Today I went for a run

Today I went for a run. So did 28,000 in Boston. There's usually a little bit of pain involved - perhaps it is the cramp from being just a tad out of shape, or an achy knee. But on a beautiful spring evening, it is easy to look past those moments and keep pushing because of how great it'll feel when it is over. That is how it is supposed to - a little bit of effort but with a great reward - but someone, somewhere, had other plans for Boston.

Reports are still coming in and evidence needs to be evaluated, puzzle pieces assembled before a clearer picture will, perhaps, put the how and the why into what happened today. Some things are certain - there are people who's lives will never be the same as they were when the starting gun went off. Lives and limbs have been lost, never to be replaced. And that innocence we as US citizens so often take for granted has received another shock to the system.

When I learned about what was unfolding I was sitting at my desk wondering how I was going to accomplish the un-done to-dos on my mental list of the day. Suddenly, however, none of those emails, phone calls, or Word documents seemed to matter. My thoughts were with the people I know in Boston and my fellow runners competing in the race - were they OK? A scan through Facebook revealed updates from family and friends saying they were unharmed. An email to a friend asking if word had come in from the Syracuse running contingent helped settle the nerves. But my mind wasn't ready to get back to that list - not now, and probably not tonight. What can I do but think and pray? Run.

Run in solidarity for those immediately touched by today's event. Run in support of those who, just like me, don't know what else to do. As I stepped onto the trail in the late evening sun, I felt the warmth of spring struggling to take hold and wrench from winter control of the next few months. I also felt the comfort of knowing for the next hour, I would do what I always do when it seems nothing else can be done. I will loose myself in the essentials of the moment - placing one foot in front of the other, controlling my breathing, and sorting out the thoughts that want to stay while the others are left on the trail behind. Up hills and along gravel paths, pounding out mile after mile, for me there is comfort in the rhythm and the effort.

Today most thoughts that typically stick didn't, seeming petty and selfish in the context of the events. Instead I kept coming back to a particular thought about what had recently transpired in Boston. In my lifetime, I can recall a handful of similar events that rocked the nation, and one the world. Although the shouldn't be, a few are just blips in my memory: the first attack on the World Trade Center and the Atlanta Olympics bombing. Others I recall more of where I was when I learned about them - I was waiting for my friends after returning to the car from a four-day backpacking trip in the Adirondacks when the Oklahoma City bombing took place. I was in a futile apartment hunting effort at the former Seneca Army Depot when I learned about the planes hitting the Pentagon and World Trade Center.

But today I also thought of how sheltered I am from events like this because of how fortunate I am to live in the country I do. I can't pretend to know the myriad of factors that contribute to why this is, nor will I. Instead, I try to gain a shred of empathy for those who live in places where events like today are horrifically ordinary. Places where for illogical reasons humans think they can get their point across by committing explosively violent acts against their peers. There are many parts of the world that family members set out to do things much less extraordinary than running a marathon (think buy food at a market, get a cup of coffee, or even just walk down the street to go to work) and meet the same fate as those in Boston today. These events bring that reality all that much closer to us.

I wonder what, if anything, can be done? Part of me says it is too complex to ever understand - if world peace were simple we'd already have it, right? But that is to overwhelming and oppressing a thought on an already oppressive evening. Instead, I will take solace in knowing that to think global, we have to act local (and simple). Hug someone, lend a hand, smile at strangers, say hi, hold open the door, spare some change, have an open mind, and listen. Do something to show to others that you care, and perhaps they'll return this to you, or even better, pay it forward. Try not to focus on the attention hungry minority but rather on the silent majority who, with a little encouragement, might eventually smother that minority with care and love.

Spring Sprung

Bam - just like that, it is here. Spring. Flowers. Sun. Warmth. Rides. Shorts.

Finally feeling the last vestiges of many things fade into the past. Winter and illness being the most tangible. Last Monday, April fooled us into thinking that April meant, well, spring but instead brought us three consecutive days of snow. This weekend gave us the first real attempt of spring - sun and warmth.

I took advantage of this welcomed change by going big. Yesterday, 3 mile walk and then a 4 mile run. Today, 8 mile run followed later in the day by a 6.5 mile mountain bike ride. Tomorrow, asleep at my desk!