But for my grandkids:
I ran 27 miles yesterday morning. Strava.com set up a challenge for its users, that for whoever finished a marathon in the past week they'd donate $10 to the NYC Sandy victims. So, I did. I've been building up mileage some so it wasn't like I haven't been running, and it was a good excuse to try.
The morning was excruciatingly beautiful. I was giddy as I passed evergreens lightly sprinkled with snow glistening for a few moments while the clouds left passage for some rays of sun now and then. And the fields were all contrasty with their overturned soil and little plops of snow on top. And then I ran past a nature preserve and saw a fox prancing in little hops down the road. I held up my fist like they did in The Fantastic Mr. Fox. Or maybe that was to the humongous owl I passed twice, with grizzled old feathers. Or to the huge bull with its muzzle neck-deep in a huge bowl of hay. Or to the little sparrow (?) on the wire that flew and landed and flew and landed with me for several dozen meters down the road. I honestly can't remember, but saluting the fox sounds best, I suppose.
It is a quiet country on the road to Cheney. After passing the wide open spaces of the fields and the nature preserve one enters the cloistered windings of beautiful road, sidelined by young, stately pines (?) and some of their squat Christmas tree cousins. Fences are frequent, both barbed wire and slat, and now and then a little home winks out at you from in the trees. There are mysterious dirt roads branching out from the main one, which I hope to someday explore. I left my mark on the one at my halfway point, if you know what I mean. There was a white dog with huge black splotches traipsing through the forest a hundred meters away and I was hoping he noticed. I'll be back.
I posted a picture to Instagram while slowing to a walk once I started up again. I figure I have so many pictures taken while running, I may as well take the chance to actually post one while running. Turns out it was blurry, but I couldn't tell while on the go. Probably won't do that again. Very often.
Sometimes I get emotional while I run. I think it's a conglomerate of beautiful experiences. The initial energy I have makes everything more easily visible and exciting. There are smaller anecdotes within the larger whole, like the coyote and the bull. There is the role of the sun, and the way he plays his lights and shadows for me. It is the feeling of stretching my legs on the downhills and the little dances I make around puddles or rocks that leave me feeling nimble, maybe sometimes graceful. On short runs it is the heave of my lungs and pounding of blood in my ears as I redline. And on the longer, it is the knowledge that there will be pain and discomfort, the agony of suffering through it in the present, and the satisfaction of gingerly folding yourself onto your side in the fetal position knowing it is all over when you get home. You did it.
And so, that was yesterday's experience, and it was beautiful. I'm such a Puddleglum that I sometimes wonder when I'll get hit by a car, or injure myself, or get cancer such that I won't be able to run again. I wonder similar things about my fingers and violin playing, or about my ears and hearing voices and music. And it's at those moments when I quickly revert my thoughts to the "genie" that I sometimes make God and quickly shoot up a Thank You for my healthy legs. I try to shoot it up fast enough so that it knocks the other thoughts out of the air in time to keep them from jinxing me, like Robin Hood the Fox when he quickly flicks up a second arrow to re-aim the misfired first arrow back down for an arrow-splitting bullseye.
It's not every day that I love running. There are many in which I merely glance out at the darkening world or the wet world or the cold world and decide I'd rather maintain my poor sitting posture on the comfort of my bed. But other times I get out without thinking of it much and run 27 miles. And those are the days I will remember, and the days that will make me proud.
So, Grandkids, maybe you'll love to run someday. But not until you're older because I don't want you to stunt your growth. But either way is fine, because I love to run.
