I tried to deny it. I tried to recenter and concentrate my attention on my stride. I tried to change my socks. I had my treads checked. I had my laces re-laced, but nothing was alleviating the hurt in my feet after a run. I’ve been running for twenty years in the same brand of …
I love running trails. I love escaping into the solitude and being surrounded by trees watching as critters skitter by. It’s something I discovered about myself in college when I stumbled onto the trail that I wasn’t even sure was a trail. It led around campus and as I followed, I knew there was something …
This morning I stretched out of the longest run since our six-month-old was born. It wasn’t anywhere near the mileage I was running two years ago when we found out that she was going to be joining our family, but it was significant because it was the first time since she was born that I …
This morning was only my second run in my new shoes, so there was certainly some discomfort. Running in new shoes always reminds me of how out of sorts I have been. It reminds me that rather than tuning into the aches and pains that had been accumulating, I have kept running unwilling to stop …
This morning, I knew it was time, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to run the 3.5 mile course I run on Fridays in reverse. I didn’t want to because I knew it would disrupt and disorient me. Yes, I know all of the reasons as a runner why you should reverse your …
I take my first awkward steps like a fresh born fawn fumbling and uncertain. How can the cyclical pattern of running, which I had done for so many miles feel like translating a line of foreign prose? It’s the breathable mesh and supportive, synthetic upper materials that actually exists in these shoes unlike the others …
I found myself running the stop sign run at my parents’ house this weekend. It’s uphill to the end of their street where a stop sign sits at the crossroads to the main road. As I tried to convince my legs and lungs that I had done this run many, many times before, I remembered the …
The streetlights had not yet gone off. There were murmurings from the houses that families were waking up to go to school, to go to work, to start the day. As Willie and Waylon and I ran by, the stillness and the silence of the day surrounded us. The quiet was a stark reminder of …
I’ve been told that I (or rather we, since Willie and Waylon are on this journey with me) are only a quarter of a mile from the end of the trail in Columbia that we’ve been running for over a year. Every time we run this particular trail, we don’t reach the end. Those who …
As we start out, I marvel at the neighborhood waking up. Cars starting. Seat belts fastening. Heels clicking. I wonder what they are going to do. They are going to work, certainly but what is work for each of them. A place to wear heels, bring coffee in tumblers, bags full of work stuff. Do …
