Does anyone else remember "Talkin Bout a Revolution'? What a beautiful song. I have these memories of driving in the car with my mom, running errands listening to it or Edie Brickell's "What I Am." And the memories seem like one, long memory as if we drove around running errands in the Silver Subaru for a whole year of my childhood. I know, of course, that they are small individual memories. Some of them involve snowscapes and fingers dragging over cold fogged windows, some involve windows rolled down and sweaty thighs sticking to each other, in some there is a Cocker Spaniel mix puppy on my lap and my mom and I are going to pick my brother up from school as a surprise. They are good memories.
That running together of memories is kind of what running is like for me. Excuse me the pun. And excuse the abrupt change of topic. Anyways: my running memories, except the time I fell on the treadmill, all kind of blur together. I don't run for long periods of time, and by this I mean both distance and the time between when I decide I will start running regularly and the time I stop. But whenever I come back to it, it feels like I'm re-entering that one big memory.
And I love it, because I never have and probably never will self-identify as a runner. I don't think runners consider three miles a long run. I don't think runners just stop running and start walking whenever they feel like it. I don't think runners have one pair of running pants and wear the same shoes for four years.
My favorite place to run is in the woods, even though I pretty much never do. But for some reason, that one big long running memory that I was just talking about, it seems like it is in the woods, like the ones below. Maybe that says something about the power of running. Or my delusional memory. Either way, running is a nice thing to come back to that feels something like myself but that I don't have to take too seriously. So many other things I do creep in and define me: writer, teacher, mother, wife. It's nice to have something to return to, that grounds me back in body when I get all wrapped in those things I'm supposed to be or supposed to do. I run, but I'm not a runner. And I like it that way.
That running together of memories is kind of what running is like for me. Excuse me the pun. And excuse the abrupt change of topic. Anyways: my running memories, except the time I fell on the treadmill, all kind of blur together. I don't run for long periods of time, and by this I mean both distance and the time between when I decide I will start running regularly and the time I stop. But whenever I come back to it, it feels like I'm re-entering that one big memory.
And I love it, because I never have and probably never will self-identify as a runner. I don't think runners consider three miles a long run. I don't think runners just stop running and start walking whenever they feel like it. I don't think runners have one pair of running pants and wear the same shoes for four years.
My favorite place to run is in the woods, even though I pretty much never do. But for some reason, that one big long running memory that I was just talking about, it seems like it is in the woods, like the ones below. Maybe that says something about the power of running. Or my delusional memory. Either way, running is a nice thing to come back to that feels something like myself but that I don't have to take too seriously. So many other things I do creep in and define me: writer, teacher, mother, wife. It's nice to have something to return to, that grounds me back in body when I get all wrapped in those things I'm supposed to be or supposed to do. I run, but I'm not a runner. And I like it that way.