Thursday, January 14, 2010

running dream

I went running through the Arroyo yesterday. It’s a nice corridor of naturalized landscape to spend time in, think, hang out with the Sycamores… My subconscious must have liked the run because it brought it back into my dreams last night:

(I was running on a long trail, a “race.” At one point, about halfway through the run it got super windy. I had to lie down on the trail to avoid the gusts. I held on to a small alpine-stunted Ponderosa pine for extra stability. Then some race volunteers came over to me and they were like, “it’s fine, you can get up, it’s not that windy…” So I tried and they were right. I could keep on.)

Interesting, because on the actual run yesterday I was thinking that I don’t really need races. If I want to go run X number of miles somewhere I can just go do it by myself for free. I’m not going to use $40 worth of energy drink and pretzels. But, maybe this dream tells me more about their deeper value. The people at the races, volunteers and runners, are all there to support each other and act, in some sense, like a team – challenging, guiding, allowing, encouraging, helping each other to do well at this one little part of life… and maybe that seeps into other parts as well.

2 comments:

mindful mule said...

Yes… community is nice… but you don’t have to over do it… maybe a few races a year to check in… and blogs go along way to cover the spaces in between… unless, of course, you’re walking, running, or riding to the start… then by all means, race away… just don’t drive that car all over the earth to do it.

Hone said...

I almost always choose what races to do around where I will actually be at that time.

I always enjoy running on my home trails a lot more than any races....and its free.