Beautiful day

I used to get all wound up in pace, distance, miles per week, stats, numbers, objective measures of my performance as a runner. I spent so many months, years even, chasing goals - a sub-27 5k, 10k under an hour, my elusive 4:XX marathon. I used numbers to measure my worth as a runner, and for too many months, my worth as a person. 

Problem is, as far as runners go, I'm not very good at being one. I'm slow - middle-to-back-of-the-pack slow. And more than once I've ended up at the bottom of the race results. And that's okay. I know I'm not fast. I know I'm not going to win. That's not why I'm out there. If it was, I would be sorely disappointed more often than not. I'm out there because I love to run. Period. The end. 

And when I've not been able to run, or when I've taken a break from running for whatever reasons, I find myself missing it. Over the past 10-12 years, it has become part of who I am. It does not, however, define me as a person. And I think that separation in how I see myself is what allows me to run at whatever pace, whatever distance, whatever the objective measure ends up being, and still find joy and release and peace with my running. 

I ran today. There was a lot of walking because of my heart rate and the base training I'm building. But there was also a lot of laughing and joking and happiness in my run that was shared by my running partner. And it was a beautiful day despite a chill in the air and some high humidity. 

Or maybe it was a beautiful day because I got to run.