Flashes of Panic

Football has already begun to take over the track we sometimes use for workouts in Wakefield. Fortunately, our workout group recently discovered that the baseball field is generally unused at the time we meet, and a lap of this particular field is close enough to a quarter mile for workout use. It’s pretty smooth, most of the way around, easy to run on but not as machined-flat as a track. The grass doesn’t give much back, the way a track would, so we have to work a bit harder, but it’s also softer to land on.

The other day, willing myself to stay on the shoulder of my much-faster training partner, I recalled quite vividly the half-mile loop around the lower playing fields at the College where we did most of our cross-country workouts. I don’t often look back on that loop fondly, but I realized that my view was colored by my current circumstances. Then, we did a lot of running on back roads with generous shoulders, or in the woods and hills around town. Now, I’m constrained to pavement and concrete (and, in some quarters of Cambridge, brick), or trails so rocky they may as well be concrete.

Wednesday morning as I ran along the Charles, and thought about what a great frame that river makes for a picture of the city, I also thought: too many people. Too much concrete. This isn’t really my place. I need softer ground.

Now Playing: I’m Running from Big Generator by Yes

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