Day 247: Float On

Alright don't worry even if things end up a bit to heavy
We'll all float on alright

- Modest Mouse 

Sometimes when I'm running--an activity that I've been forcing myself to do fairly religiously since the turn of the year in an attempt to live a more (semi) healthy lifestyle--magically things happen. 

Usually, the magic takes the form of me pushing through some mental or physical barrier that I wasn't sure I could overcome, like running longer or farther than I have before. Sometimes, the magic is just the simple pleasure of running under a beautiful, peaceful sky or on a Sunday morning when the world feels sleepy and dreamlike. Sometimes, the magic is a certain, enticing aroma that's heavy in the air, like the various smells that a recent rain has stirred up and is drifting around my head, much like the ones that last night's rain concocted. Sometimes, the magic is a rainbow that forms in the sky directly in front of me,  much like the one that did also last night as I was coming down a hill that I had just barely made my way up. Sometimes, though, the magic takes the form of memories filling my head that are actually connected to the act of running. 

It's been a long time since I was 15 and 16 and running came easy to me and I genuinely enjoyed it. During the summer months back then, I'd do my running in the dead of the night, when pretty much everyone else in the town I lived in was fast asleep. Some nights were eerily quiet. Other nights the junebugs would be hopping under every street light or a bat or two would be flapping its wings or a car with someone I knew inside would pass by and keep me company. Most often, though, I just floated on those streets that surrounded my town, as if I was on clouds all alone in the world without any place in particular to get to and without any time limitations putting constraints on me. I never seemed to get tired back then. I never seemed to get mentally fatigued, either. I just floated on and on. 

When I run today, it's nearly impossible not to focus on the running, as much as I try not to and as much as i try to place my thoughts elsewhere. Some days, it's deflating and defeating. Other days it makes me pissed at myself for being so mentally weak. Once in a while, I just accept I'm older and I've room to improve. 

Why are my legs dead already?

I shouldn't have drank that beer last night? 

I've never felt that twinge in my knee before? 

I wonder if it's been three miles yet?

Why the hell am I even doing this?

Back when I was a kid and was free of such thoughts, I focused on everything else but the running it seemed. I just took off. There were no notions of running in order to get healthy. I already was. There were no worries about drinking a beer. The worry was how to get the beer. There was no unexpected pain that popped up, other than those that concerned why everyone else I knew seemed to have a girlfriend except me. Back then, my mind and thoughts seemed as expansive and wild as the cornfields I'd run past. 

Man, the moon is fricking brilliant tonight. 

I wonder if I run by her house if her bedroom light will be on. 

College is going to rock. 

I wonder if all that Aqua-Net really will make my hair fall out someday. (Yep.)

What's crazy about running today is that every so often, I'll get a peek at that kid back then and remember how running made him feel and how it can still make the me today feel. The rain or the sky or the music that I'm piping into my ears will serve as some kind of secret passageway where I can temporarily put my thoughts on hold, and I'll just float. The floating doesn't happen anywhere nearly as long as it once did, but when it does, I'm completely content. I'm talking myself into running marathons. I'm envisioning myself with a runner's body. I'm filling my heads with all kinds of possibilities . . . until ultimately, I wind up bringing the act of running right smack dab back to the forefront of my thoughts and kill the vibe.

That's the secret of life I'm convinced, not killing the vibe. Not dictating thoughts. Not micromanaging the moment, but letting the moment manage itself. On those days when I drown out the nagging thoughts tied to dead legs and winded lungs, I feel possessed in an entirely good way. I feel anything is possible because I'm worried about nothing at all. If only I could learn to flip that switch at will.

I admire my 16-year-old self for having figured all this out decades ago, whether he knew it at the time or not. He had it made. I'm glad he took advantage of the gift and of the freedom he was given and of the solitude of the night and of the ability to just float. I'm glad he taught me what it's like to float.