We, The Runners of Tomorrow

I have been without the ability or the permission to run for almost three weeks now, well, at least since my Half Marathon failure in Houston at the end of January. Since then I have dealt with a number of different things in my life that have left me close to depression and quite far from my definition of success and satisfaction. Now I am well aware of the ups and downs of life, I have been dealing with them for 27 years now. In fact, my 2010 set new standards for life's lows. Be that as it may I still have the health of my family and yet no matter the course or discourse of the day I awake once more to see the moon has kissed the sun goodnight and the sun has chosen to greet me again. For the emergencies of life we look to set a cushion between us and disaster. Dave Ramsey said it best in one of his seminars. He said that if we setup a budget for life's disasters of emergencies we create a partition betwixt the two and they are no longer disasters or emergencies. For instance, if we have an emergency fund in a money market account or cash value in our Life Insurance Policies of say $5,000.00 and a $3,000.00 disaster happens, well it's not really a huge disaster because we were prepared. It still sucks, but it's not as bad as if you had no funds whatsoever and then a $3,000.00 disaster struck. I was there last October. I won't let that happen again. Two weeks ago a tree fell on the corner of my house...shitty yes but I had learned my lesson. I made a few phone calls and viola! no more broken house.

This past weekend I didn't have a financial disaster accost me with such burdens, I had a psychological one. One of immense proportions. One that I had never thought would ever plague my life. I realized at that moment that this situation was no more severe than previous situations, the only variable was my running was not present for this one. That 1 hour escape for lunch had eluded me for so long I began to lose my grip on stress. I began to remember past situations, though troubling, I knew every day I had one hour of just me and elements. Whether I did 3 miles or 6 miles I wasn't coming back for 1 hour. No cell phone, no computers, just the wind and the sound of my feet on the pavement. It was euphoric, liberating even, how elemental my runs were. Every Sunday morning a track workout at Saint Martinville Senior High School and then a distance run to ease the muscles. All this was gone from me for so long I hadn't noticed how important is was.

Running is my cushion between life, and what life decides to deliver to me. If I am having a great day, what better way to celebrate than a tempo run through local neighborhoods. If a bad day it is, then how better to sort things out, or forget about them completely, than with a slow methodical run. It's a release no matter what. I am not the fastest runner, but I am a runner nonetheless.

I am released to begin my running again on Wednesday. Hopefully my weekends will be free from too much work. I love life and I love running, they are not my masters but my servants. Despite their status I need them both.