In Homage to Miami

The Miami marathon was run today, with temps that would make any long distance runner happy- overcast, cool breezes...with that surreal sense of feeling outside of time, making a run like a journey into a dream...
I went out for a 10 miler, the big Griffin loop, cutting down 40th and a beautiful empty long stretch. Despite all the usual stiffness, I felt pretty buoyant, hitting a nice stride by the time I got down to Thomas and the last straight away to home.
I'm averaging about 25 miles a week now, and feeling more comfortable. I can see how increasing the long runs, on lazy days when I have no other pressures for time, will give me the outlet I need to disappear into the neighborhoods. There would be no possibility of building any good arrangement of schedules without running; and even the thought of allowing it to fade into the background is not an option. I look at new shoe guides, mags, articles, follow the rock star runners just as much. My vision of myself as 'uber runner' may not turn out quite as I thought- or who knows, maybe just not anytime soon; but my vision of myself as lifelong runner feels sound. I take myself out for these mini-expeditions and discover the world all over again. Each new horizon, each design of landscape, every atmospheric change takes me to a new place, and frees up the forms that get stuck into predictable shapes from the week of conforming and confirming everyone else's expectations.
I am the out-lander, coming through. Wishing you were here, in my head, running with me.

For Vitae by request

tuning into the World pathos,
the voice of lament,
imagining each others' pain,
fighting our separate battles,
I help, hope,
conduct the current of possibility,
listening and seeing deep
into immediate need.

Answer me, please.
Let us be found.
Awaken between the shades of night
and touch the hand of Life.
Risk- everything.
We fling ourselves like stars
across the blackened skies,
run with it and see just how far
you go.

Sunday LONG run

I got everything done with errands yesterday, after a morning 5-6 miler. My plan today was to go out long without any directive for time or distance. In my mind's eye, I saw that Publix out on west Stirling, where I used to pit-stop on my summer training runs. It just didn't seem out of the question. And the weather was on my side; coolish, drizzly, overcast.

So up and out by 7:30...and feeling as usual sore and distracted by all the aches and pains that seem to be part of waking up at middle age. Running is my relief from age, at least around miles 4-5; unfortunately all the ones before and after are pretty dire...but worth the effort and the push that comes from hope that one day I will adapt.
Oh well, I dream.

Headed west. On a Sunday morning there is very little traffic on Park. I can take the whole stretch running right in the road, on a straight away 2 miles long. I settled into my tunes, and began to wake up. Took one big stretch up to the park before the overpass on the Turnpike where I took my time and adjusted my shoes. I decided to try an old pair of Asics. If the Brooks are spare, the Asics are like running on big marshmallows....full of weighty cushion, my hope was this would spare me discomfort going long. What I forgot was why I've put them aside- poor engineering, a rough spot on the right toe, everything felt compressed...but yes, I had plenty of cushioning!

Took the overpass. Had to run around the rez now that the Seminoles closed 64th. Ran up a nice long stretch to Stirling and took my time at the Publix I planned for...passing the same homeless guy who seems to headquarter on their sidewalk, giving him a nod as I make my way in and refuel. Wilson St is a favorite piece that heads between Stirling up to Griffin along a tree-lined canal with beautiful big properties and nurseries. I am doing fine, if tired. The winds were heavy and only now was I heading more into them; once I rounded out east at Griffin they were right in my face and for the first time I felt really fatigued. The gray skies, the occasional shower, the stiff resistance quickly wore me down; I tried to figure out an efficient route to circle back home, and decided on 40th down, cutting eventually to Emerald Hills. I walked a stretch to 40th. I took off again with my hood up and tried to remember what it was like to train for the marathon, when a run like this was business as usual. My feet went on automatic and I settled in again, keeping the stride until my next stop at the small park on Emerald Hills drive.

My sense of time begins to fade. It starts to feel as if I've been out for days, trekking around. The lack of sun to give me any indication of time passing adds to the surreal atmosphere. It becomes dream-like, zen- it is me along in a big universe with a lot of cars and endless miles of roads....while I patiently, slowly make my way closer and closer to home.

Why are we compelled, like horses to the barn, to find our way home? What is it about our 'place' our space that calls us?? When I was little I used to roam back paths for endless hours, to escape home. To get away from the strange and hostile energy of adults, from everything artificial and confining, to be myself. Now I run for the same reasons, but I hone in on my own little cave which has given me comfort over my Florida years. I'm looking for a new house. It will be hard to manufacture the same labyrinth of routes i have built up for so long, somewhere else.

