Yesterday's post by my friend, George Zack, and often an answer in the podcasts with Lucho at Endurance Planet, got me to thinking about what I'm actually doing with my workouts...are they training or just an outing to the woods? Yes, I would prefer to run like I did in the past, but I simply can't. However, this year I truly believe that I can consider myself a runner, once again. It took a lot of dealing with my knee arthritis and meniscus issues and a lot of hiking but can now sustain some real miles, albeit slower than what I remember.
I find myself reminiscing way too often and am also jealous when I see a younger runner go by with such ease in his gait. But I have also come to enjoy my extra time in the out-of-doors and actually get into the "flow" as discussed by Andy Jones-Wilkins in his column at iRunFar.com. So as Lucho would put it, I do what I can and don't worry about what I no longer have any control over.
I also thought a lot about the message presented by Aron Rolston at the NIACC auditorium last night. Dealing with boulders in your life and opportunities to change perspective on what is most important to you. It was a very good, inspirational, and motivating talk and I was glad I had the opportunity to be there and that NIACC is able to arrange for such high quality events in their annual series.
Today went very well as I used a run to the high school, to deliver a student ID that I had found yesterday, as a warmup then hit the trails for my finishing loop at a pretty good clip. As mentioned yesterday, it is very dry out and the river is unusually low for this time of year.
10 mile run in AM and additional hiking later.
