Here and elsewhere

This isn’t going to be one of those posts in which I whine about being somewhere and wishing I were somewhere else. I also won’t write 1,000 words — I promise.

I wasn’t sure last night whether my knees were ready to run again this morning. I didn’t leap out of bed in eager anticipation. I’d actually slept through the entire night, something I haven’t done in a while. It took me a few minutes to get going; I got started about ten minutes later than usual.

Then I went out and ran 4.09 miles and for at least part of that time I was… elsewhere. I settled into a comfortable pace that would have been impossible a few months ago. I barely glanced at my watch.

I do remember seeing a few people out with their dogs. I remember noticing the fresh snow on the mountaintops. I remember slowing down twice at corners to allow cars to pass… I keenly remember feeling the small draft of cool air that followed their passage.

At one point I realized that I must have forgotten to take one of my usual turns, because I couldn’t remember having seen that street. But when I got home and uploaded my Garmin GPS watch data to my PC, there it was on the map. I’d been on that street. I’d taken the exact route I’d sort of roughly planned, and my per-mile times were all within a few seconds of each other. I’m not entirely sure where my conscious attention was while I was on that street… it was elsewhere, or maybe it was nowhere at all. Maybe I was in a blissful zen running state of presence/nonpresence.

In any case, I came home awake, refreshed, exhilarated, and pain-free. I like that.