The impulse for home reflects our search, and our deep need to return to ourselves. We push ourselves out the door everyday just to come home again to what we know. The run represents my early and most fundamental memory of taking off as a means of finding parts of me that must be free from this constant context, as if nature needs my attention to talk about the changes we undergo. I am at home when out there. But I understand now the function of home. In my heart, there is a deep place that comes with me no matter where I am, and the presence of my true self tells me to open it up and run on anywhere, even 5 miles too long today.

Hope and Hard Work

While our Prez speaks at a church in DC for MLK day coming, my thoughts weave around the NPR story I heard about Dr. King's "pilgrimage" to Gandhi's family in India, the deep roots of the civil rights movement in non-violent change, and the enormous challenges upon so many to be lifted from the pressures of catastrophe both big and small. Getting everyone Creating unity in all our recovery efforts is difficult; even in my own family, the fractious contention from lack of understanding and communication is an ongoing factor.

Planet earth; how do so many stories develop simultaneously out of the dust and dirt of the stars? How are so many different peoples set upon the same surface facing so many different challenges? Who was slave, master, revolutionary, artist, fear-monger, power-broker? Who were the agents of change who sacrificed personal happiness for the work of the poor, the dispossessed, the sick and dying?

Today, I took myself out on the Griffin loop back over to 40th, which I haven't seen much of since the marathon....putting together probably about 6-7 miles, I am fighting the obstinate set of my legs even as I try to coax them into action. The good stretch, after my pit stop at Publix, came as I cruised down a largely empty stretch of road to Stirling...feeling the opening up of my body as it found it's comfort zone...and the beautiful rhythm of the pit-pat of my shoes.

"Freedom, justice, equality.." are not easy things to achieve. There is never the "day" of freedom....or change....progress is a messy process. The running never goes as hoped or planned....my current level of ability now is not even close to where I was last summer. But the hard work comes in the attitude of constant effort; every day, a day to support ourselves, our loved ones and our good causes to blossom on into their potential...the 3 dimensional world wants to take its time; until earthquake or sudden death descends. It's then that the fragile line between spirit and physical realities blend and bleed into each other, and our hearts, as the seat of so much traffic of soul, needs love to expand.

Send your love. Into the future.

It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life. Where you stumble, there lies your treasure.

~Joseph Campbell

Past and Very Present

When I went to see Mom yesterday, Dad was very present in the conversation. Maude, our trusty aide, had a 'visitation' after the unveiling at the cemetery, reporting him to say: I need to be buried again....! No doubt stirred up by the attention of all of us at the site, calling him out and rattling his patient wait for my mother to join him.

Mom also saying she'd been missing him....and me, with all my new news kept thinking "man, I'd like to tell Dad! He'd really appreciate this!" The reality that life has of demarcating itself by virtue of births and deaths is a strange thing; we are never really done with the dead, and even those born into the family have been anticipated. So are we ever without the 'unseen' generations? They hover on the edges of our formal reality like shades of times overlapping our own; they influence deeply the thoughts and feelings of the present. They pressure our hearts frame of reference to broaden our view, our dreams, our link to the timeline of history, keeping us from selfish focus. They call us.

Even the record breaking cold is something Dad would have found remarkable. I ran over 5 miles on the treadmill at the gym afterwards; watching the news, the slow-moving repetitions of the gym rats, the blare of music....sorry but give me the wide open space of the roadways- and my solitude....the gym is the avenue of last resort.

The winters up north would drive me into my deepest self. Here, the push comes grudgingly- we should be the respite for the cold! So like everything else in life, adjustment sometimes comes hard....I surrender to the biting winds by coming indoors and satisfying my 'to-do' list.

A PBS show on an artist whose long and happy life was characterized by full-time work, a loving partner, a self-made home.... I know the dream of creating my own enclave, my therapeutic and creative haven is there; I once had it with the Barn, I can build it again. Step by step, something is pulling me towards what I can only describe as my perfect place. And within, the space that warms my heart, despite the record cold, has already warmed the oven of creation; the forces that incubate and push us all towards our Best Dreams.

Cold Run

Waiting for the sun to be fully up seemed prudent on a morning when the temps bottomed out in the high 30's! For South Florida that's the same as minus numbers for you northerners....the normally muggy, warm air has been sucked of all heat; in its place, the arctic wind chills sweep over our flat landscape with surprising force. I wanted to wimp out, I hadn't slept as well as I'd liked...I could have gone to the gym, but I truly hate the treadmill. My strategy for times like these is 'do not entertain other options- stay with Plan A!.' And thankfully, I was able to roll out of bed, layer myself up and out the door I went.

