One of the best things about this crazy (stupid?) goal of running a half-marathon in every state is that it has encouraged (or peer-pressured…however you want to look at it) several of my friends/family to run their first half-marathon.

For half-marathon #11, one of my childhood friends, Hayley, was the willing victim 🙂

Hayley and I have gone to school together since first grade and were roommates in college so she really knows all my dirty secrets (of course, I have no secrets since I am practically an angel 😇). Our other college roommate, Elyana, and I have been trying to convince Hayley to join us on a race for quite a while. In the beginning on 2018 she finally agreed! We decided on Michigan as that is where Hayley’s mom moved for her power woman job at the University of Michigan.

Although the race was in Detroit, Hayley’s mom was gracious enough to let us stay with her in Ann Arbor (about 45 minutes to an hour outside of Detroit). We arrived super late on Friday night and after making it to Hayley’s mom’s house we all promptly went to sleep.

The next morning we awoke to a glorious spread of food for breakfast – Hayley’s mom had gone all out! There was yogurt, cheese, fruit and Hayley’s mom was on deck ready to prepare us eggs in our format of choosing. #heaven

This is clearly why children do not grow up and move out of their parent’s house…😂😂

[Brief side note: Speaking of parents…you may have picked up on the fact that I have been referring to Hayley’s mom as Hayley’s mom and not by any name. She has a name and I know what her name is, but I don’t know what to call her!! Do I call her Mrs. Kaiser as that is what I called her my entire life even though (1) she has remarried and (2) I am, theoretically, an adult and should call other adults by their first name? Do I call her by her first name and just wait to be corrected? Do I not call her anything and just avoid saying her name (pronouns are fabulous)?

So many struggles! These types of things are the real growing pains of becoming an adult that no one teaches you about!

As I pondered all of these options and had some mini internal anxiety attacks, I decided the best course of action would just be to ask Hayley’s mom. Since I was the first one awake on Saturday morning, it was just the two of us at breakfast. Time to make my move! 

Except, here’s what I quickly realized…when you are trying to figure out what to call someone, you need to have direct eye contact with them. Why, you ask? Because you don’t know what to call them so you can’t use their name to get their attention! And since Hayley’s mom was making us breakfast she was not looking at me (which, let’s be honest, I was okay with since I prefer the food to get the priority). Do you see how delicate of a process this all is?!?

Finally, I got up my nerve (and eye contact) to ask.

Drumroll please……

She literally just laughed!!! Which for anyone that knows Hayley’s mom this is not surprising as she does laugh a lot, but still! Apparently, this monumental moment for me was really not that big of a deal to anyone else. Sigh. 

Long story short, she is to be called Theresa. I’m still working on saying the actual name out loud, but I will start by referring to her as Theresa in the rest of the blog post. #allgrownup

Okay, sorry, that was not a brief side note at all…moving on to the rest of the blog post…]

After breakfast, we headed back to Detroit to pick-up Elyana’s sister, Elizabeth, at the airport before heading downtown so we could grab our race packets.

We decided we would spend the rest of the day checking out Detroit, which I have never been to before. We immediately stopped at The Guardian Building, which was right next to packet pick-up at the Convention Center. The Guardian Building was constructed in the 1920’s to be the headquarters of the Union Trust Group, a new banking group. The building was completed in 1929, just in time for the stock market to collapse, which took the Union Trust Group with it. However, investors decided to save both the company and the building. The banking group was renamed the Union Guardian Trust Company and the building was the Union Guardian Building, eventually shortened to the Guardian Building.

The building is a classic (and bold) example of art deco, one of the predominant styles of the 1920’s and 1930’s. The skyscraper is a National Historic Landmark by the National Park Service. Unfortunately, there were a number of events on the day we stopped by, so we didn’t spend too much time in the building, only checked out the lobby. The pictures do not do the building justice so please go see yourself!

Next, we headed to midtown to grab some food. Given that we all had a race the next day, we probably went to the worst possible option for lunch: a fast food burger joint with shakes. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

The interesting thing is that the restaurant, Royale with Cheese, was inspired by the movie Pulp Fiction.

