What a bunch of crap

My running is getting better.  I am able to go longer distances at a faster pace and I am able to talk for a good bit of it.  I partially judge my fitness on how much I can talk on a training run.  I actually can't believe that I have become a running talker.  Or a talking runner.  I think it comes from my inherent hatred of long distances.  I need something to take my mind off the miles.  When running with people I am comfortable with, that means talking.  When running by myself, that means I need music.  Trail running provides all kinds of distractions.  Squirrels, bears, twigs, roots, rocks, cliffs, etc.  The miles go so much faster when I am distracted.  We ran yesterday in the aftermath of a "snowstorm".  In our area, we got about 5 or 6 inches of snow, which wasn't bad, but it was windy.  Very windy and cold.  The wind was blowing right in our faces for much of the time.  We also run in a fairly hilly area.  I found that the concentration it took to not let the wind blow my face off, took my mind off the hills.  My friend said that the hills took his mind off the wind.  It is all in the perspective.  My point being, I like stuff taking my mind off the run.  I may have said this before, but I don't think that I am a runner who goes out to run to clear my mind.  I don't find joy in the run.  I find joy in the effects of the run.  In other words, especially when I run by myself, I just want the run to be over.  Once it is over, I think back to how wonderful it was and I can't wait for the next one.  I think part of the euphoria is that I didn't die.  My runner's high comes at the end.  I'm in my car, I have a Dunkin Donuts coffee, and I am alive and thinking about what I just did.  Time spent with good friends sharing in the run is also incredible.  During a race, I am totally different.  I don't want to talk.  I can't talk.  I shouldn't be able to talk.  For those running purists out there who say you should just be in touch with your body and listen to your pace or your feet and shouldn't talk or listen to music or communicate with squirrels...well, fuck you.  I am a middle aged, average looking, middle of the pack amateur runner who is just trying to stay in shape and die in a healthy manner.  Speaking of music, I have had disagreements with people over whether to listen to music or not when we run.  My opinion is that if I am too stupid to see or hear a car coming, or a bear attacking me, then I deserve to be run over and/or eaten.  There are runners out there that take themselves far too seriously.  As important as it is to me, I have to rein it in every once in awhile and say it is just running.  I am a decent recreational runner with some goals I want to achieve.  Therefore, I train with the intent to perform at a certain level.  That level kicks me out of the run for joy club.  The joy I get is seeing my body respond to the miles and the surprise I still have when I am able to get certain results.  I am on a quest to see what my body can do at a semi-advanced age.

I just read an article about what aging does to performance.  Everything falls apart, basically, as we age.   I don't really need to read this to know it, but it when you read about it, it is kind of scary. Testosterone levels, heart rate, muscle tone, bone structure, fat loss, brain cells, rate of recovery...pretty much everything.  What gets stronger as we age, at least in some of us, is the resistance to quitting.  When we are younger it is just easier to quit.  We think we have plenty of time to make up for things.  Well, time catches up with us.  We get older.  Life beats us down.  At least it thinks it does.  But we make it to a certain point and we make it through certain things and we kind of beat time and life.  It pounds us and pounds us some more, until it just doesn't hurt that much anymore.  And something like running, while painful, is really nothing.  It is just running.  I personally feel that I am still in my twenties.  I am an old, kind of wrinkly, gray and sore twenty year old, but mentally I don't feel like maybe a 52 year old should feel.  However, I realize every day that I may hit a plateau physically at any time and I'm not ready for that yet.  I want to try to pull every bit of performance out of myself so I can start the slide down the other side knowing I did everything I could to see what I could do.  I can't go back to high school and do things again.  Back then I half assed everything, never really pushing too hard.  I can't get that back, but I can do what I can right now.  I would like to see what I can do.  All I really know, is at this age, pain just doesn't hurt that much.  I'm gonna leave it at that.