Life is Good

"I feel good, I knew that I would, now" I Feel Good: James Brown

I got out of work today with good intentions. I was determined to run 5 miles, since it was "warm" (almost 50 degrees), and I had the night off from working at Weight Watchers. I arrived home and was pleasantly surprised to see that my wife had put out the holiday decorations outside of our home. I had actually forgotten that she had taken the day off. I rushed inside, knowing that I had less than an hour before sunset. My lovely wife was putting up our artificial tree, and I had intentions of performing a "duck and roll" to our bedroom and changing into my running gear. My wife had other ideas. She asked for help solving the case of the one strand of lights that didn't work. It's not that I didn't try to help. But every solution I'd come up with was met with the comment "I already tried that." Finally I did what every good husband of 27 years does. I shut up and listened. Long story short, 20 minutes later she had the lights working. And I had my freedom to go change my clothes, now with about 20 minutes to go before sunset. I walked towards my bedroom, and was met by my son exiting the kitchen in his power wheelchair. He asked me if I would do his albuterol treatments with him. Obviously I couldn't tell him "No." Besides, family always comes first. Albuterol treatment completed, I looked outside. Darkness greeted me, but I didn't greet it back. As I've said before, I hate running in the dark. I weighed my options: Wimp out (not really an option, since new cat has vet appt. tomorrow, so I won't be running); run original goal of 5 miles; or since I don't like running after sunset, cut my run back to 3 miles. A 3 mile run was my decision. I dressed, did my stretches, put on my cool glowing, highly visible at night armband, grabbed my music, and headed outside. I looked in the sky, and noticed how beautiful it looked: moon shining brightly, venus nearby, and a few other visible stars. It was a "Life is good" moment. Suddenly, it was going to be alright running in the dark, and with streetlight lit roads. Mile 1 was an 8:16 mile, followed by a 7:50 mile 2, and (drum roll please) a 7:23 3rd mile. Total time: 23:29, or a 7:49 per mile average pace.