Change of Pace

So much for all the free time I was going to have over break. I imagined I would be blogging every day...twice a day even...but it seems that I've simply fallen out of the habit. Or I burned out from all the writing I did over the past few months and just couldn't bring myself to type.

Those last few groggy days spent in the Mizzou library left me half dazed and completely incoherent, so it's just as well that I gave myself a short break from strenuous brain activity as I split town and reconnected with my old friends back in the city.

Running in Central Park again was divine, especially after letting two months slip by without logging a single mile on my rapidly atrophying legs. The lungs weren't thrilled about the sudden uptick in activity, but all in all in didn't seem like I'd lost that much fitness. I ended up with 15-20 miles for each week of break, which almost seems like a joke, but you have to start somewhere.

One of my grad school classmates sent me an email over break to see if I was interested in training for a spring marathon with her and while I think I personally will be aiming for something more like a halfway respectable spring half, it would definitely be nice to have someone to run with...someone who does NOT run at 5:30 AM like the local club that I attempted to train with last semester.

I'm also going to have to keep an online visual journal this semester for one of my photo classes and I figured I might as well just log the entries here for anyone who might be interested in what it is that I'm doing that has put such a crimp into my running career.With any luck, I'll be interspersing my thoughts on strobe technique and multiple light positioning with actual entries about mid-Missouri spring running. Hey, I did rename the blog "Change of Pace" after all, I just didn't realized how much slowerthe new pace would be!

Some of the books I used for my last big paper....good thing they're not about my running!

My east coast friends may have the impression that the midwest is flat as a pancake, but I'm here to tell you that is a far cry from the truth. It's fine when you're running along some lovely bluff, but the moment you start to cut across said bluff (and there are a lot of those out here) the terrain turns into a roller coaster. Add an inch of slippery snow to the incline and a brisk morning jog turns into serious slow going. That's fine though, since I figure I'm still getting the same benefit from being out there, no matter how long it takes me to get up the damn hill.

And the true workout for me at this point is probably more of a mental one anyway. It hasn't been that long, but already I can barely remember what it was like to be an every day runner. So if I've got the wherewithal to get myself bundled up and out there on what has to be one of the ickiest days of the winter so far, there's hope for me yet.

Aside from the bother of having to worry about hit-and-run incidents and crazed rural serial killers, there's something really special about a snowy twilight run. I laced up the togs last night just as the light was starting to fade and headed over the bluff to the MKT trail to see what it looks like covered in white stuff.
	The city here uses cinders on the road to keep the ice at bay, so the sidewalk alongside turns into a really disgusting morass of black muck by a day or two after a snowfall. When I got to the trail though it was like something out of a dream.

The grey sky hinted pink at the edges and reflected up off the snow with an ethereal light. Even after I passed the open fields and entered the darkening woods, the snow-covered path glowed gently before me, as comforting as the ceramic fir-tree nightlight that used to stand sentry in my childhood room. For the most part, my only company was the soft crunch of my own footfalls, but I did pass a one other woman enjoying the lavender twilight. "It's hard to run in the snow," she said as I passed her. I suppose my shins are a little sore today from the slippery hills and that slight nudge back that comes with every step, so maybe it does make it a little harder than usual, but after a run that feels that magical, it really is so worth it.