Breathe Owl Breathe New England Tour 2007

—Posted on June 6th, 2007—

we went to sleep a few hours before shaving Micah, putting band-aids on his nipples, and sending him off on the train

Our next stop was Somerville, a suburb of Boston where we met up with Susan’s old friend, cellist and fellow Interlochen alum Daniel Plane, who had just played his senior recital, and was graduating from conservatory. We played a house show to an intimate, but enthusiastic crowd, that included a very special rendition of ‘Werewolf’ where Andrea began to cut off Micah’s beard, which fell in chunks to the floor around him. The weather was getting worse, and there was talk of canceling the Marathon, which hadn’t happened since WWI. We did some carbo-loading with Micah, and went to sleep at his cousin’s house in Cambridge. Andrea ventured outside momentarily with umbrella in hand. As soon as she stepped out, the wind slammed the door, and turned the umbrella inside out as she stood on the porch. She gave a little cry, and hurried back indoors. Outside, freezing rain pelted the windows, and we went to sleep a few hours before shaving Micah, putting band-aids on his nipples, and sending him off on the train.

He finished in 2 hours, 56 minutes and 39 seconds

The next morning, the weather had improved somewhat, but was still cold, windy, and somewhat rainy. We got periodic calls tracking Micah with the microchip in his shoe. He was averaging six minute seventeen second miles for the first quarter! We pushed our way into the finish line and waited. We arrived just as the top women finishers were coming through. We watched the runners round the last corner of the race. Some of them looked great, and others looked like they were in a lot of pain. Micah rounded the bend, and we shouted to him, and then hurried to the finish where we found him, shivering and sore in his standard-issue tinfoil blanket in the cold wet and windy streets of Boston. We held him up as we changed his wet shoes and socks in the street, and covered him in our own warm clothing. He went in for a massage, and then we all sat down to an excellent lunch at the nearest Indian restaurant. He finished in 2 hours, 56 minutes and 39 seconds, breaking his own record at the Chicago by a minute despite the decidedly more hilly terrain of Boston in addition to the less-than-ideal weather conditions that caused the winner (a Kenyan) to run 7 minutes slower than usual.