Tag Archives: raking leaves

I went running today. That’s two runs in three days after a break of over a month. I have been having a hard time going running after work and even when I have been running regularly, I have a hard time running on Monday, because, you know, Monday. Therefore, I feel quite pleased with myself and I am going to reward myself by posting another Running Commentary.

I spent a good portion of the day today telling myself I would go home and run. For once I did not think of any good reasons not to. That was nice, because it can get tiresome arguing with yourself. A few times when the sun went behind some clouds I didn’t even feel my hopes rising that I would be let off the hook with a downpour. I just thought, if it rains, I can run on the mini-tramp while watching the silent horror movie I DVR’d off TCM last week.

No rain changed my plans. I did not let my dog Tabby’s hopeful look send me on a guilt trip. I just went upstairs, changed into running clothes and got the heck going. It was warm enough for shorts and a t-shirt. I didn’t even need to put my headband over my ears. It was awesome. There was still plenty of cloud cover, too, so the sun was not in my eyes. Then again, we just changed the clocks back. The sun is lower in the sky by 4:01 p.m., which is what time I left the house.

I headed up to German Street and turned left towards Caroline. I thought I would do the down Caroline, up Margaret, down Henry, up Bellinger routine. No busy streets to cross, lots of interesting houses to look at, I could rock this. I didn’t think I had to do more than 20 minutes although it would be nice if I went 25, as I did on Saturday. I like to keep things loose on my weekday runs, see what my body feels up to. No point in killing myself. I still had a blog post to write and dinner to cook.

As I ran, scuffling through the leaves when I found them, I did not feel guilty about leaving my little dog behind (she doesn’t like to run with me). However, I soon felt I was a selfish wretch for running at all. You see, our back yard is covered with leaves. My husband Steven plans to spend a good portion of his day off tomorrow raking leaves and dismantling my container garden on the deck. Now, raking leaves is perfectly good exercise. If I wanted to burn calories, why the blankety-blank didn’t I just pick up a rake and get moving? Oh dear.

Still running, I pondered my options. Rake after my run? I could do that. Finish the run, take Tabby on the cool-down walk, pop open the garage door, find my gardening gloves, and have at it. Good plan. But what about my blog post? What about dinner? I pictured the clock, tried to figure how long things would take me, debated how long of a run I really needed now that I was out here and, truth be known, enjoying the act of running quite a bit.

I wondered if a heart-felt apology would make things right. Well, no, the leaves would still be there. I could tell him we’ll rake together as soon as I get home on Tuesday. He might not like to wait that long. Perhaps I had better just rake some today. I thought about opening the garage door. Our garage door opens hard. I had actually gone an entire Monday at work without much of a backache. I didn’t want to open the garage door.

Oh, what kind of a lame excuse is that? I stopped thinking about raking and started wondering how long I ought to run for. All the way down Henry, across Park Avenue and through Myers Park? Just all the way down Henry? Maybe just one more block?

I ended up doing 25 minutes. By the time Tabby and I had walked a very enjoyable cool-down walk and I had stretched, I had forgotten all about the leaves. I took a nice hot shower and got into sweats. I looked at Facebook and checked my email. I realized I felt very tired. I decided to try to write my blog post anyways.

I hope it turned out OK.

Oh yeah, now I have to cook dinner. Damn.