier, I would meet my future Boston College roommate.
While on a New England tour of colleges, I figured I might as well look at this school. Look I did, and attend I would. And I ran on the cross country and track teams as a walk on for one year, and then I discovered some aspects of college life that made that early morning four mile run every weekday seem a little less appealing, and I gave up the team for the duration of my years at BC. However, my running friends remained, and my running was never gone completely. It was just on my own time, in my own way. But, if not for running, I never would have attended Boston College.
After college, I had a stretch of years of not running for a variety of reasons, none of them having to do with the actual act of running. I was just doing other things. Some were good. Some were bad. But it was there, in the background. I was still a runner. I returned to Boston after having lived in Seattle for a few years, and I found my college running friends. They had this crazy idea… "Let's run a marathon!" I started training again, and before long, I was back to the girl who ran far and was good at it. But most of all, I remembered how much I loved to run. By the time the Marine Corps Marathon in November of 1991 arrived, they were injured, and I was the only one standing! I almost did not go to D.C. But then my Dad said he and Mom would fly to D.C., and maybe, just maybe, he would run one more marathon (he had run 16, I had run none). He tried, but a knee injury prevented him from toeing the start line, but not from riding the Metro all over D.C. that day, cheering me on from six or seven different locations before meeting me at the end with a big hug of congratulations for my very first, and still, to this day, my very fastest, 3:23:08, marathon finish. I was 26 years old.
My very proud Dad and I after I finished my first marathon, the Marine Corps Marathon, in November of 1991.
Decade four, my thirties, and the beginning of my realization that being a runner is not only possible but definitive, whether you are actually running or not. Because I believe, at some point in your running life, all the things that running gives, become a part of you, inherently, who you are, how you think, how you navigate life, becomes attributable to the fact that you are a runner, even if you are not running at that moment in time. In 1997 I moved to Nashville with my husband at the time, a plan, and an understanding of my life. In a few short months, all of that was upended, and I found myself in Nashville without the husband, no plan, and a complete rewrite of life as I had known it. But I had my old and constant friend, running. And we got reacquainted and soon became inseparable again. I joined a running club, I met new friends, several of whom were professors at Vanderbilt's Owen School of Management. After a few months of running, and running, and running (and waitressing and bartending), I applied to business school, with a recommendation written by a professor (and one of my best running friends). If not for running, I never would have found my way to the Owen School of Management, met my future husband and one true love, run my second and third marathons (Chicago in the fall of 1999, Boston in the Spring of 2000), gotten married, had two beautiful baby boys.
And the 40s! Oh, the 40s, and running, decade five. I could write forever about running in my 40s. Suffice it to say that in my fifth decade of running, I discovered the beauty of loving the running of someone other than yourself. I took my biggest break from running when I was Mama to my two little boys. I ran after them, a lot! But I did not distance run. On one park outing with my boys, I saw a business school friend engaged in an outdoor "Boot Camp." I had never heard of such a thing, but I was soon signed up, soon stronger than ever, and soon running again. Through this boot camp, I discovered team running (and all the shenanigans that accompany) with the training and two trips to the Hood to Coast Relay in 2010 and 2011. This led to two more marathons, my fourth and fifth, in 2011 and 2012. And then we moved back to Maine.
In 2011, my boys were not yet running with me, but they were watching and cheering. Rocket City Marathon, December 2011.
The joy and revelry of being on a relay team! Hood to Coast Relay, Oregon, 2011.
In Maine, the tail end of my fifth decade of running, and, in my current and sixth decade of running, I discovered this love of the running of someone else (even bigger than love for self-running, I will venture to say), primarily through my two sons.
The love of running through watching my two boys compete, illustrated here in the fall of 2020, as they were teammates for the first time on Camden's high school cross country team.
I am often asked the question, "How did you get your children to run?" and my answer is, "By telling them NOT to run!" As a lifelong runner and new mother to two highly active young boys, running was MY time, MY break, MY salvation. But over and over again, my boys wanted to join me. The watershed moment came on Spring Break in Florida, when I finally let my youngest join me, thinking he would hate it, as he was in orange Crocs and it was extremely hot, but the little bugger ran an eight minute mile and wanted more! Watching him love running, seeing his little legs flying in those little orange Crocs, seeing the smile on his face at the end, I was beaming from ear to ear, and suddenly, I remembered what I felt like running at seven years old. And just as suddenly, I entered the beautiful world of being a runner through one's children.
