All the mothers on crossing guard duty had a smile or an ``attagirl!’’ for me as I ran past an elementary school about a mile from home. All the mothers except the one who was busy high-fiving a girl smaller than the backpack she was carrying.
``Be brilliant in there!’’ the woman told the girl.
Even though the encouragement wasn’t meant for me, it lifted my spirits and I picked up my pace a bit.
I run up to 60 minutes, five days a week. During the winter, friends will advise me to try the treadmill at the gym. Those friends don’t know why I run.
A jog on the treadmill would do just as much for my blood pressure, sugar levels and heart rate – which are all pretty good, despite my sweet tooth and love of all things fried. Indoor exercise would no doubt be as good as outdoors to further my goal of being around to nag my kid until she is well into her 70s.
I don’t run with a goal of working up to a marathon. I don’t worry about my speed, though I am occasionally irritated when someone who doesn’t look all that fast passes me.
My rewards aren’t T-shirts or medals, but moments.
A few days every winter I have to bundle up for my run as if I were going skiing. Thermal underwear, wool socks, two pair of gloves, collar turned up high and hat pulled down low. I step carefully and while so far I have had no spills, I’m grateful for a pair of ice-gripping traction cleats my mother-in-law gifted me last Christmas.
On one winter run I encountered neighbors barbecuing in heavy snow. The couple had planted their grill in the drifts in their front yard, and wore gloves and puffy coats. Perhaps it was a Sunday football ritual they were loathe to surrender, no matter the weather. I was running, so, hard to say who was crazier.
When winter begins to loosen its grip, I start to see which of my neighbors was on the ball enough to plant bulbs the previous fall. A nosy neighborliness is one of the reasons I run. Will that house on the busy corner EVER sell? Does the city’s historic preservation office know about the solar panels above the front door of that Tudor? Dejection when I notice a favorite neighborhood restaurant is boarded up. Euphoria a few blocks later, when I realize the place has moved, not shut down.
I come home with observations to relate to my husband. When we travel, I tell him about restaurants, galleries and parks I’ve run past and think we should visit together on our tourist rambles.
I take a watch when I run while on a trip. I head in one direction for 30 minutes, then turn and retrace my steps. I have little or no sense of direction, so the watch strategy is crucial if I want to get back to the hotel. I sometimes get cocky and abandon the straight-there-and-back formula. Once, in Vienna, that resulted in wandering for what seemed like twice my normal time. When I finally stumbled back into the hotel, I found my family blithely enjoying pastries and coffee in the café. It turned out I hadn’t been lost as long as it had felt. Lost time is relative, it would appear.
Sense of direction or not, I do some of my best thinking while running. That morning in Vienna, I managed to dredge up a phrase or two from high school German, though I did find the hotel before I found someone of whom I could ask directions.
Other mornings, a solution for a tricky transition in a piece of writing will come to me, on the wings of endorphins, presumably. Or, I’ll mentally sort through my closet and return home inspired to fill a bag or two for Goodwill.
I’ve even been inspired to poetry. I titled this “Homestretch”:
The final blocks are paved
With century-old red stone.
Treacherously uneven:
I should watch my steps.
But on a hot day
My mind runs ahead.
So vivid, it is more than imagination:
I feel the glass, smooth and heavy
I drink so quickly
Cool water splashes my shirt.
Two butterflies flutter brightly across my path
Snapping my attention back to the golden moment
Before I stumble.
Running is connecting with my surrounding and with myself. It’s meditative and empowering. I reach home, ready to see brilliance everywhere.