Closing in on six months to the 100 miler! The magazine Subaru sends me every month has a nice article on ultrarunning. I read something about hallucinations being somewhat common and had to look into it. Found a rather interesting blog post from another runner: "I couldn’t understand why she could not see the four-foot tall yellow and black bumble bee dressed in a red and white football letterman’s jacket standing in front of me. This cartoonish bee-man didn’t have legs but, instead, was supported upright by a stick that extended into the ground. The best way I can describe him is that he looked like one of those shadow puppets that are popular in Asian countries – the ones where the puppeteer holds the puppet by a stick behind a backlit screen. But this was not a puppet. My Stick Bee Guy had a long nose and was pointing a white-gloved hand down the trail, telling me where I was supposed to run. He was nodding at me and had a big smile. I liked him very much. Given Tracey’s ridiculous skepticism, I walked over to Stick Bee Guy and tried to pat him on the shoulder. But my hand passed right through him, and then he was gone. There was no stick. There was no bee. There was no Stick Bee Guy. I felt only the warm Vermont morning air where my trail companion had been only seconds ago. I trudged the last few miles to the finish line without saying much, trying to figure out where that Stick Bee Guy could have gone so fast. Later, under Tracey’s questioning, I reluctantly had to admit that Stick Bee Guy might have been a hallucination brought on by lack of sleep, physical exertion and dehydration. My two young daughters, however, thought it was cool that I got to meet Stick Bee Guy. For years after that encounter, the kids asked me “Did you see the Stick Bee Guy, dad?” when I came home from a long run or from an ultra-marathon. I have completed numerous ultras, including four other 100-milers since 2001. Unfortunately, I have never seen Stick Bee Guy again. But I look for him whenever I run ultra-marathons. I miss that little guy, and I still think he is real." Kind of wondering what I might see out there XD.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Jul 2013 20:44:16 +0000
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