Denver, Colorado, United States.

Dec 30

34-Kilometer Race

I am 25 years old.

I have lived 20 years in my home country, Honduras; 3 years in my second country, Mexico; and 1 year in my third country, the United States.

Now, let’s land in the year 2023…

The winter cold burns the skin, similar to the sensation of burns under the heat. The light that illuminates the earth transitions from different perspectives during the day, and putting my body in motion out there creates snapshots of all sensations per second, storing them in an infinite memory. If I could fully access the present, I could feel every sensation of what is happening now, but I have not yet managed to do so. I can only do it in small fragments, and when I’m there, everything seems to feel with deep acceptance and gratitude. Instead, my brain runs off the rails towards the past and the future, and the present seems only a bridge to cross to one of these two places. So, when am I really living?

Something tells me that I will be able to observe this entire human experience from an eternal place, and it tells me strongly that I don’t have to feel any concern or need to force my mind not to be present. It seems that much uncertainty lies in the present; you really don’t know what will happen, and even though I am making it happen, it’s really hard for me to be here. I want to be able to be here, in body, mind, and soul every day, to truly feel it, and not have to die to come back to observe it in a way where my soul is just a spectator. I need to be present at every stage, most of the photographic shots, and only make trips to the past to understand unfinished scenes and give myself other spaces to create the future I want, but again, to be in most of the shots here in the present.

It’s my 25th Christmas, on the 25th, and I go out for a run through the city of Denver, Colorado, in a winter with temperatures below zero, with leggings and a jacket, trusting that I will manage to balance my breathing so that my body stays at a functional temperature and does not suffer from hypothermia. I questioned Christmas a couple of years ago, wondered what it really means to me, and the memories associated with this event take me back to my childhood at my maternal grandparents’ house. These people have an extremely good heart; they donated land for the construction of the Catholic Church in the community, located in the western region of Honduras, conquered by Spain from Europe. These communities develop in a mixture of Spanish beliefs from past times and a vague memory of their own ethnicity. So, my maternal grandmother is an activist belonging to Chortí Maya groups and is also a participant in the Catholic religion. I think this is the best way to try to describe these currents in Latin America and their mestizo nature. I was taught Christmas as the birthday of Jesus Christ in the Catholic religion, and Santa Claus was a confusion I had for a moment. I suppose the idea of an old man smiling, carrying gifts, and coming down the chimney, where no one could see him, fascinated me. I even stayed on several occasions watching to see him and talk to him, but it seemed that when I got distracted, he left the gifts under the Christmas tree. Growing up with three different families, I could see from an early age that there was no absolute truth and that each family seemed to have its traditions and ways of seeing life. These three families were my mother’s family, my father’s family, and both families that each created both in my mother’s marriage to someone who was not my father, and in my father’s marriage that was not with my mother.

I have reached the conclusion that Christmas, regardless of religion or perspective, is a special time to gather with family, pause any roles being played in the external world, and return to the company of a group of people with the intention to celebrate and share. This is the second Christmas I celebrate with new acquaintances in a new country, but I now understand that no matter what I’m doing, I want to be with my family in the coming Christmases. I consciously choose this, and that will mean Christmas for me: sharing time in the present with my family.

I named this the ‘XMAS Marathon’ and set out on the afternoon of December 25th with the intention of conquering my first 42-kilometer marathon. Throughout this year, I have been training my body with runs and subjected it to 250 hours of yoga. My first long run this year was 25 kilometers. After many years of training in the gym, I realized two years ago that I wanted to learn to engage in outdoor sports. I started cycling up to 40 kilometers on my first sports bike in the city, from Puebla, Mexico, and this began to teach my brain how to react immediately to traffic and understand external road communication. Before training outdoors, I was terrified to cross the street; now, I can even anticipate this external movement seconds in advance and move my body in the directions I want. I’ve also discovered that each different sport provides external views in different ways. I mean, you can travel the same street, but it seems that the human eye captures it differently depending on the movement it is making. As if those visual parts that sometimes seem to escape can be captured by putting together more pieces of a puzzle that you didn’t know were there, waiting to be assembled.

In my Xmas Marathon I on this December 25th, I reach the first 10 kilometers in an hour and a half. I had to create a body movement that helps me withstand the low temperatures. I stop for a moment to observe the landscape: Christmas lights, people walking with their dogs, and empty streets. Most Denver residents seem to have moved from other states, so on Christmas and Thanksgiving Day, the city feels deserted.

