I find my Inner Runner

I finally had the opportunity to focus on 'space' yesterday; outer and inner. I spent much needed time on my apartment, reviewing and organzing all sorts of areas, finding trash treasures and new ways to bring the elements I love into view. I have been living in the same kind of space since my teens; a glorified studio, to work, read and regroup, to hide and heal. There is less division between outside and inside; plants are thriving. And as always, the images and art everywhere serve to mirror my inner landscape where anything is possible.

So I approached a run yesterday in the spirit of adventure without plan. I wasn't sure if I wanted to do a 6, 8, 10 or longer miler. I knew 4 days in a row was pushing it, but didn't want to pass up a beautiful day. Plus I had 2 pieces of blueberry pie to account for. I headed up Park Rd to Stirling. It gave me a mile to warm up and think about how far west I could go. A little sluggish, it wasn't long before I found my stride. On Stirling, I focused in on the long straight stretch and stopped at 56th for cranberry juice. At that point, with everything feeling fine, I decided to head over 441 to the Seminoles. The road back to Sheridan was a beautiful, full-out glide. One more stop at John Williams Park (city kept its parks open, County did not), and I continued east. Definite fatigue and miscellaneous aches and pains thru my feet and legs, but they shifted around. This seemed quite reassuring, as if all the small parts were working themselves out. Somehow, by the time I rounded up to Emerald Hills Drive, I found it, I settled in, with everything a-hum, and there was my Inner Runner.

She took me in a great leap of confidence and wrapped me in the music. We took off down an empty road the holiday had cleared out. The circular stride of my feet and the swing of my arms, tucked efficiently in to my body, beat out against an invisible drum of air somewhere mid-point before me, and once again the eperience of running as drumming came alive. I melted all boundaried into the soaring light and sky around me, the air in a steady whoosh as it carried me along. I've had stretches of good runs, great runs, but nothing that felt like this; I went on till the end of the run, till I made it home in this state of transformation. I somehow started the run on a quest for survival. I ended in a great ball of light.

We never know when the moment arrives. We train to be ready for it, however. We use our disciplines, whatever they may be, to crank open doors wide enought to let the energy flow when summoned. Most of the time, we don't even know we've made the call. But something else in us does. It gets us ready. It makes sure that days and days are put in of gritty mornings along lonely roads, deep in deepest thought, pairing away at any unnecessary doubt which can cloud the impact of bliss. We must be ready to receive, to embrace, to run with it, carrying it along from point to point until it is ours to carry no more.