The watershed moment in April of 2012 during Spring Break in Florida when my running was no longer MY running.
We continued to run together as a family, and if we were not running together, they were my biggest fans, and I was theirs.
Just one of hundreds of images of my entire family running together over the past eight years. Nordic Heritage Trail Festival, July 2016.
Not only was my running no longer MY running, we ran as a family almost always, either they were running, and my husband and I were cheering, or I was running, and they were all cheering, or my husband was running, and we were all cheering.
Family trail running vacation in April of 2017. Moab, Utah.
Marathons six, seven, eight, and nine were all run, and every single one of them included my entire family. The Cabot Trail Relay was run three times, and two, and (hopefully) all future relays did, and will, include my entire family.
Our family running has been chronicled many times over the past eight years.
It was also during the tail end of my fifth decade and my current sixth decade of running that I discovered the downside of "I am a runner." I experienced the self-described "injury that must not be named" (plantar fasciitis, shhhhhh, do not say it out loud), not once, but twice, and both times, for a period of nearly two years. From the fall of 2012 through my self-surgery (partial tearing in the first mile of a nine mile relay leg in the middle of the night in Canada) in May of 2014 in my left foot, and from January of 2018 through November of 2019 in my right foot. It was during this second round of PF that I experienced some dark days. Try as I might to replace running with all the other activities I could do, it just was not the same. I wondered if I would ever run pain free again. There were days I wished I were not a runner. I was scared. If I cannot ever run again, who will I be going forward? How will I get my "fix?" I had never run an ultra. Would I ever get the chance?
It was as a result of my first sideline with PF that I found salvation in, and a substitute for, my lack of ability to actively run. During my sixth decade of running, my "I am a runner" resulted in the creation of, and continued participation in, the trail running club, Trail Runners of Midcoast Maine (TRoMM).
An injury led me to dirt, which led to the creation of Trail Runners of Midcoast Maine, pictured here in May of 2016.
As I aged, and as I injured, and as my priorities shifted, I realized the importance of maintaining an aspect of "I am a runner" in my life, for the times when I could not run. Prior to TRoMM and my TRoMM trail family, if I was not actively running, I was not part of a running community. In founding this trail running club, a primary goal was to create a community and one that would be open and welcoming to anyone willing to give it a try, as well as continuing to be available to those sidelined with an injury. Trail running and TRoMM have provided a place where a runner can continue to participate, running or not. The community is still there.
A beautiful illustration of continuing to participate in TRoMM while unable to run. Fall of 2016.
And I am so happy to report that largely due to that community being there, and my continued involvement in it with biking and hiking, and being patient, and having fun while having to be patient, I had a most successful return to running, a year of running and racing despite the pandemic, and did complete my first ultra, the Megunticook 50K in September of 2020.
So happy finishing my first ever ultra, the Megunticook 50K, in September of 2020.
My family, my biggest fans. Megunticook 50K, September 2020.
Sitting here at my desk in March of 2021, writing about my life as a runner, I am a runner. Whether running, hiking, biking, walking, snowshoeing, cross country skiing, I am a runner. Whether alone, with my biological family, or with my chosen trail family, I am a runner. Because no matter what else, running is who I am and who I will always be. I may have to be creative in how I continue to "run," but regardless, I am a runner. Period.
About the Author
Emily Higgins McDevitt was born and raised in Aroostook County, Maine. The youngest of the four red-headed children of Dr. George and homemaker Caroline Higgins, she thoroughly enjoyed her 18 years at 14 Dudley Street in Presque Isle. She attended Boston College from 1983 through 1987, then moved to Seattle as a Jesuit Volunteer. After two years in Seattle, she returned to Boston. From 1997 through 2012, she lived in Nashville, Tennessee. She has been a potato picker, a retail clerk, a camp counselor, a preschool teacher, a bartender, a homeless shelter graveyard shift bus driver, a nanny, a day care center administrator, a graduate student, a state house intern, a seasonal greenhouse worker, a bookkeeper, a waitress, an after-school program director, a graduate student (again), a research assistant, a wife, a stay-at-home Mom, a community advocate, a photographer, and the founder of Trail Runners of Midcoast Maine. And a runner, she has always been a runner. She currently resides in Camden and Mount Chase, Maine, with her husband, two sons, and three dogs.
