Cutting Slack

I was looking forward to seeing my running friends in Highlands on Saturday morning after being gone for so long.  It really wasn't that cold - just a few degrees below freezing and a light breeze - and, expecting to see a large, convivial group waiting at Founders Park, I was surprised to see only one runner, Bob, and he did not look very happy.  He was not feeling well either, he said, and only came to Town to take his daughter to work.  We waited the usual five minutes, then five more minutes, standing around the corner of the building to avoid a wind that had become sharper.  I told Bob he should go home; then I left on a solo three-mile run.  When I returned home I sent out this e-mail to some of the Saturday morning regulars:

"Hey, what's going on?  Has this running club fallen apart in my absence?  I show up Saturday morning - a nice balmy morning, by the way - and only one runner shows up, Bob, and he is not feeling well so he has to go home.  So I have to run BY MYSELF!  Saturday morning runs are the MAINSTAY of the running club!  Where was everybody?"

Always nice to stir up a guilty conscience!  As expected, I received some replies from the guilty and the innocent and the merely tardy.  Karen said she was late and saw me disappear around the corner as she crested the Fifth Street hill - fair play to her!   Morris said he waited until later in the day, when it was warmer.  Despite my outraged e-mail, I have to agree that it is sensible to wait until the warmest part of the day this time of year (but when have runners been known for being sensible?).  The problem this week was finding any warm part in any day.

We awoke to a light snow Sunday morning and it looks like there is more on the way, with temperatures going down to a bone-chilling 12 degrees by mid-week. There was a time when I would run in conditions like that just to test myself.  Art and I ran one Saturday morning when it was 10 degrees and I joked that, when I spit, it froze into a little ice-ball and bounced on the road.  But those days of "character building" runs seem like a long time ago today as I sit here enjoying a cup of hot tea.  I completed a half marathon a week ago, after all.   

We all need to take a few days off from time to time.