So I don’t watch movies or even pretend that I am remotely in the loop of pop culture. I have never seen or heard of Pulp Fiction, but I swore it was a scary movie. I mean it sounds like it’s the name of a scary movie!!

Yeahhh, it’s not.

Anyways, apparently, they do reference royale with cheese in the movie! Seriously, thank goodness for google, otherwise I would be even more of a black  hole than I already am!

Once we finished lunch, we headed over to the Detroit History Museum. I love museums and this one was really great. First, the museum was free (although I must recommend that you donate money upon your entrance). Second, the layout of the museum was really unique and interesting.

The lower level of the museum had replicas of Detroit streets from the 1840’s, 1870’s and the 1900’s.

Of course, I have no idea how historically accurate the streets are, but it felt very real! I was impressed with the attention to detail and how the museum did such a good job of walking you through some important aspects of history.

They had a storefront for the Democratic Free Press, which was the short-lived name of the largest daily newspaper in Detroit (currently called the Detroit Free Press). I enjoyed seeing this as the race that we were in town to run is called the Detroit Free Press

The second floor of the museum had a whole section dedicated to automobiles, including an entire assembly line! Obviously, the automobile industry has played a huge role on Detroit and it would be hard to have a history museum that didn’t recognize this.

One of the aspects of the industry I enjoyed learning about was the rise of unions. The role, and public image, of unions has evolved so much over the last several decades, but I think it’s important to understand why unions started in the first place. In Detroit, unions formed due to persistent long hours, unfair labor practices and dangerous working conditions of the auto industry. Just for a quick highlight, in 1916 at Ford’s Highland Park Plant there were 5,400 burns, 2,600 puncture wounds and 192 severed fingers! 192 severed fingers!!! That is just too much (sorry y’all, I don’t do well with blood or the thought of blood…).

On top of the danger, the impacts of the Great Depression allowed for several unfavorable labor practices to occur. Since many carmakers had to shut their business, several hundred thousands workers lost their jobs. The carmakers that stayed open cut wages, required more working hours and allowed working conditions to significantly worsen. As a result, the United Automobile Workers of America (UAW) was founded in 1935 with the goal of negotiating more favorable labor contracts. By 1940, Detroit was the most unionized city in the US.

Of course, just because unions existed, did not mean that the companies would recognize them. While Chrystler and General Motors recognized UAW by 1937, Ford Motor Company was not having it. It was not until 1941 when the Supreme Court and the National Labor Relations Board ordered Ford to stop opposing the UAW that Ford Motor Company officially recognized the UAW. (Please note, I very much simplified the history here, leaving out several protests, fights and confrontations.)

I think it’s interesting to note the role that the Supreme Court had in requiring companies to recognize unions initially since any changes to the future of unions (aka their disbursement) is likely to be because of rulings by the Supreme Court. What goes around comes around? History repeats itself? 🤔🤔

The third floor of the museum had several different exhibits. One of the exhibits was focused on innovators and inventors…Detroit has some cool famous people!

Did you know the woman who started “Tubberware parties”, or selling household products from her house or via parties, was from Detroit? Her name was also Brownie Wise which is really just as interesting to me…

How about the man who came up with the idea to paint lines on the road so people could safely pass each other when driving? #ThanksEdwardHines (In other news, Mr. Hines thought of the idea for a lane divider as he was driving behind a milk wagon that was spilling part of its load onto the middle the pavement. And now you know why we have white lane dividers!)

The innovation part of the museum also had a neat interactive section where you could try to build your own car or make your own bottle of soda. Unfortunately, Elyana’s care did not make it…her wheels were just too heavy!

There was also a large section of the museum that showed the history of African-Americans/civil rights in Detroit. I felt this part of the museum was done very well. The exhibit started with a section on the Underground Railroad and went all the way through the civil rights movement in the 1960’s.

Fun fact: Did you know Detroit was code name “Midnight” on the Underground Railroad which was the last stop before Canada?

Not fun, but interesting fact: Did you know Detroit was considered the northern seat of the KKK? Apparently, one of the same things that attracted blacks to Detroit (good jobs from the auto industry) also attracted poor white farmers from Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.

