I Remember Why . . .

I like to run outdoors.

I enjoy the sounds of feet on pavement, on dirt, in puddles, over woodland paths and tree trunks. I enjoy the sounds and feelings of cars whooshing by with the wind either in my face or at my back.

I don't even mind exhaust fumes.

So much.

I grew up running on suburban streets and the campus of my alma mater long before it became the place I would cram 4 years into 5 for "higher education".

I like hills.

Real hills.

Not some mechanically induced, computer-generated fake hill that's supposed to make me thing I'm gradually ascending farther (further - which is it?) above sea level in hopes of finding some wonderful realm which I've either never seen before or have seen before and revel in the hopes of seeing it differently this time.

Sheesh!

Now, I remember why I run out-of doors!!!!





I do not like treadmills.

At all.

Any more than I like tracks.

Running without going someplace just seems to detract from the whole reason to me. If I see the same scenery the entire time, I get bored.

Which makes running a drudgery.

I hate drudgery.

Passionately.

I live enough in the shadow of helotry at my daily routine that I don't need any more of it in the rest of life.

Certainly not in something as freeing as running has been for me over the last 30+ years.

I really can't remember when I started running for enjoyment.

I mean, not just as a kid who ran to get someplace fast or because a friend or twenty wanted to race.

I mean running because it is a wonderful way to see the world around me in a way very different than that which I'm accustomed to seeing the world.

Running because I appreciated the feeling of my lungs working to take in enough air to keep my body functioning well enough to maintain my pace while I was enjoying the sights and sounds of the world around me.

Running because it took me someplace, even if that place was a complete circuit and I ended up where I started.

We don't see much when we travel down roadways at 35mph or faster. It's much easier to see the birds and the trash left by others and the grass that needs cutting and the roadkill or to smell the fresh flowers and the winter onions or the burning leaves when you're goading yourself along to get away from that mean dog or to discover what's up around that bend you've never rounded or when you know the water-stop is coming up at that fountain ahead.

Life is much more fascinating at 6-10mph and you don't have windows or doors or seats barring you from interacting with the world around you.

It's just you and your own two feet, running.

All that said, I got on a treadmill last night.

For the first time in eons.

The kids wanted to swim.

I wanted to run.

It's been a while, but the new pair of shoes and the no-longer-painful left knee just needed a good whirlwind tour of the cardio room at the local "Y".

I also did something else I've never done.

I used an MP3 player.

While running.

On a treadmill.

Made me remember even more why I don't like treadmills.

Or MP3 players.

I felt like the treadmill would be a decent compromise that might allow me to find a pace, be close enough to know the kids could come find me if they really needed anything, and I would have an evaluation of just where to start on my running game over the next few weeks.

Music does strange things to my pace.

Staring through a doorway into an empty foyer of some minor annex at a rural YMCA does very poor things to my pace.

I felt like if I could've just closed my eyes and ran, things would've been much better.

Really hard to do.

Without stumbling.

Or completely falling down.

No, I didn't do anything of the sort.

My eyes remained open the entire time.

Which was longer than I thought it should take me to run 2.5 miles, because I was barely even winded and my heart rate never made it to my 80% goal.

Non-laboring Labor Day 2009

We went to the mtns on Labor Day.

I normally LABOR on Labor Day - usually around the house getting a plethora of projects either started, only to remain in various states of incompletion for months on end; or complete a few that have been hanging over my head.

Not this year.

This year we played.

First, we went to Table Rock State Park, where I have spent lots of time in the distant past, but not so much in the last 16+ years. Matter of fact, Melinda commented that she & I had never been there together.

Well, we have now.












With the kids.










We hiked the Carrick's Creek Trail, which is really quite astounding for Melinda with her current back issues.






















We had ourselves a picnic lunch and then headed up through the mtns to Brevard, which holds one of the most fun little toy stores in the Southeast . . .








Two stories of sheer childhood bliss.









Etch-a-sketch fun:
























Paddle balls:























Toys from a bygone TV era:
















Army men:















Marbles:























And then there's the slot-car track:































































Of course, I appreciate the real plaster & lath as well as the hardwood floors in the old downtown shops:
































































There are just some fun details on the streets, like giant toy wooden soldiers and the gumball machine:































I even found a pristine tool set just like one my brother had as a kid - one that my kids never saw anything but bits & pieces of and they managed to lose or destroy the remainder of what was passed along. I couldn't believe the price tag on the thing!!!!!!







































We were just about tuckered out, as evidenced by my most energetic boy's exhausted stance:
























But, we still had one more errand to run.

APPLES!


















Hendersonville was a wee bit crowded, due to the Apple Festival, but we skirted that and headed to our favorite apple stand for the season's final haul of Honey Crisp's. Good thing, too, because the sky was ready to loose a storm of epic proportions on us, but we just managed to get turned onto I-26 before it caught up to us: