40 Years on the Run

It just occurred to me this morning that this month marks an important anniversary in my life. I don't know the exact date. If I'd known it would be important, maybe I'd have written it down. But I didn't know, and I didn't write it down. Maybe it's today. Not that it really matters. What happened is this: One day in October 1971, 40 years agone, I went out for a run and never came back.

Okay, I came back, but I've been going out regularly, five or six days a week ever since. If moderate exercise will keep me in good health, I should be pretty dang healthy. I've been pounding the pavement for 40 years now. If nothing else, I have sturdy calf muscles.

I can remember exactly what I was wearing that first day. The first cool front of the fall had come through, and I had on a pair of wheat-colored jeans that there's no way I could squirm into now, a paisley shirt (long sleeves), and a pair of rubber-soled canvas shoes that I'd used to play handball in when we lived in Austin.

My plan was simple: I'd run as far as I could, then turn around and walk back home. I took off from the end of my driveway, turned right and ran down Ninth Street to Indian Creek Road. I turned left and ran until I couldn't run any more. I figured I'd gone at least a mile. Maybe two. I was quite pleased with myself as I started the long walk back.

When I got home, I got in the car and measured the distance. I was amazed. One-fourth of a mile? How could that be? Surely something was wrong with the odometer, or maybe I'd just looked at it wrong when I started out. I turned around and drove home to check it again.

Sure enough, I'd gone one-fourth of a mile. Not exactly the heroic effort I thought. Oh, well, now I knew there was room for improvement. I'd go out again the next day and do better.

I did go out the next day, but I didn't do any better. I didn't want to strain myself. I'd wait until the next day to improve, but I already knew there'd be a next day. What I didn't know was that there would be a next day for 40 more years.

And there'll be another one tomorrow.

Today I Met Alonzo

You never know what might happen when you're out for a little run. Today, for example, I met Alonzo. He lives about half a mile down the street from me, but I'd never seen him before this morning. I probably wouldn't have seen him today had I not heard someone yelling for help when I passed his house.

I had on sunglasses, and Alonzo was standing back under a carport in deep shade. I didn't see him at first, and I might have gone on had he not yelled again: "Sir! Sir! Please help!"

I saw him then, and I went into his yard to see what was going on. As it turned out, he'd had trouble starting his old pickup and had raised the hood to check the battery connection. The hood had slammed down on both his hands and latched. He'd been yelling, but nobody could hear him. Everybody in the neighborhood was inside with the doors shut, the windows closed, and the air-conditioners humming. Alonzo was in a pickle and in pain, and I was his only hope. I felt a little like Luke Skywalker, only more incompetent.

When I tried the hood release, it wouldn't work. I tried getting my fingers under the hood and lifting. No dice. Meanwhile Alonzo was using colorful language, and his little chihuahua was barking like crazy, straining at his chain and nipping at my naked calves.

Then I saw a child's toy broom on Alonzo's front porch. I was able to cram the broom handle under the hood and pry it up just enough for Alonzo to pull out his hands. I thought he was going to pass out from the sudden relief, but he managed to stay upright and thank me for helping. I'm just glad I happened by and was able to do something for him. My good deed for the day.

New Poem about Running

It's here.

It's Not the Heat . . .

Well, okay, that's not true. If you live in Alvin, Texas, it is the heat. But it's the humidity, too. Put them together and you have some interesting running conditions.

When you go outside in the morning around 7:30, you can kid yourself along for a few seconds. After all, it's only 80º. How bad can it be? So you start out, and before you've gone a block the humidity has wrapped itself around you like a succubus. It inhales your breath. It adds 20 pounds to each shoe. The t-shirt that had lain lightly on your shoulders flaps around you like a wet shroud.

Since Alvin is only a few miles from the Gulf, you'd think there'd be clouds. You'd be wrong. It's like the sky was imported from Death Valley

You'd think there'd be a soft sea breeze, too. Once again, you'd be wrong. The only breeze is the one you create for yourself as you jog. At the speed I jog, that's almost no breeze at all.

After ten minutes, you start to wonder why you started out in the first place.

After twenty minutes, you hope you remembered to wear the visor with your name and the emergency phone numbers written on it.

After thirty minutes, you begin to think about the G2 that's waiting in the refrigerator, and you hope you live long enough to open a bottle and slug it down.

After forty minutes, you stagger into the driveway, take off the t-shirt, wring it out, and pinch yourself to make sure you've really survived another day.

For some reason you can't stop thinking about tomorrow. Damn Fleetwood Mac.

For the Birds

In my last post, I talked about jerks. Those were human jerks. I’m not sure birds can be jerks. They’re just being birds. But I’ve had a couple of memorable encounters with them.

Everybody knows about mockingbirds. They’re territorial, and they’re fearless. Just ask my cats. Or, for that matter, just ask me.

One afternoon in Brownwood, I was jogging down the street, such as it was, that passed bedside the junior high building when I was dive-bombed by a mockingbird. I don’t remember the time of year, but it must have been nesting season. Fool that I was, I’d intruded on the mother mocker’s territory, and she didn’t like it one bit.

I wouldn’t have minded if she’d given up after the first swipe at my head, but she didn’t. She chased me all the way down the street, shrilling and flapping. It was embarrassing.

Even worse, she did it again the next day.

