I've had several friends run marathons over the years. I once even supported a friend as he ran through the entire course in Stillwater, Minnesota and almost collapsed at the end. He later said something to the effect that he didn't prepare for it well, choosing a running pace that was too fast for him on this particular course. (He learned from the experience, and has gone on to run many more marathons since, as well as other courses of varying lengths.) But I've also listened to other marathoners talk about different points along the way: different mile-markers where one feels energized; and other mile-markers where one feels really exhausted; and yet other mile-markers where, after having felt exhausted, they feel rejuvenated again. Something like: mile 1 (fresh), mile 6 (strong), mile 12 (still going ok), mile 18 (utterly exhausted), mile 22 (rejuvenated), mile 26.2 (happy they completed the course).
In this prayer and fasting, I'm at about mile 8. But I'm aware of feeling exhausted from this marathon. Yesterday was the first day where I had a pretty open day, and almost spent no time praying through the thing on the checklists, neither the one I had created, nor what was on my church's calendar. I don't feel like I'm a horrible person for it; I'm just aware that I'm not going to do this perfectly. The pastors at my church have been good about this with us: one of them said outright that there's no shame if we fall off -- just get right back on and try again. After all, the point of this marathon -- and really, any marathon -- is to finish the course. Not to finish first.
What I did do yesterday, though, in addition to the devotional I began (see yesterday's post), is I worked on music, which is an item on my feast list for this month. I added a final track to one song (which, all it needs now is proper mixing), and then recorded from scratch seven instrumental tracks for another song. I've also been working on over the last few weeks another piano sonata (four movements), which has included taking three recorded improvisation tracks, plus a fourth that I created a sonata out of something I first had written in 1995. Announcements to follow when appropriate.
One final aspect to this marathon: back when I was blogging as a younger man, one challenge I periodically threw at myself was topping my previous personal record of posts per month. It really began when I would hit 20 posts in a given month. I would then challenge myself to see if I could post 21 in another month. Then 22. Then 23. And so on. I think I got up to 25 by the time I decided it was time for me to step away from blogging. Of course, this led to sometimes posting what I would consider garbage for blog posts, as well as posting twice in a day sometimes to stem the tide in case I would forget to post for a couple days. It was a personal challenge for its own sake, and nothing else.
Bottom line: if I post every day during this fast, I will have posted 30 posts for the month of June, and one for each day. And of course, because this is a prayer and fasting challenge, I don't really want to permit myself to post garbage. So this challenge, at least strictly from the blogging perspective, moves from what was back in the day a fun yet rather childish pursuit, to a really hard but potentially rewarding challenge. Plus I can see it fulfill one of the goals I listed in March about practicing blog-writing to someday be able to write at a professional level. Perhaps having to force myself to practice posting quality material for 30 (really, 34) days in a row will be a really good litmus test.