The racial unrest continued throughout Detroit and, coinciding with the civil rights movement, seemed to explode in the “Uprising of 1967,” also known as the Detroit Rebellion of 1967.

I am going to be honest with you. I had never heard of this uprising which seems slightly crazy as it clearly had a huge impact on Detroit. I am not sure if the uprising seemed minor in comparison to some of the other events during the civil rights movement or if teachers were asked to focus more on southern event or if there just isn’t a reason?

For those of you who haven’t heard of it, I am including a paragraph from the Detroit Historical Society website:

“It began following a police raid on an unlicensed bar, known locally as a “blind pig.” Over the course of five days, the Detroit police and fire departments, the Michigan State Police, the Michigan National Guard, and the US Army were involved in quelling what became the largest civil disturbance of twentieth century America. The crisis resulted in forty-three deaths, hundreds of injuries, almost seventeen hundred fires, and over seven thousand arrests.”

Ummm what?!? Five days, 43 deaths, 1,700 fires and over 7,000 arrests?!?! HOW HAS THIS NEVER BEEN BROUGHT UP?!?!

All I am going to say is that if you go to Detroit, please go see this exhibit. Particularly, if you, like me, are not familiar with this event. The exhibit does a great job of explaining what happened and even includes a mini-show that has the voices of Detroit residents that experienced the uprising.

One thing I found interesting was that every part of the museum took a positive spin. There was this (not so) subtle theme about Detroit’s ability to bounce back after suffering. I’m not against this approach at all and, truthfully, it probably is the right approach to take because it doesn’t do anyone good to focus on one’s ability to overcome challenges. However, I felt as an outsider that is was hard to see the true reality of Detroit.

Is Detroit one big happy multicultural family now? There is no racial unrest or issues? Yeah, doubtful.

And what about this whole declaration of bankruptcy thing? How can you file the largest municipal bankruptcy in the history of the US and not really talk about that in a Detroit history museum?

I’m not trying to argue that Detroit is a bad city. They have issues, just like all cities do. I just wish that the ‘uplifting tone’ of the museum had some traces of reality intertwined.

After our Detroit adventure, we drove back to Ann Arbor where we had a spaghetti dinner and just enjoyed the night together (clarification: early night as we went to bed by like 9 PM).

The next morning was race day aka the worst day ever.

WHY IS THE WEATHER ALWAYS SO TERRIBLE IN EVERY RACE I RUN?!!?

No seriously. It was miserably cold. Not just cold, but unbearable windy.

I was not a happy camper. Seriously, I wish you could understand how many layers I had on and how bitter I still was.

After arriving in Detroit, we decided to take a pre-race picture so we could capture the “before death.” Please casually ignore the sketchy parking garage structure we took the picture in.

Up to this point, I felt like the race organizers had done an amazing job with the logistics and details, especially for a race with so many people (upwards of 25,000 runners). Both the half marathon and the marathon cross over into Canada (super cool!!!) which is a logistical nightmare….border crossing galore? But the race organizers were very clear about what you needed to bring and we had no issue at the race expo getting our passports checked. Similarly, all race day communication was straightforward and sent far in advance.

So it was a bit of a surprise to me when we got to the beginning of the race and it was just a huge mess. There are thousands of people in each corral and the space between each corral was TINY! People were overflowing everywhere and then starting to panic that they weren’t going to start the race in time. I was legitimately fearful of a stampede occurring.

Thankfully, there was just a lot of people, but no stampede 😌

Hayley and I started the race together. We ran together until about mile 3 when we started crossing the bridge to Canada.

Okay, maybe I am a bit nerdy, but running into Canada was so great!!! I have only ever been to Canada on a boat and it was just weirdly amazing to be able to start a run in one country, go into a totally separate country and then end your race back in the first country. As I write this, I realize that it’s probably not a big deal for people that live in Europe, but for someone like me who the coolest likewise event is running from VA to MD (really not exciting) this border crossing event was fantastic.

Also, the Canadians were great. They had SO many people on the streets cheering for us. And orange slices! They cut up orange slices for us!!

