I Don't Know Who it Will Be

Saturday morning.  The sun was shining, and the temperature was 56 degrees.  I heard the unmistakable sound of somebody texting on my phone at 7:30 a.m.  "Is the group running this morning?" an unknown person was asking.  The Highlands Roadrunners Club has a website and a Facebook page, and I am often contacted by out-of-town runners asking this question.  Then I received an e-mail from Robin, who runs with us from time to time, asking the same.  "I'm out of Town today but I assume the 9:00 a.m. group is running," I replied.  "Have a good run!"  I checked the weather in Highlands:  34 degrees, cloudy.  I hope some hardy runner showed up to run with Mystery Texter and Robin, but I don't know.  I was reminded of the immortal Delbert McClinton song:

I don't know who it will be
But I can tell you who it won't be.

We completed five miles, to Fort Macon and back, on that familiar road that we know so well from the past three years.  It was so nice to be running again on this flat, sea-level road, the sun shining but a brisk wind blowing from behind.  I was overdressed for the first half, but on the way back with the wind in my face it felt just right.

After our run I walked out onto the dune-top deck, and on the way back I thought I heard sea gulls squealing, somewhere between me and the condo.  It turned out it was some other fledglings, a group of three children playing on the swing set, laughing and squealing in delight.  I could hear them from a long distance off:  "One two three four five six . . ." all the way to twenty, playing hide and seek.

We spent the rest of the day getting organized and shopping for groceries.  In seemed like no time had passed on this short day in the year, only a couple of weeks after the winter solstice, when we realized the sun was preparing to set at the surprisingly early time of 5:10 p.m.  We went out to watch this event, and I found that many others had gathered on the wide beach, cameras in hand, to capture this simple everyday miracle of the sun sinking lower and lower and finally disappearing in a glory of light into the depths of the ocean.  Beautiful.