Radio Silence

 I was a mile away from my house, running up a hill, when the helpful voice whispered in my ear: "Please recharge your headset." It was the obsequious droid that was letting me know that I had no more seconds to wait before the music I was listening to turned to silence. Well, not exactly silence. I was suddenly aware of the pitter patter of my little feet on the sidewalk, muffled by the rubber buds that were still stuffed unnecessarily in my ears. 

Decision time: Should I turn around and cut this exercise period short for the sake of being distracted/entertained as I sweat? Or should I press on? I had already tacitly committed to running seven miles that morning, and turning around at that point would give me a grand total of two. Hardly the workout I was anticipating. So I kept going. Up the hill, suddenly very aware of the rhythm of my steps. I thought of a metronome. I imagined that keeping a steady beat would give me a steady pace, which is something I don't always achieve when I have all those different tempos pouring in to my head. All those words. All those melodies. The playlist I had compiled was engineered to bring a certain spring to my step. 

Now those tunes were gone, and I thought of my therapist from way back when. She suggested to me that I didn't always have to drown out the world with music. She advised me, not always but from time to time, to run without headphones. To listen to the world around me. Shortly after that, as I crested another hill, I came upon two neighbors discussing the fate of the house across the street from them. "Yeah, he's not really in Hawaii. He's in debt up to his ears. She's just camping out there."

Now I wanted to stop for a completely different reason. I wanted in on the conversation. Who was she and was anybody going to call the authorities and was there a meth lab involved? But I kept moving. 

About a mile away from that dialogue, I overheard a mother yelling at her daughter from the front porch, "You're not going to wear that outside, are you?" If I stopped there, I might take in a little teenage angst. But I kept moving.

As I ran, I heard motors roar and purr and belch on street beside me. I heard the town start to wake up. Yards were watered in anticipation of another hot day. Children screamed from living rooms because sometimes that happens too. 

And all the while I kept that metronome ticking. When I made it home, I busied myself about the yard. Trees to water, roses to tend. I listened to birds singing and squirrels chasing one another in the trees. All of this sound made me feel closer to my world. Which was fine.

Then I went inside and charged my headphones.