Tom Hill

21. English Major.

Running

“A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool.”

-Shakespeare

The common denominator that all young people share may be the idea that we know more than we do. I say this as a young person, and although I have been told I am actually sixty-four and stuck inside a young person’s body, I know that in reality I am simply a twenty-one year old in a twenty-one year old’s body, simultaneously repelled and enamored with the idea of being young. Being young is wonderful for a plethora of reasons. For most people being young means being healthy and it means that “life is just beginning.” I know that is a cliche, but there is truth in it. Maybe it would be better to say that “life is just beginning to take shape.” And, if one is lucky, there is time to be irresponsible and poor, while still leading a fulfilling, youthful life.

The other side of that coin (at least for me) is the desire to acquire more life experience, to cast away the youthful ignorance I sometimes won’t even admit I have. Often times, I will hear an individual described as “young but wise” or “wise beyond his/her years”. I don’t feel wise beyond my years, but with each death, each new friendship and experience, I can feel myself becoming more accustomed to life on Earth, to the ever-changing rhythm of time passing. Maybe this is where wiseness comes from. Or maybe I am simply spouting cliches out of youthful ignorance. I suppose all I really know is that I desire is to be wise.

All of this (or most of it) came to me the other day, as I ran along an indoor track at the university I have been attending for five months. It was a cold day, and I was happy to be inside. No amount of running could have warmed me against the chill of the sharp January air outside. I had braved the cold weather with a few friends, who were also jogging around the track. The field house was crowded with people, all of us young and able, engaging in a solitary, yet strangely comunal activity. Most people ran alone, going at their own pace, yet here we all were, together nonetheless.

One summer a few years ago, my sister and I ran together over the course of several weeks. She must have been twelve or thirteen, which would have made me seventeen. Eventually, we tired of it, and we probably didn’t run together as often as I remember. We would run along a dusty bike trial in the sticky heat, passing first through a cool canopy of trees, and then out into the sunlight of Main Street, past the old houses and storefronts. I was running mainly for my sister, because she had joined the cross country team and needed a “running buddy”. Plus, I wanted to spend time with her, as she began to grow older and more unfamiliar to me. Running seemed to bring us closer. We now had a common interest, a common activity. I liked the way my body sliced through the muggy air and I liked knowing that my sister’s body must have felt the same. We were linked by running and by the heat; by the pounding of our feet against gravel, by the burning in our faces and the sweat in our eyes. 

I have not run on a regular basis in the past three years, but maybe running a little each day is just what I need. Whenever I ran alone the floodgates seemed to open, and I would begin to compose in my mind the next Great American Novel. Or I would imagine myself as Poet Laureate, Senator, high school teacher, car salesman, grocery store manager, etc., etc. In my mind I went to Europe, I fell in love, got married, had children, went to funerals, sold books, got drunk, sang, went back in time. Except that running made all these things more urgent, more tangible. Running instilled in me a heightened sense of excitement, and then I would stop running, exhausted, content to let these dreams simmer a little while longer. Running seemed to make me more aware of my present. The sweat, the heavy breathing, the swift movement, always shook me out of complacency.

As I ran around the track at the field house, I thought of all these things; of my memories of running, of my daydreams and of my sister. I thought of the beauty of running in unison and the beauty of running alone. And as I ran in my worn out shoes, gulping air deep into my smoker’s lungs, I heard the reassurance of my body, of my existence; a voice inside me saying, “You are here. You are here. You have always been here.”

  1. tommyh7390 posted this