Traveling Woes of A Runner
Building my running routines and morning routines has been a great part of my past couple years. While I've managed to stay on course for the most part, when I'm at home, I've found it exceedingly hard to transfer the same habits when I'm traveling anywhere.
For the last week, I've been dogsitting out of state for my brother and his wife. I had grand illusions of knocking out my weekend long runs on the trails here and exploring their part of the world for my midweek runs. That didn't exactly happen.
In my defense, this part of Virginia got almost three feet of snow around a week before I got here so there wasn't exactly ample room on the streets and sidewalks for running. Not to mention the very real possibility of eating it on a patch of ice or the inevitable shoe soaking that comes along with trying to run through unpacked snow.
It's also difficult to concentrate on journaling and meditating when you've got adorable dogs giving you the "I'm ready for breakfast!" looks.
I'm also on Instagram now!
I did force a 3 mile run to try and get back on my schedule and between dodging puddles, stepping through icy snow patches, and trying to figure out how to make a 3 mile route in unfamiliar turf, it felt like 6 miles. When I can just hit my established routes at home and know all of my mile markers for routes of various distances, it makes the mental side of things a lot easier for me which makes the physical easier as well.
Maybe that 3 mile run broke the seal or maybe it was grinding out a journal entry this morning or maybe it was purely overwhelm of thoughts about work stuff that pushed me into a 5 miler in the cold rain today, but either way, it was a gloriously purifying experience. I still didn't really know how I was going to make my mileage and despite my best puddle dodging efforts, my shoes got soaked as the snow melt rushed across the sidewalks. It was still an awesome and much needed run.
As I'm writing this, the inscription I put in my class ring is coming back to me, "Power Through." Somehow, despite wearing it every day, I forget that crucial bit of advice. That will give me something to meditate on tomorrow as I inevitably make these dogs very confused.