Maybe it wasn’t a big deal to them because they are used to the weather, but it literally got me emotional that people were willingly outside in the god awful weather just to cheer us on. #blessyouCanada

We were in Canada for about 4 miles or so. On the way back to the US, we ran through the tunnel (as opposed to the bridge). The tunnel is a mile long. Let me tell you, a mile does not seem that long in a car, but when you are running a mile in a small enclosed area it feels like eternity. It also probably didn’t help that the tunnel was SUPER stanky. All those sweaty humans in an enclosed space did not bode well for the smell. On the bright side, now I can officially say I’ve completed the “longest underwater run.” (Yes, yes, all jokes I know haha)

The neat part about the tunnel was being able to stop at the divider between Canada and the US. There’s nothing like crossing a border on foot!

The worst part of the entire race was right after the tunnel. Not only was it 100% uphill, but it was soooo cold! In the sauna of the tunnel you somehow forgot how miserable and windy it was outside, so when I finally emerged from the tunnel, the freezing air was like a slap in the face.

Sadly, the rest of the race was not much better. The last five miles felt as slow as molasses. I’m not exaggerating – I am pretty sure I ran two miles in between mile 9 and mile 10. Can I get a double check on that course distance?!

In the end, I did manage to finish the race (2:26:36) 🙏 🙏. Even though my body was not on board, I felt pretty good mentally throughout the race. I was able to convince myself that I better keep running, otherwise I was just going to be stuck in this awful weather for longer.

Hayley finished about twenty minutes or so after me which is super great considering that she did not actually do any training for the race (I told her not to follow my lead!!).

And then of course there was damn speedy Elyana who finished her FIRST EVER MARATHON IN UNDER FOUR HOURS (3:52:20)!!!!!!! No seriously, she was so fast we actually missed her at the finish line…#goals

Also, I have to call out Elyana’s sister, Elizabeth, for seriously showing the rest of us older sisters up. Elizabeth lives in Boston, but flew out to Detroit for approximately 36 hours (even changing flights) just to cheer Elyana on during her first marathon. She made all these amazing signs for Elyana and strategically placed herself throughout the race to cheer Elyana on!

It was so thoughtful/nice of her that it actually guilted me into buying plane tickets for my own sister’s first marathon. Yes, I totally caved to the societal pressure of not being a good enough sister.

(And for those of you wondering, Mara did actually finish her marathon!)

In conclusion, this race definitely gets a thumbs up from me. It was well organized, the route was ideal and the race shirt was one of my absolute favorites. My only hope for you is that it’s not nearly as cold as it was during our race!

After the race we went back to Ann Arbor and Theresa took us around the town. We went through campus and our tour guide (aka Theresa) gave us the scoop on the fun facts about the University of Michigan and Ann Arbor.

1. The Michigan Stadium is the second largest sports stadium in the world. The largest stadium? Well that would be the Rungrado May Day Stadium in North Korea. Yes, you heard me correctly, North Korea. 🤣🤣
2. A good number of famous people attended Michigan. One being Madonna (who knew?) and another being Gerald Ford. Although, it should be noted that Gerald Ford has no relation to Henry Ford. In an interesting twist of history, Gerald Ford was born Leslie Lynch King Jr., but after his parents divorced and his mom remarried they started calling him Gerald Ford Jr. (after his stepfather). Weirdly, they never legally changed his name so he wasn’t officially Gerald Ford until sometime in his 20’s.
3. Even though Ann Arbor isn’t a huge city, several large name companies were founded there. Both Domino’s (technically it was founded in a small town Ypsilanti which is right outside of Ann Arbor) and Borders Bookstore were founded in Ann Arbor and are still headquartered there now.

Downtown Ann Arbor was really cute and I would definitely recommend spending some time there. If it hadn’t been so cold and my legs actually worked, I would have loved to just walk around!

The rest of our time in Michigan was just spent relaxing. And by relaxing I mean I found a kitty to cuddle with while I worked on grad school homework!!!! Sigh. Life really is good.

P.S. Since the post had several questionable photos of me, Hayley and Elyana, I feel the need to end the blog on a high note with a cute picture of us. I promise we really can clean up nice! 🙂