Outrun

I am still running. Way back when I was a snotty twenty-something, trying to dissect my newly divorced father's psyche, I once asked him, "What are you running from?" He looked at me as I would now if my son felt  he was clever enough to look into the deepest recesses of my soul. There was some mild disdain, and some curiosity. Was there something that only I could  see? Something he was blind to, that I was going to be the one to pry open his eyes and shine a light that had never reached them?
Probably not. It was my father who first suggested running to me as a regular form of exercise. At the time, it was also a form of exorcise, having recently broken up with my high school sweetheart. I was trying to rebuild my physical and emotional well-being. A mile at a time.
I ran because it was easy enough to do, and when I finished, I felt better. It made sense to me that there was an easy connection to be made between the endorphins that I was stirring up and the peace I was generating in my mind. I assumed that my father must be out on the road, working out his demons as well. Maybe he was, but he never talked about it to me. Probably because of my somewhat confrontational approach, but that is how I was running my life at the time. I was in a hurry to grow up, to out-think my father.
Last Friday, I came home for work and went out for a run. It has become an important part of my mental health regimen to get out and log a couple of miles at the end of a busy week just to put some literal  yaand physical distance between myself and the week that was. I was about a mile out when I was passed on the right by a wiry young fellow, followed by his girlfriend. Their stride was light and bouncy, and I suddenly felt all of my fifty-three years. The bouncy couple stopped at the intersection ahead of me, giving me a chance to catch up. I knew that I could take a little jog to my right and move myself a few yards closer to the other side of the street, and when the light changed, I took off.
I pushed myself and stayed ahead of the bouncy pair for the next half mile, where I felt relief when I peeled off their route and continued on my own. For a little while, experience outran youth. I had been racing against my own mortality. I could hear my father laugh. He would have been in his early eighties if he had lived to his birthday this week. I'm guessing if he could, he'd still be running.