“This is my 10th year and I love it. This is for me the best time of the year. It is a very sacred event for me and I just love everything about the race.” Nirjharini is at the helm of one of the most exclusive food establishments in New York. It is a job that involves incredibly long hours, relentless preparation of countless meals and snacks, and a exotic clientele whose very specific needs are not like those of any other diner on the planet.
The 12 Self Transcendence 3100 mile runners very lives and well being depend upon what Nirjharini and her equally dedicated crew do in a tiny kitchen in Queens. It is a hive of activity for much of a very long day that creeps well into the depths of night. Delightful ever changing aromas continually waft out into the nearby flower garden. Smells that only begin to hint at the flavor and energy that seems to imbue every morsel, that is regularly packed up and shipped over to the race, 5 blocks away. Always arriving piping hot or soothingly cool to the runners as their needs, wishes, and wants evolve throughout the day . These remarkable athletes who always seem to be nibbling, and sipping, and chewing on something tasty that came from this very special temple of food.
It is perhaps the most superbly catered take out establishment that you just might find anywhere. Yet all the effort, and all the care, and all the love going into the food preparation is wholly devoted to only 12 almost always continually hungry individuals. For the food that is prepared here is the very fuel that keeps them going, both day and night for an average of 60 miles a day.
When their body feels as though it is dying from fatigue, or a pain or blister is screaming out in a foot or muscle, some tasty tidbit, some warm bowl of something, can be the comfort, the remedy, the very strength that makes their difficult journeys just a little easier. That all this food be fresh and tasty is crucial for each of the runners long hard efforts to make their daily laps. That it is prepared with such dedication and love may just be why they reach their self transcendence goals.
A soulful smile
Is the nourishing food
Of love.
A fruitful cry
Is the fulfilling food
Of oneness.
Sri Chinmoy, Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, Part 113, Agni Press, 1987