The Sunday Morning Run

Sunday mornings are the best time of the week. You are far enough removed from the work week and its obligations, yet no so close to the next one that you need to start worrying about what’s coming up. Saturday mornings are great, but there is still work to be done on Saturdays, chores around the house, workouts at the gym and trips to the market and you still generally haven’t decompressed from the week that was. Sunday afternoons are nice, but once the ballgame is over and you wake up from the nap, you’re faced with the reality of going to bed in just a few short hours and then starting yet another work week, and the late Sunday afternoon blues start to set in. But Sunday mornings just can’t be touched. They are whatever you choose them to be, for some it means getting dressed up and heading out to church, for others a nice leisurely time with a big pot of coffee and the Sunday paper. Some people like to sleep in on Sundays, personally Saturdays are my day to sleep a little late, I like to get up nice and early on Sundays so that I can make the most of the day and get some time to myself before the rest of the family rises.

I’ve given up the Sunday papers and pretty much papers in general, as I figure there is only so much time in the day to read, and I would rather read good books and interesting magazines than to keep up with the mundane and trivial matters that the daily press covers. I still enjoy watching Meet the Press, and to a lesser extent, This Week as a way to get my news and politics fix. It is a Sunday morning tradition for my wife and I, we TiVo both shows and watch them after she’s up and about, plus that way we can pause whenever something comes up for a heated discussion, which is about every couple minutes or so. It usually takes us well over an hour to watch Meet the Press with all the pausing and discussing and unpausing and wait just one more point to make. Depending on the time of year, namely whether it is the hot weather season, which in Phoenix lasts for about five months from mid-May through mid-October, or the nice weather season, which runs for the other seven months, I either take my long Sunday run before or after watching our shows. After which it is time for pancakes and eggs, or waffles and eggs, depending on which one of us feels like doing the cooking and what the kids want, I’m the pancake specialist, my wife is the waffle woman.

The Sunday morning run is something I relish and cherish, both during and after, and it is the topic for today. Namely, what I think about and what I feel as I go on it. Right now the heat is a factor, so time is of the essence, the earlier the better, once you get past a certain point of morning the desert sun becomes too oppressive to deal with. This morning I got out just before 7, which is generally about as late as you want to get started in August. Thankfully, the sun stayed hidden back of some clouds for most of the time, which brought much appreciated relief from the heat. The roads are mostly empty at that time on Sunday morning, which gives me plenty of space to do my thing and fewer distractions, the closest thing you can get in the city to running down a deserted country road with only the sound of your hoofs on the turf and your breath in the air, steady cadence and even rhythm. Nothing but open road ahead and time, time to think and feel and just be, my favorite time.

I’m convinced that when you are truly engaged in a task about which you are passionate and which you love engaging in, you lose yourself so completely that nothing can touch you. Athletes call it being in the zone, but it is not exclusive to sport, it is the feeling you get when you are lost in a great novel, or movie, or a conversation with a fascinating person. It is the feeling I get when I write as well, I become oblivious to my surroundings and just let things flow. When I’m running I am in another place, away from all the cares in the world, at once immersed in the world around me in a way that is pure, yet also apart from it in a way that gives a freedom like few other things can give. I am alone with my thoughts; I can hum or whistle any tune I like, unrestricted by the offerings on my IPod or the gym radio station. I have no one to converse with except myself; I have some of my most honest dialogues with myself when I am running. I am somewhat aware of mileposts and targets such as the next stoplight or speed limit sign that signifies a new stretch of my journey, but I generally forget about what I’m doing, I just do it, as the commercial used to say. It is probably the closest that we humans come to the animal world, being able to get over ourselves and to just do and be without worry or concern or awareness of how others are perceiving us, which if you think about it is uncommon in our modern world.

This morning I ran 10 miles, no stopwatch today as I just wanted to run and not worry about the pace. I didn’t even have a real game plan when I set out, I just ran until I felt like turning around, when I got to where I know the five mile mark is, I simply turned around and came back home. I got lost in what I was doing to the point that I forgot about the goals and the good I was doing myself, I am training to run my first marathon in January if my knees and other joints hold up, but I am not adhering to any sort of training schedule, the only book I’m reading on the matter is a book called Chi Running which is about utilizing the Chinese concept of the Chi, the life force that propels all of us. My Sunday morning runs are sort of like this column; I set out with a general goal in mind and just see where it all takes me. I set out with the goal, the thought came to me during the run, of writing 1000 words on my Sunday run, and at approaching 1200 words the goal has been met, the finish line is in sight. What I’m training for I’m not exactly sure, but like with my running, I figure that so long as I’m enjoying what I’m doing and that what I’m doing is at least semi-productive, something good will come of it in the end. I’m learning, slowly but surely, to let the game come to me, to take life as it comes and not to worry constantly about what the future might hold. I’m learning to hit the road with a general destination in mind, and to enjoy and embrace the many detours that are sure to spring up along the way, to always strive for excellence in all my pursuits, to trust in God that things will work out according to a greater plan than I am capable of coming up with, and to enjoy the long strange trip called life as much as I possibly can.