Thursday, January 12, 2012

Impossible Don't Exist

This is my motto for 2012. Thanks to Molly this is my favorite new motivational song (Tonight is the Night). The start of 2012 has been filled with great things and sad moments. While my husband accepted an exciting new position my friend lost her battle with cancer. I've been fighting with a serious level of funk for the past two weeks. Everyday I tell myself that today is the day that I'm pulling out of it. My runs have felt more difficult and it just didn't seem fun anymore.

This morning I woke up convinced that my run would be awesome today! Thursday's are my short runs - 2 miles, which gives me the flexibility to have fun and run faster. As I started out down my street my shins and calves protested but I convinced them that with only a two mile run they better jump on the awesome bandwagon. I was feeling good at my turn around point, which means the last mile is all uphill. I've been experimenting with proper running etiquette. Who knew I was supposed to be running into traffic not with it. This seems wrong to me, because I seem to encounter a lot of streets where people are only going to look left when making a right hand turn, resulting in  me getting run over. But, I realize I'm in control here, so as long as I keep my eyes open, I should be okay. I run Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday mornings. Mid-week I wait to run until all the schools have started, around 9am, this means that all of the commuters are gone as well, so there is not too much traffic to worry about. I've been running on the correct side of the road for a few weeks now with the exception of the 1 mile run back up my street. I've still been running with traffic as there is a pretty large blind curve that makes me nervous. Now, there is about 5-6 feet of shoulder on my street so you would think you would be okay, but I've seen people cut the corner pretty tight into the shoulder just driving it. I started thinking that I used to run down the street on that blind curve and didn't seem too bothered about it. Like, I guess if I can't see them coming and correct at the last minute, that's okay??? The idea being that if I run against traffic I can see them coming and jump into a ditch or something? Today is the day, I decide I'm going to run against traffic, back up my street like a real runner! Of course, it's my luck that said blind corner has a solid row of bushes as I'm looking over the bushes I see a truck coming my way, I notice a car on the right side of the street backing out of their driveway. Let me preface by saying they in no way would have collided but the driver of the truck was watching the car and not paying attention to me running up the street in my bright green shirt. He is so far in the shoulder and I'm thinking fuck, this shrub is taller than me and I don't think I can actually clear it. I actually stop running and hug as close as I can to the shrub when he finally notices me and corrects. Are you kidding me???? If I had something to throw at him I would have. And if he had not been driving so fast I actually would have taken my shoe off and thrown it at him, but I kind of like my running shoes.

The point of my story is that I was having a very nice run until I almost got run over and may have to reconsider proper running technique when it comes to my street. This would also explain why my run was 25 seconds slower than last week.

Basically, impossible don't exist - unless I get run over, so I'll try not to do that.

1 comment:

  1. Ha! Yes, it might be a little harder in your neighborhood with little to no shoulder...but the idea is right, that you can see them and avoid and that makes it safer than if you can't see them coming.

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