Category Archives: running commentary

I started to go running yesterday with the idea of A. Looking at the flood damage (luckily not too much of a flood around here) and B. Making a Running Commentary Post.  I was only marginally successful. I was to begin with a little surprised it was not still raining.  A glance out the window showed me the street was no longer a river, so I suited up and went out.  I put on my Road Guard Vest (as we Army people call it; civilians call it a reflective vest) in case I went out in the road.  It also has a handy zipper pouch for tissues.

Right away I saw running in the road was ineligible.  It was all mud!  As I ran down the sidewalk, I encountered a lot of mud, too, then a bit of debris, mostly sticks of varying sizes.  The main problem I had was when I got to the corner:  the mud was super concentrated where I wanted to cross the street.  I turned a couple corners where I hadn’t meant to.  Sometimes I ran in the grass to avoid the mud. I don’t mind getting dirty, but I try to avoid falls at my age.

As I turned back onto my own street sooner than envisioned, I saw a cavalcade of two mothers and several children of various ages, some in wagons, on their way to the corner to catch the bus.  I have seen them before.  I almost always greet my neighbors.  Sometimes I accuse the groups waiting for the bus of having a party and not inviting me.  These neighbors were just setting out for the corner.

“It’s the parade!”  I said.  I have called them a parade before. They warned me to watch out for the slippery mud.

I made it across the street and around another corner before I admitted defeat.  I had gone something over 17 minutes (too lazy to go get my Garmin and check), and I just had a failure of resolution.  I turned and walked back towards home, a thing I almost never do.  When I got to the corner, the parade had almost reached the bus stop.  They only had to cross the street.  Some boys already at the bus stop hollered at two girls about to cross to wait, because cars were coming.  We look out for each other in my neighborhood.

I called across to one of the mothers, “I gave up!”

She gestured to one of the girls and said, “She fell down twice!” The girl ruefully displayed her muddy legs.

“Oh NO!” I said, with great sympathy.  I said that falls could be dangerous at my age, to which the mother agreed.  I managed to reach home without mishap.

Some of the May flowers I hope the rain will bring!

No, I did not take a picture of the mud.  However, for the sake of including an illustration, here are a couple peonies and a few daisies from last May.  I guess this wasn’t an April shower, but sometimes one must make do.