On And On

 My wife gave me a book for Christmas: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami. This was a clever gift on her part, since I have two competing obsessions. One is running. The other is writing. Reading another writer's thoughts about running has brought much contemplation to the past couple of weeks. The first level of which has centered around the injury that has plagued me since before winter began. Having a right knee that keeps me from chugging around in my very normal and conditioned way has cast a pall over an otherwise joyful season. After a few days of laying around and being disabused with thoughts of never running again, I got up off the couch and started taking brisk walks along some of the same paths I would normally be doing the aforementioned chugging. 

Mister Murakami writes about the time spent outside, the elements, the music in his ears, the wind on his face, his legs finding a rhythm. I relate to that. He relates the experience of training versus exercise. I can relate to that. He points to the various marathons he has run. This confounds me. The longest run I have recorded is a thirteen mile odyssey that seemed to go on forever and though I did not collapse at the end of it, I figured the following day could be something in the three to four mile range so that I would not be setting any new wild expectations. 

But more than anything, I understood the discipline that he wrote about. Haruki Murakami runs marathons and writes novels, but I could grasp his ethos. It is what a long ago writing teacher once said to me, "Keep the habit of a pen." At the time, I nodded at this wisdom that sounded much more important than any of the poems and stories I was scribbling. But I wanted a place to hang my writer's cap, and it seemed like a good bit of fundamental advice. 

Perhaps not coincidentally it was right about this time that I began to run. Not as a chore but as an avocation. I ran a 10K race with my father, and I was hooked. It was right about that time that I read The Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving. Like so many of Irving's novels, the central figure is a writer, and an athlete. John Berry is told by his grandfather, Iowa Bob to "get obsessed and stay obsessed" when it comes to physical training. I took this to heart must like John did, and what you are reading now is a direct result of that decision. Seventeen years of something to say, even if it felt a little thin. I still pushed that "publish" button in the upper right hand corner of the screen when I felt I was done. 

Just like I continue to lace up my running shoes every day to see how far they will take me. Sometimes around the block. Sometimes longer. But I keep the habit. Of the keyboard. Of the road under my feet. Some days are easier than others. But I keep going. 

On and on.