Gifts

My 45th birthday is coming up next week. Like the speed limit sign says, this is fast enough, I don't need the years to go by any faster. It's hard to believe 45 is midlife when you feel like you're 23.

Today I felt like I got a birthday present, in an odd way. Lately I've been feeling sort of flat. Not depressed, but not really excited about running, or anything, and I've been dragging my feet about planning my next adventure. I'm not the only one, I've talked to a few other people lately who are also experiencing low energy and lack of enthusiasm.

I tend to get introverted and every so often I have to remind myself that there's a world out there, otherwise much of the time I'd be content to focus on whatever task I'm doing at the moment, or lose myself in my long solo runs.

The connection to others is a gift.

When I meet people who are depressed, they often have isolated themselves unintentionally, and they feel like they have lost their connections to others. Helping them reconnect is important, because the connections are still there, they just haven't been maintained. It usually takes a small effort. For depressed people that effort can seem like a huge mountain to climb, but that's another tangent.

This morning I was out on my run, planning to go about an hour, to get some miles in, and I wasn't feeling particularly enthusiastic but didn't feel bad. I was approaching Shields Street, headed west on the bike path when I ran into three runners coming toward me. I recognized Cat, and she was out with two other people running before their yoga class. She was about to stop and to talk to me but I turned around in their direction and started running with them. We ran about a mile and a half together before they turned off for yoga and I had to go home.

Just talking with Cat about her upcoming plans to run her first 50 miler, and her enthusiasm about having talked with another ultrarunner in her first 50K last year, who helped her see another way of looking at finishing an ultra, was uplifting for me. One of the runners she was with talked about how she hopes to do a marathon someday. Feeling that energy and knowing they are exploring something new reminded me that there are so many nice people out there in the running community, lots of people I have never run with, opening the possibilities to expand my social circle and running partners.

And when I got home I had two emails from running friends who will be joining me in my run on Sunday, Felix and Jeff. I felt so much better. Later I had energy to go back outside and enjoy the afternoon on the trails, after a massage from Cindy.

Sometimes you don't see the gifts that are hidden because you see only the screen that you've put up to filter things out. If you filter the world out too much you won't recognize a gift right in front of you, you're too busy screening things out.

Someone can brighten your day unexpectedly. It's a matter of opening your eyes and allowing yourself to receive the gift.

This afternoon I ran around Dixon Reservoir. It was a warm day, in the 70s, and the wind was gusting on the east side of the water. All the college students were out, restless, working on their tans, getting ready for spring break. Nothing is green yet, we need some rain. This is Colorado, and we should be getting several feet of snow by next month. We change the clocks back to Daylight Savings Time on Sunday.

Spring is here!