Missed It By That Much

Suppose they gave a party and nobody came? Well, it seems a lot of people came, but I didn't. Oakland had it's third annual Running Festival, and nobody invited me. It should be noted that none of the thousands of participants who did get up on Sunday morning and braved the gray skies and sketchy pavement of our city streets were invited. They registered ahead of time. They got up and made the commitment. They paid their money, ran their race, and got their t-shirt.
By contrast, I got up slowly that day. I wasn't feeling my freshest, and I was sponsoring my family's trip to the local cinema to see the film about teenage pain and suffering. I chose to take it easy that day. Normally I am up and running well before noon: never a full marathon or even a ten-kilometer, just a few miles to get my blood pumping and keep my streak alive.
It was so much easier to feel the spirit of the Running Festival when it actually ran past our house. Starting sometime after eight o'clock for the past two years, a steady stream of sweating citizen-athletes poured past our front door. This year, that path changed, and we were bypassed, perhaps because the streets a few blocks over are a little more free of ankle-snapping potholes.
And it would be easy to blame the organizers for my lack of enthusiasm. I looked at some of the swag and felt a twinge. How could I, who calls myself a runner in that profile just to the right of this blog, miss such an opportunity?
Then came acceptance: I will run again. I might not get a souvenir t-shirt, but I will run again. It is, after all, what I do. I don't need a festival. It's what I do.