The Art of Running

I run nearly every day. The place I run is out in the country, it's beautiful out there. Running is my escape. My escape from stress, from real life, from people. When I run, that's when I do my best thinking. I get really frustrated when people ask me to run with them. It completely contradicts everything running is to me. Most people don't seem to understand this and are often offended when I tell them that I hate running with other people...I am not interested in having a conversation when I run. We can go for coffee after I am done and talk then. Until then I just want to enjoy the scenery and day-dream. I'm not sorry.

Today on my run I was thinking about what I would do if I could do it all over again. I've always wished I could be more artsy then I am. I wish I could be a professional dancer, or an artist, or a photographer, or an interior designer. Then I would chop off all my hair and dye one strand red and wear glasses with thick rims. I would change my name to Nyree or Phoenix and I would date a punk rocker who played lead guitar in an indie rock band. I know this sounds completely ridiculous...but that's my fantasy. Sometimes I want to jump in my car and take off to the West coast and become someone else entirely. However, I will never do this...I just think about it.

One thing that scares me about running is men. When I run in the country guys drive by in their trucks and on their motorcycles. They shout inappropriate things and sometimes drive by several times. I've heard the horror stories of girls getting raped or killed out in the country. It happens in those small towns where you think something like that could never happen, especially not to you. However, when some guy in a crappy old truck drives past five or six times and stares me down it freaks me out a little bit and I am forced to think about these kinds of things. I don't understand why people hurt other people. Everyone is broken about something, everyone suffers, everyone hurts...some more then others. This is no excuse to use your brokenness to hurt someone else. The world is a dark place, I don't understand.