We all have our neroses, and the longer you hang out with your teammates, the clearer they become. I have quite a few of my own and they typically involve food. In fairness, I think that I can blame all of this on my mother. My mom was one of those people who never threw out anything and thought it was okay to leave the container of milk on the kitchen table for hours while we ate, and then put in back in the fridge for the next day. Needless to say, I do not drink milk anymore and haven't for about 20 years. Maybe more. You can look up my age on my tri results, but I'm not going to make it easy and just give it away.
One night, I was over at my parents' house for dinner and they were cooking shrimp on the grill. You might think that sounds tasty. But the shrimp were the already cooked frozen shrimp type. You AREN'T supposed to cook those. You defrost them and serve them cold. Or make shrimp salad out of them. Whatever! So when I requested some of them to make shrimp cocktail, my mom said, "okay," and directed me to the pantry for the cocktail sauce. It was "new" and unopened. It was also black. In my world, tomatoes are red, they are not black. "Mom," I said, "how old is this cocktail sauce? Nevermind, I will just look at the label. Mom, this cocktail sauce expired 17 years ago!"
So yes, I became a little neurotic about food, and I grocery shop every 1-2 days. I also freak out when people try to shake my hand while I'm eating at a restaurant. Or if they lean over me to talk to someone next to me and spit all over my food. In my perfect world, we'd all eat at our own tables and wave to each other during meals. And maybe text. But not talk. And definitely not spit on each other's food.
When I started doing tris, I was quite shocked at my change in behavior. Not that I will eat old food...because that ain't happening. BUT I will eat food, any food, dirty food, food off the floor, food other people have touched and coughed on and stepped on and well, you are starting to get the picture. Is that an unopened pack of Gu I see on the ground that has been stomped on by 500 people? Pick it up and save it for later. (yes, I will wash the pack first). Did someone leave the mini boxes of cereal on this table from their swag bag? They are mine now.
At the Augusta 70.3 last year, I was the runner of our relay team, and the more water I drank while waiting for the race to begin, the more I wanted. But I ran out and couldn't find anymore. I spied a very large container of it that someone used to fill their aero bottle near the bikes. It was by the trash cans. They hadn't used much of it and were throwing it away. Hmmmm....it looked just fine, so I picked it up and refilled my water bottle. I might have drunk straight from the bottle. It's just hard for me to admit that.
This past fall, during my first century ride, I stuffed nutter butter cookies from one of the rest stops into my back pocket of my jersey and forgot about them. After the race, I was starving, and despite them being soaked with my sweat and quite soggy, I ate them and licked my fingers clean. I also scraped the remaining soggy, doughlike substance from the jersey pocket to get every bite. When you are ravenous from 104 miles of cycling, you just don't care what people think.
What? Licked my filthy fingers clean? And it hit me. There is a bubble. A triathlon bubble. It allows us to train and compete and not get sick. It protects us against all kinds of disease and nasty crap we get into. I have gotten out of some of the lakes we swim in with horrible bites and rashes only to find that a couple of days later, they are gone. We have all eaten from tubs of orange slices into which countless other filthy hands have reached before us, and not gotten sick. We drink from gatorade containers that I am certain have not been cleaned out since Gatorade was invented. It is the protective triathlon bubble, and you'd better be happy it exists. Because I know I am.
I am not proud of this behavior, not at all. But it does provide a little freedom for me to believe in this bubble. And perhaps, a little bit of therapy to be free from my craziness about food, even if it's only for a short time. Just don't tell my mother.
