Run Time

On Sunday mornings, while many people sleep in, I go running as soon as I wake up, because I'm an idiot. Plus, there aren't that many people, so it's one of the few times I can truly get some alone time, away-from-my-creative-writing-and-technological-tethers alone time. (Most of the time, I'm accessible to others at an instant's notice, or I'm subsuming myself for the sake of my writing. But when I'm running, the lack of oxygen after five minutes and the isolation means I can just free think. It isn't as if I'm coming up with great insight into the human condition, or that I'm contemplating my novel [though I might be, it is free think].

Honestly, a lot of the time, it's like a just-forgotten dream, and I don't remember the specifics, but it also isn't anything serious, and so I can relax, mind and body. I don't have to worry about the important people in my life. I don't have to worry about the unimportant people in my life. I don't have to worry about myself or my future. I don't have to think about a damned thing, if I want. I'll wave and say "hi" in a breathy, would-be-sexy-if-i-were-on-the-phone manner if someone passes, but for the most part, it's just me. And these days, I need it so much more than I used to.

People used to tell me that the older I got, the fewer friends I would have, but the more important they would be to me. They were half right. I have many more friends now than when I was younger, and they are more important to me now than my friends were when I was younger. This presents minor difficulties at times. Sometimes, like silly putty, they stretch me in different directions. Sometimes, I stretch, and sometimes, I snap. And sometimes, I run away from all of it for three miles at a time.

A while back, I felt like I was constantly fighting... something. It turns out that what I was fighting was my own laziness and self-centeredness [go back through Writ and do a word count. "I" will constitute by far the most common word, exceeding "candy," the next most common word, by more than a twenty-to-one ratio.]. Less and less of my time is my own. Other concepts have dibs on it before I do, for the most part. I'm even starting to borrow time from sleep in order to work on Saving Grace. But the running, that remains. That's K.T. time.)

Well, that was a hell of a tangent.

So, running. Usually no one on Sunday mornings, but this morning, there was another runner. We were running a one mile loop, only in opposite directions, so we crossed each other a couple of times. Now, I don't have the brainpower to come up with something witty to say on the spot, because all the oxygen is shunted to my legs. My omnipresent fallback for such situations is "We keep running into each other."

*groan*

She said something as I was running away, and I couldn't quite make it out for a few minutes, but what I think she said was "We do, you're so much faster." I think I really am getting faster over longer distances, and for some reason, I take real pride in that, in a way normally reserved for my writing. Probably because, like writing, I have a little natural skill, and a lot of perseverance.

Later, stumbling back to the apartment, a guy I've run past several times before asked me how much I ran, and I mumbled, "Three miles." He said, "Good," and kept on walking. Hell yeah. I remember when I could barely run a mile before wanting to die. Now, I run barely a mile before wanting to die, but I keep going. I know here *points to skull* it was just idle chitchat, but here *points to heart*, it still makes me smile, even now.