“It is one of my favorite places to run.” As Suprabha says this, the dawn is greeting us with an incredible gentle glow. The 12 runners have already just set off and she has obliged me this morning to do a lap of the course with me. Of course she doesn’t get to New York that often as she lives in the DC area. So one can naturally assume that she doesn’t get to run here that often. At least not now.
But it wasn’t that many years ago in which this was not just her favorite place to run but in many ways the very epicenter of her life’s journey. 13 summers she spent circling this block and when I dare to even comprehend just how many laps and miles she ran here my mind shuts down. Latter using a small calculator, it spat out a gigantic trail of numbers. As I look at her lightly jogging along now, it all just seemed so unbelievable. How was it possible that this petite little woman could have run so many miles here. (40,300)
“Well mostly I just feel something here. Of course if I zoom in I can pick out special moments, but it is just really nice to be here. It is nice to spend a little time with the runners. It just brings it all back. Mainly I just feel grateful to be part of the race. Not just all those times but that I can still come back and feel part of it.”
She feels the presence of Sri Chinmoy she says just as much now as before. “Doing the same miracles. That is one of the most beautiful things about the race is that you can always feel that Sri Chinmoy is here.”
“I don’t think anyone will ever fully understand the 3100 mile race. Everybody I think feels something, and feels how vast and beautiful it is. Because it really offers something to everybody. So many people can be part of it, and be touched by it.
She then relates a story about the great Ted Corbitt when one summer he visited the race while Suprabha was running it. She said that when Sri Chinmoy learned that Ted was visiting with the runners he immediately came over to meet with him.
According to Suprabha he apparently asked Ted, who was by now quite elderly, why he hadn’t participated in the 6 and 10 day race that had taken place earlier in the Spring. Ted told Sri Chinmoy that at this point in his life he was having difficulty even walking little alone entering multi day races.
Sri Chinmoy told him. This is not something you are doing for yourself. This is something you are doing for the world.
“I think it is really true. Maybe we don’t even know what the race is doing. That is what I feel, but it has to be reaching very far. It is very expansive. I think we are really lucky to have the race.”
In the world of
Unbelief and disbelief,
Our faith in God itself
Is the miracle of miracles.
Sri Chinmoy, Seventy-Seven Thousand Service-Trees, Part 8, Agni Press, 1998