To a Jogger
If you had found a regular path through the woods after all your many returns to this pretty parcel of nature we both love, and stuck to it, we would have almost certainly met by now. But clearly you are not a creature of habit. You are a creature of caprice. I like that. It makes things that much more exciting.
If you had turned up on Saturday, one of your preferred days for a run, we would most likely have met. I had several possibilities to head you off. The paths were absolutely deserted. And I was in fine form that day, in a quite elevated mood. I felt inspired. But you ghosted.
On Tuesday afternoon, if you had taken the path past the abandoned house as you often do, what fun we could have had in there. I even prepped the place in anticipation. I had an interesting array of tools laid out in a bedroom on the second floor. Believe it or not, I could see you jogging from the broken out window of that bedroom. It has a decent view of the path in the distance you took instead, the one that winds by the miniature waterfall. I watched you doing your lunges beside the little creek-facing bench that’s placed there for the sedentary enjoyment of nature by slobs.
Thursday, we were within a minute of finally meeting and I was running through everything in my head from my position just ten feet off the path when the annoying family with the little mutt came from the opposite direction. And you freakin’ knew them! You exchanged pleasantries with that mob of unphotogenic roly-poly trolls while that little white fun sponge of fur barked non-stop in my direction. The toupee on legs sensed me. And then you decided to cut your run short and reversed your direction to walk back to your car with them. Where was your motivation? I had mine. The dingo stole my baby.
The next week, was it a Wednesday, I was within minutes of sealing the deal. But you have improved on your pacing and time immeasurably in the past few weeks! Are you training elsewhere? So my shortcut turned out not to have been short enough and I ended up winded and terribly chagrined. I was doubled over and red-faced. I might be getting too old for this. You didn’t come back the same path, so that was that. Call it a day.
Friday was to have been the day. I had you with dead certainty. I was up on the hill from which you can see the cemetery across the way and was able to descend with great speed onto the path you were taking. And you were alone. I could see there was no one coming from any direction. All the paths were deserted. Finally. And as I tore down the hill for our long-awaited and long-destined meeting, something impossible happened. I passed a trail cam! Who had placed a deer cam in this bit of wilderness. It’s not even private property. Maybe it’s a government wildlife project. It stopped me dead. It’s indeed fortunate that I have such good peripheral vision and caught it. I tried approaching it from behind and thought about removing and destroying it. But I had to consider that the cam might be transmitting images to a cloud-based server. That’s why I wear the ski mask now. Sometimes the old ways are the best ways.
They say the longer you have to wait, the sweeter the pay-off. I suppose that is true, but frankly, you are exhausting. I should thank you for helping me get into the best shape of my life. I’ve been running other trails myself and have started discovering other possible “projects.” None of them seems to be in such great shape as you. What a relief. But still I consider you my favorite. The one that keeps me up late at night. When I close my eyes before falling asleep, it’s your legs I see racing through the forest. You are like Schrodinger’s cat, both dead and alive. I’m sorry I’ve let you down so many times. But we will meet one day soon. I promise. Consider it a raincheck.
