Running Commentary

I picture myself deep in the forest, just me, alone with the path, the overarching trees, and maybe a nearby crystal-clear body of water of some kind (the fantasy isn’t always super specific). Some days, like this past Sunday, I can sustain that illusion for a little while. On that day, which was given over to an 11-miler, even the bench I did crunches on was in the wild—note the exotic jungle cat exiting the frame. But today—not so bucolic. I needed a little hill work, so I headed for the mean streets of Albany. (All right, this one’s a bit of a fantasy, too. Albany is a web of streets, but few of them are especially mean.) I made my way up Marin Ave. to the Alameda, then north to the top of Solano Ave., where the asphalt stretched endlessly down the hill before me in the early Labor Day light, and I might have been the last runner left on the planet. The scene called for a theme song -- maybe something Rocky -esque? -- but alas, my inner radio was silent. I did fin...

I just took a nap. Whoa. Like many currently alive human beings, I tend to behave as if I’m a human doing rather than a human being (this clever label is not original with me—I thank one of the many Buddhist writings I’ve dipped into over the last ten years for this synonym for a typical contemporary homo sapiens). The King schoolyard. Photo time-stamped 6:22 am, September 1, 2011. Yesterday I ran over to the King Middle School track before breakfast and did three Yasso 800s before running home again. I’m working up to ten, but three was all I had time for. I wanted to do some track work and to make my workout fit into my training regimen for this week, which will take me to a 22-mile total and include a long run of 11 miles. I bring this up not to humble brag (much) but as an indicator of my tendency to take an increasingly demanding running schedule seriously. Problem is, I also take an increasingly ambitious work schedule seriously (job in the city! proofreading a book! copy e...