TL;DR

I started my birthday with a run. Running has grown to be my place of solitude and peace, where I work out all the feelings and tensions of a challenging world. It’s a return, as the pandemic, like in so many cases, took me away from my practice. I’m grateful for the ability to run, grateful for the perspective it brings on discipline and persistence. This time brought new challenges in pain in my feet and calves, and I thought it was just a facet of aging. Today’s gift was the absence of that pain. Maybe it’s the new shoes, maybe just the work already completed, but I finally found that gorgeous middle ground between warming up run and waning run: the working run. The pace that fills all the middle miles when you feel capable and zen and like you can just go forever.

Two years ago I baptized my feet in jory soil on my first season of half marathons. Last year was silent. This year, I rise. And run.