The sunset begins to take away the daylight, and my survival alerts activate. My brain tells me to turn around and go back to my apartment, but my soul loudly says that I will turn back after kilometer 21. I continue and reach the Cherry Creek trail where there no longer seems to be close contact with civilization. It feels like I’m immersing myself in a reality of clear skies, waters crossing the city aqueducts, some wildlife, and very few humans walking, even under the trail bridges, I can see homeless people wrapped in piles of rags. I continue.

I’ve shared an audiobook recommended by one of my friends from Honduras, with whom I’ve had a friendship for more than ten years. This book is called «Hambre de Hombre» (Hunger for Man) and is written about personal overcoming by the author and studies conducted on different women she works with. This book comes to this point in my life as another piece of the puzzle on my journey towards self-healing, unlearning, and returning to the root of myself. It poses to women the question of where they choose their partners from, whether from the woman they are or from a wounded child who has not healed. It opens an extensive conversation about where we experience the relationships we make with other human beings, whether from the realization of our existence or from societal and genealogical patterns. This book even questions current feminism, placing it in the extreme, leaving the current and recent generation confused. It has not left a space in the middle for reflection and understanding that genetically, women are different from men. The goal is equity, respect, equal rights, equal opportunities, and the choice for women to have the freedom to choose their own destiny. But it is urgent to open a conversation within feminism about the current demands on women without a functional structure towards the reality of biological design and the difference between the feminine and the masculine. And personally, this is not about equal parts but necessary parts that need each other to be complete.

Personally, I embrace my femininity wholeheartedly, inhabiting it in a balance where I free myself to experience what my soul desires. I give myself space to question, for in wakefulness, I can find an identifier that makes me feel I am truly creating my own reality. Those parts I don’t understand, current processes, and those places and dreams where I have yet to navigate, I leave to this infinite illuminated power, which I sometimes call God and other times Universe. I constantly work on an acceptance and gratitude for life that allows me to understand that I am a spiritual being having a human experience.

I’ve reached kilometer 15 of this race. The sky seems clearer, and the existence surrounding mine seems desolate at this moment. I take a deep breath of icy air that sails and warns me that I am experiencing winter. This exercise will help my body create recognition and allow me to traverse it with confidence. My body is amazing and has a quick adaptability because it is designed to experience life on this planet Earth.

Listening to this book, I pose the following question to myself: What does being a woman mean to me? I quickly respond that I am also a creator for myself of what it means to be a woman. This information comes to me quickly because I participated in a march in Puebla, Mexico, in 2022, to protest the high numbers of femicide in Mexico and the need for effective laws applied instantly to stop this, to achieve justice, create safety, and raise awareness of respect towards women.

This is a sacred moment in my life, where I have created an astonishing strength to take responsibility for myself as a human being, emotionally, economically, and to venture outside to fight to achieve and realize the dreams I want to bring to this reality, and to live from my authentic self. At this moment, as a 25-year-old single woman, I realize that I am thankful to be part of the struggle through my own experience of choosing my own destiny. When I think of a union with a man, I want the creation of this pure and true integration, where my femininity does not feel intimidated by masculinity. I desire to create a space with the man I choose and who chooses me, a dual union, where both are unstoppable, respecting our spaces and our own individual development, and where there is a creation of one. I seek to feel respected, supported, loved, and have the freedom to experience motherhood with the flexibility of my own times for raising and educating my children, as well as the freedom to continue with my own personal projects. I intend for that to happen by choice when entering those new stages and experiences. Although I am in other processes at this moment, thinking about this fills me with excitement.

I’ve reached kilometer 20, and it seems like it’s just me from the view of my human eyes. The cold intensifies so much that I’m not sure if I should continue. So, I begin to create a space to reflect on what has happened this year and how I can feel so much growth, understanding, emotion, and gratitude toward life. I think about how hungry I am to experience and how brave I want to be to let go of what no longer serves a purpose in my life, what has fulfilled its cycle. Even those unfinished parts where I feel so much pain about having to leave, but where the pain seems more extensive if I decide to stay close. That’s when I embrace myself and surrender to my faith in God to keep moving forward, even if there’s a fog that doesn’t allow me to see clearly. I trust.