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking I should have run a different route, but I’m as stubborn as any bird, by golly. The next day I went back, and, sure enough, the bird attacked. This time I was ready for her. I had a long piece of red cellophane ribbon that I waved in the air. The bird was so startled that she flew away and left me alone. After that, I tied the cellophane to my headband. The bird would swoop down, see the cellophane fluttering behind me, and fly back to wherever it was that she came from.

So the ribbon did the trick. Either that, or the bird thought I was crazy and didn’t want to have anything to do with me.

Mockingbirds might be territorial, but they aren’t dangerous. Hawks are another story.

Sometimes I’d run down Indian Creek Road. I ‘d run exactly 2-1/2 miles, ending at the top of a very steep hill, turn around, and run home. One day on the home leg of the run, a screaming came across the sky. I had no idea what it was. It sounded like a jet plane. The scary part was that it was headed right for me.

I looked up over my shoulder and saw a huge bird (okay, maybe not so huge, but it looked huge to me) falling like a rock, and it had taken dead aim on my head.

As you might recall, I teleported once when a rattlesnake surprised me. I didn’t do that this time, but I discovered that I could run about ten times as fast as mortal man is supposed to run. You know those legendary 9.0 hundred-yard dashes you’ve read about? If only someone had been timing me that day! I’m pretty sure I broke the nine-second barrier.

Even at that I almost didn’t elude that hawk. I felt the jet stream as it whooshed by me.

To this day I don’t why the hawk was after me. I hadn’t done anything. There was no nest around. There wasn’t much of anything around. Maybe the hawk was soaring so high above me that I looked like a bunny to him. Or a fieldmouse.

You remember the Peanuts cartoon in which Snoopy says, “Birds find me fascinating” (or something like that)? They don’t find me fascinating. They do, however, seem to find me.

Jerks

Not you, or course, but there are a lot of them out there. Runners seem to attract them, for some reason.

The other day I was jogging sedately down Lee Street when I heard the sound of a motorbike and a lot of yelling. I looked to the right and saw the bike speeding down Herring Drive. There were two riders, a boy and a girl. The boy was steering. The girl was hanging on tightly.

They flew past the stop sign at the end of Herring as if it hadn't been there, zipped across Lee right in front of me, and sped onto the gravel road that wends its way through a small trailer park. I could hear the yells as they hit the dips and bumps.

I kept on going, and not long after I was past the trailer park, the bike came roaring out. I'm not a mind reader, but I knew exactly what was going to happen. I've been running for years, and things like it have happened before.

I always run on the left side of the street, and I moved over as far as I could, running along the edge of the lawns. It wouldn't have mattered if I'd been ten feet farther off the street, however.

The motorbike zinged past me at about 50 mph, so close that if I'd stuck out my elbow, I could have cracked someone's skull. It must have seemed hilarious to them if their laughter's anything to judge by. I'm always glad to brighten someone's morning. The riders swerved back into the proper lane and turned left at the next corner. They'd stopped laughing by then, but I knew the memory of brushing past the geezer would warm their hearts for days to come.

Neither rider was wearing a helmet, but I have to admit that I was tempted to stick out that elbow. I didn't, though. After all, I wouldn't want to be a jerk.

Snakes Part 3 -- You'll Believe a Man Can Fly

Or teleport. I'm not sure which.  I report, you decide.


This happened in Brownwood, Texas, like my other snake encounters.  I had just arrived at the bottom of a small hill, and I was thinking about Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.  Why?  Why not?  Does a man need a reason to think about Reese's?


To tell the truth, though, I did have a reason.  A week or so before, in just about that very spot, I'd found a package of Reese's lying in the road.  Not just one little double pack, but a big one, with eight or ten of the smaller packs in it.  


I have no idea what it was doing there, but I've found stranger things while out running.  Naturally I picked it up and took it home with me.  

Judy wasn't sure about it.  She thought the candy might be poisoned.  Even when I pointed out that the big package was still wrapped, as were all the individual packages inside, she continued to have reservations about my eating any of the candy.  She said that someone could have injected the poison with a fine needle, although there were not obvious holes in the wrapping.


I wanted to be cautious, but I love Reese's, so I eventually ate it all and didn't suffer any ill effects as far as I know.


But that's not what I wanted to write about. I wanted to write about the snake, which I didn't see because I was thinking about the Reese's.


That's not entirely true.  I did see the snake.  Eventually.  I was in mid-stride, the point at which neither foot is touching the ground.  I'd just lifted off my right foot, and my left leg was stretched out in front.


I looked down and there was the snake, a rattler as thick as my arm.  Admittedly I have skinny arms, but still. . . .


The snake was directly beneath me.  I don't know how I'd missed stepping on it.  I think he was as surprised as I was by the situation.  Maybe he'd been thinking about Reese's, too.  I didn't ask.


Anyway, that's when it  happened, though I'm still not sure what it was.  All I know is that when my left foot hit the ground, and I swear I'm not making this up, I was twenty yards down the road.  It sounds impossible, but it's true.  One instant I was in mid-air above the snake, and the next instant, when my foot touched down, I was nowhere near it.  

For you SF fans, I'll just say that I felt the way Gully Foyle must have felt when he jaunted.  It was one of the strangest feelings I've ever had, but I didn't question it.  I just kept on running and left the snake far behind.  

I've thought about that event often over the years.  I can still see the snake below me as clearly as if it had happened yesterday, and I can still feel the oddness of landing so far away from it.  It was a great feeling.  

I'd love to do it again someday, but without the snake.