My 5 mile out back, looping over to take Arthur west, back on Park, was not as bad as I thought; my layers were right- putting the windbreaker over everything else kept the breezy chill out for the most part. And I'm loving my new tights. For me, just being out in the sun, air and under the wide sky is the whole reason to run. The boost I get from moving freely out in the open is my therapeutic punch up for the day.
I can feel those endorphins and dopamine hitting all the right spots, and the blood circulating through my body....there is a rush of calm at the end, as I walk off the last stretch...and a feeling of lightness, confidence and quiet joy for completing the run.

You can do it and I know many of you do. Runners are amazing that way; they will brave almost any conditions, and disabilities, push through their limitations of all kinds, just to feel what I feel...the lightness of our bodies even as they pull themselves against the gravity of earth. The run sets up free every time. And in the moments when our minds are let loose, everything else comes with us.

Zen in 2010

The temps dropped into the 40's last night, but I was prepared with my new cold-weather tights and lots of layers, determined to start a new year/new work week back from holiday break with a run. I'm not a cold-weather gal. I left the north in large part due to the winters, which exacerbated my depressive and isolative tendencies. My need for sunshine and the great outdoors to help ground and revitalize me flowed into my running, which began after I was already here in So Flo.

So I may be the most overdressed runner around, but I was also the only one I saw. And once I got over the shock from the warm apartment to the starkness of the cold air, I got myself going. I decided a 5-6 miler, out and back was prudent; nothing too demanding, and I could zone out into the run without too much thought of the traffic.
I noticed how being packed into my clothes gave me a sense of inner pull...that even as I needed to connect with that outside world, I was able to recede deep into my mind, the music on the ipod, the awareness of my various body parts, some none too keen on the whole endeavor.

I am still struggling with those 'hot' spots; back of the hamstrings, the tender spot on the right hip, the lock-up in my neck and shoulders....but the dependable shift comes if I can keep up a reasonable rhythm for at least 3 or so miles....by then, the warmth and loosening of all my limbs begins to give the run a free and flying feeling...and the aches recede into the jaunt of my joints in their alternative beat down the road.

It's been a painful year, and a tough transition to '10. It took every bit of that break to settle back down, and find the emotional space to regroup and reassess. I'm pleased to feel that no matter the set-backs, mistaken assumptions, mistrust and unreasonable behavior of all kinds, the chaos of work, the drama of clients, family and friends, the connection with Self is intact. I shared with Vitae my vision of cosmic embrace...and how a spontaneous ride up the 'ladder' of consciousness can still bring me to that higher ground. May the New Year bring us all more Zen in '10, as CC puts it, and may the Powers that Be see their way through these last few doors until the New World is upon us.

Good News Year

The bright and shining image of my kids from beijing was my greeting for 2010. The medicine card said "The Bear" and took all the threads of my endeavors into a tapestry of confirmation; to cultivate the intuitive vision, to dwell in the Dream Lodge, to seek the eternal answers inward to reach my goals.

Yesterday, I took the spontaneous opportunity to run mid-day, perfect and moderate temps, slight cooling breeze, sun. I have focused on easing into 5 milers until they become more solid, and this time, slightly extending my range toward 6-7 as I wound around from my pit stop at little Anderson park and looped up to Emerald Hills. I found an outlet for my questions, i let loose my fatigue, frustrations, yearnings of every kind. I found a few stretches of nice speed (for me), where the rhythm of my stride produced that kind of hypnotic comfort which comes from the mix of entrainment and percussive pressure on the flats of my feet. Running produces a near perfect self-acupressure; you can alter the footsrikes and strides to feel the vibration through certain muscles and areas of the body....sometimes I deliberately work on constrictions and yesterday, a very stubborn part of my foot, which has jammed since MCM, loosened.

I flew.

I cried, I remembered everything that's happened this year, in a kind of whirling review of scenes which flashed through the light and skimming clouds and caught me unaware of anything, everything, as I followed the rhythm- up, and down, up and down, and down.....dad's death, passing the exam, the marathon, losing would-be love and loves of all kinds....finding the core of my commitments, not giving up on myself. On my dreams, my goals.

Every morphing of my life has brought the essence bare to the work of my every day. Whether the gods see fit to give me happiness, joy, love, I am ready to value the gem of my soul. I resolve to set it free.