This marathon involves several things I am bad at. The first and most obvious is running. The second is fundraising.

Team in Training works this way: event participants agree to raise a certain amount of money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, and TnT handles the race logistics and matches the participants with each other and with a coach. Once my knee went bad, I pretty much abandoned the team and the coach – I had my own special limpy-appropriate schedule, and anyway I don’t see any reason why runners feel obligated to put in their miles bright and early on Saturday mornings. But I stuck with the organization because they really do great work, and I like the kind of model they follow where everyone contributes something they can – coaching, running, cash, morale – and in the end this adds up to big meaningful things that just wouldn’t have gotten done otherwise. I am not the rah rah teamwork type. I am the let me just do this myself type, or the why don’t you just do that already type, and I generally don’t go in for the nonhierarchical consensus based project style. But in this rare case I am a fan. Rah, rah.

So my end of this, in addition to a crazy amount of running-related activity that I will describe in a subsequent post, is raising nearly $4500. This is difficult for two main reasons: (1) me, and (2) everyone I know.

(1) There are many things I like doing, and there are many things I don’t like doing but can suck up and do anyway. Asking for things from people I don’t know is neither. We are encouraged by TnT to approach businesses with requests for donations or services or percentages of their earnings, and forget it. Schmoozing and working connections is not my thing. The good work of the world could not be accomplished without it, but that is why nonprofits have development directors. And I would sooner run a marathona month than be one. Which means in my fundraising, I initially approached people I know. Which leads to

(2) I know a lot of people. Amazing, inspiring, fabulous people. To get an idea of them, pick at least one item from this list:

artist

musician

writer

grad student

four years of college loans

and one item from this list:

just bought a house

about to buy a house

just got married

about to get married

just had a kid

about to have a kid

just started a business

about to start a business

and then you will get a sense of who I know. And knowing this, you would be *astounded* by how generous they have been for this bizarre undertaking of mine. And that generosity – along with some equally overwhelming generosity from my parents and my friend’s parents and a few people I don’t even know – got us about 40% of the way there.

And so the next 60% looms, and I just don’t need looming right now, what with the graduating and the new internship and the general chaos and the running all the time. So I am chipping away at it. There was the first garage sale, which for all its agony at least brought in $150. And then there was a trip to the store that buys clothes, $15, and the store that buys books, $60. And soon there will be a big party, which much more will be written about.

But today there was a second garage sale, this time in my friend Warren’s driveway and not in the parking lot of a big box store, and it brought a much more cheerful and supportive $200. I’m still sunburned and exhausted like last time, but far less bitter. This time people gave me five dollar bills for three dollar items and refused change. And one couple saw my sign and came to ask me about lymphoma, because their friend had been diagnosed two days before, and she didn’t know what it was or where to go. And I told them about the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s website. And they bought a calligraphy set.

But no one has yet bought the Star Trek engineer costume. Let’s overlook the fact that I can identify the particular ranking of Star Trek officer to which this uniform would belong, and just say that I guess I’ll have to have another sale.