I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was bothering me.

I was packed together like sardines with hundreds of other anxious runners near the starting line of a big deal marathon.

Photographers were busy capturing images that they would, in turn, share with the world.

Maybe my angst was just pre-race jitters.

Crowds lined the streets and kids held up hand-made signs to en­cour­age their favorites onward.

Anticipating the sharp report of the starter’s pistol, the athletes steeled themselves for the 26-mile and 385-yard run.

I looked at my wristwatch to set the timer. Uh-oh. I didn’t have my watch. Maybe that’s what was ticking me off. And then it hit me.

Forget the watch! What the heck am I doing here? I don’t run. I hate running! No wonder I was out of sorts.

When I was young, my baseball coach humorously observed that I possessed three distinct running speeds: snail, turtle, and sloth.

He was right. I was accelerationally challenged.

So why on earth was I running a marathon? This wasn’t some jog around the park. Serious business was afoot, and I was confident that I was about to make a complete fool of myself.

Furthermore, I had multiple myeloma for crying out loud! I was anemic and weak. My bones were a mess. I just knew that I was going to fall down and get trampled. Someone please stop this insanity!

Even more bizarre, I was attached to an IV pole.

And, in plain view of a gazillion people, I was wrapped in a drafty hospital gown. Across the front of it was my runner’s number: 10. Except this 10 was like the 10 from one of those ‘from 1 to 10, how bad is your pain?’ charts.

My number 10 was freaking out and crying for its mommy.

Then I glanced down and noticed that my laces were untied. If that wasn’t bad enough, I was wearing shiny black patent leather wingtip dress shoes, brand new and not broken in.

Sheesh! How or why was I going to run in untied shiny black patent leather wingtip dress shoes? Oh, and I was sporting mismatched green and red argyle socks.

I was not only uncomfortable, I was also unfashionable.

As I was bending down to address the shoe situation, out of the corner of my eye I saw the race official raise his arm to shoot the starter’s pistol.

‘Wait! I want out!’ I shouted.

BANG!

Too late. As the shot rang out, I yelled and jumped up in a panic. My heart was beating a mile a minute, and I was panting like I had already run the race. My eyes opened wildly.

To my great relief, I found myself safe and sound in my bed at home. It was just a dream. You probably guessed that.

There was no IV pole. No argyles, wingtips, or cheeky hospital gowns in sight.

I was glad that my wife was not awakened by my outburst. I’m not sure that she would have lent me a sym­pa­thetic ear at three o’clock in the morning.

I’ve shared some of my weirdly vivid, myeloma-laced dreams with you before. This was a good one.

Someone once suggested that I go see an analyst or a psychologist about my dreams.

I have visited with oncologists, phlebotomists, internists, orthopedists, dentists, nutritionists, interventional radiologists, endocrinologists, nephrologists, hematologists, pathologists, anesthesiologists, and oph­thal­mol­o­gists.

I’ve even spent time with some fellow Methodists.

Frankly, I was about ist-ed out. They all certainly deserved a break from me. I decided to figure out the origin of my marathon adventure on my own.

Well, I was deep into my second round of consolidation chemotherapy, and wacky dreams were a nightly occurrence. Chemo was probably part of the answer.

My dream happened way before the sad events at the Boston Marathon, so that wasn’t it.

Maybe it was triggered by my friend, a skin cancer survivor who constantly harangued me to run with him. Running is a true passion of his. Not breaking any more bones is a true passion of mine.

Or it is possible, as Ebenezer Scrooge described, that ‘a bit of undigested beef’ from a questionable take-out barbeque joint did a real number on my slumber.

But what I really suspect invaded my dreamland was that four unrelated people, just days before that fateful night, admonished me to remember that:

Living with myeloma is a marathon, not a sprint.

I understood what they meant. Pace myself through the treatment. Results don’t happen overnight. Be pa­tient through the trials and tribulations of battling such a difficult disease.

Really, I got it.

But unable to fall back to sleep after my near-miss marathon, I started to think about that adage.

You know, most people enter a marathon on purpose. I haven’t met anyone who had myeloma on their to-do or bucket lists.

In marathons, I suspect that you rarely run two steps forward and one step back. With myeloma that hap­pens more often than we’d like.

Marathon courses are clearly set, marked, and measured for you. Myeloma courses – not so predictable.

When you run a marathon, you want the finish line to get closer and closer. With myeloma, absent a cure, you want to postpone the end of the race indefinitely.

In a marathon, you think about running toward something. With myeloma, you find yourself running away from something. Not only that, you feel like you’re being chased.

Before a marathon, you practice diligently to perfect your arm swing, your stride, your posture, and your breathing. After all, practice makes perfect.

Ain’t no practicing ahead of time before the start of myeloma. It’s hit the ground and run with it.

Myeloma sure takes us to some interesting places, real and imagined. I envy my myeloma buddies who can burn up the tracks. I’m cheering you on. But I think that this turtle will stick to walking!