As often happens, I neglected to make my Saturday blog post on Saturday. This morning I thought to make it first thing, but after I had futzed about (holy crap, autocorrect recognized “futzed” as a word!) with coffee and Facebook (judge me if you will, I find Facebook sometimes comforting these days), I really felt more like running than blogging. It was almost light out. I decided to go for it. For one reason, I have been trying to self-medicate my depression with exercise. For another, the Boilermaker 15K is coming up. Eventually.
Holy crap, it was cold! Never mind, I told myself. You’ll warm up as you go. Ignoring the logical part of my brain that said my fingers and face traditionally do not warm up, I kept going.
More problematic was the ice. There were patches of ice EVERYWHERE! Some of it was insidiously hard to see. I found a nice bare strip down the center of most roads I went on, but clearly it is a mistake to run down the center of, say German Street, which I happened to be on. Well, maybe there wouldn’t be much traffic. In fact there was not a lot, but it only takes one car to obliterate one middle-aged lady runner. I sprinted for Prospect Street as I heard then saw one approach.
I quickly decided a long-ish run such as I had enjoyed yesterday was not necessary. 15 minutes would be OK, I told myself. Even at my cautious shuffle, that would be at least a mile. As it happened, I went for 20 minutes, just under a mile and a half.
As I went, I did not observe much, since I was mainly keeping my eyes on the road. Therefore I did not enjoy the benefits of distraction which running outdoors usually brings. Never mind. We all know some runs are better than others. The point is, I ran. And now I have blogged. Bring on the rest of the day!
Mohawk Valley Girl 