11/10/2022: 7.23 Miles
Going to the running club continues to be a challenge, albeit a very worthwhile one. To be honest, I’ve stressed myself out about going to the club quite a bit, just because going to a gathering of 30-40 strangers week after week is such unfamiliar territory for me. But it’s such an important learning experience for me to undergo, even if it’s coming a bit later than I think most people do.
This week, I talked to a few different people about a few different things. I don’t like to get too descriptive about these conversations. I guess that’s just because there’s a sort of private intimacy in getting to know a person for the first time, and I don’t really want to share such encounters unless something really impactful or important happened. So I will remain vague on this matter for now.
Perhaps the most notable thing that happened at the club this week that I ended up by chance behind a couple of the faster runners a few miles in, since they were doing a different, longer route than my group. I met the glance of the guy who’s been running with this club for eight years, but he was very quiet and very focused. In his eyes I saw the fierce importance that this short run held to him, an importance that I’m sure he holds throughout all of his intense training. I could have kept up with him and the other guy up there if I wanted to, but I’ve spent enough time with that same sort of wild passion in my eyes. Although it is thrilling, I’ve had enough of it to know that it is not my priority right now, and that it is not a feeling that encourages conversation. So I dropped back. I’m here to run sociably after all; not to be a sociable runner.
After chatting with people for a bit longer in the shop, I jogged back home with a few interruptions on the narrow sidewalks on this warm breezy night in Brookline. Some streets are emptier, or perhaps more full than they would have been on similar nights some years ago, but the way I move through them feels just the same. As my body winds effortlessly past pedestrians, my mind sometimes shifts back to the past…
~Tim’s Still Running.