Running has been crucial for me this year because it has allowed me to express through my body all the confusion and reach a point where I can feel clarity. It is the embodiment of a body that keeps moving even when everything seems to be against it.

Venturing outside to seek your truth is an adventure because navigation must be done inward in deep darkness. When born from there and deciding to evolve towards the light, the external seems a material expression of what arises from within.

The United States is a representation of a capitalist system with instructions created for those who want to follow what others say is the truth. In this, it does not differ from the different systems created and implemented in various countries worldwide. It is also challenging here to know the original creators of its true experience. However, the same structure that supports the idea of this country frees spaces for those who decide to go outside and live their own reality, and this makes me grateful to be here.

I have left what felt desolate and integrated into civilization. I see a new part of the city that no longer seems like the city but rather suburbs of a state I have not yet explored. It is here when I turn to return to my apartment and finish this XMAS Marathon I. It is here where my body starts sounding alarms strongly, but I decide to continue without seeking refuge. I know I can achieve it.

I have achieved, through the required presence to survive in these low temperatures exposed to the external, to immerse myself in the present. From here, I contemplate my current existence as if I could see myself through the different axes of this planet, and it feels damn beautiful. I am experiencing running a marathon, and isn’t this what I came for? To experience through this human body?

I have learned a new language in a year, one that I clearly do not master perfectly. English, which originally is not even from America, but everyone here acts as if it were, just like Spanish in Latin America. But, what do the words mean in the end? They are just symbols seeking communicative systems among humanity. It has been my first year working in-person in an office, allowing me to interact with people who speak this language and learn to communicate with them. Although I am not doing the work that fills me with passion at the moment, it places me temporarily to learn. Honestly, real estate management and negotiation wake my interest in this idea of doing business. Perhaps it’s a part I need now. My mind goes in so many directions that having this systematic creation of structured work helps me focus naturally. I feel I can learn with ease, and with the experience of dancing with these theories, landing them seems advantageous. I can even applaud with excitement.

I am going out; I want to continue making it happen my way, with sacred respect for my own rhythm, creation, landing, and understanding. I am not in the external conversation. I am trying to grasp mine entirely. I don’t know what is happening with politics currently, I don’t know about the wars that are happening. Although the pain of the collective interrupts my station, it is inevitable not to feel anguish, desperation, pain, and confusion when the echoes of a collective are felt. Very little happiness comes from these different stations. I try to create a space where I can send love and positive energy, where in this part that I have to transit and create, I want to heal it, I want to evolve it. I am trying to stay in my own station.

Even those who seem to live their lives like the cycle of a plant, I do not judge them; I respect their ways. But I choose how to educate myself, I choose what I want to learn, within the systematic human forms that I can control. I choose what is most convenient for me, and I don’t plan to apologize for this because my intentions always come from a pure and honest place. In the mystery of communication not 100% with the soul, there are processes of deep learning that I do not consciously remember choosing, but I trust that everything will make sense, and I will soon understand why. Or simply reach the point of not seeking why, and just be grateful.

I reach kilometer 33, and here I can no longer ignore my mortality. The temperature continues to drop, and I must find a place to recover before entering a state of hypothermia. The clothes are not suitable, and I begin to feel ice on my skin. I run a little faster and reach the lobby of a building that looks like a hotel. I breathe, take water, keep breathing, and return to my body; I begin to feel intense pain. I finally recover a warm breath after being there for 30 minutes and call an Uber. My apartment is very close, but I can no longer expose myself for that day. My Xmas marathon seems to be 34 kilometers this time. I arrive at my apartment trembling, fill the tub with Himalayan pink salt, the water is warm. I see my feet destroyed, my red groin, my lower back burned, and it is difficult for me to move through space. I breathe deeply and warm up again. This race has been extreme due to the weather conditions, but I went out to try it. I feel inspired to keep running, and I hug myself for also knowing when to stop.

2023

Thank you for catching me in your existence, thank you for the songs that accompanied the soundtrack of these times, thank you for the new learnings, for those long nights of confusion where I felt sick of life and wanted to escape, but I stayed there observing my own existence. Knowing that I am bigger than all of this, that I continue to know myself in each and every one of my forms. I am seeing the different faces, I remain true to myself against all odds, I navigate it, I float and the sun is radiant, so enlightened.

You are the ocean, surfing one of the waves, but do not forget that you are already the ocean.

Written by Kafme