The accumulated weight of florescent office light bulbs, deadlines and painfully hollow conversation leaves me disoriented as if I've been set at a slow spin in some overpriced office chair. The late spring sun works its way through the trees and into the parking lot like coffee through a clogged press. A drafty north-south wind cuts across my face as I pull open and fall into the driver's seat of my RAV4. A second hand 60m climbing rope, chalk bag and beat up trail shoes sit hodgepodge in the trunk, subtly giving away my true life-blood. I pull a pair of old running shorts from the second row floor and dust them off. The engine hums, almost with excitement, yanking at the hem of the shorts I've just pulled on, nudging at me to drop the gear into drive. Heeding the prod, I pull the car out of the homogenized business development and onto the highway. Mason Jennings' Ulysses spins.
With one hand on the steering wheel I hack away at the buttons on my oxford, supplanting the 80/20 cotton/polyester armor of my day job with a ratty old race shirt. It feels right, weirdly appropriate on an almost existential level... but smells slightly off. As if the accumulated miles in this half-sour/half-kraut marathon T somehow worked its way into the fabric's DNA, rendering the T now immune from discount Tide detergent and high efficiency spin cycles. The minutia of 9-5 M-F begins to settle, like particulate in a glass. The churned waters of some primordial fish tank easing off, shit and sand and old scales falling slowly and shiftily in a feather dropped from hand descent. By the time I pull the regular (and illegal) U-turn into the trail-head parking lot, my post-hurricane-waters, Ganges polluted brain is now roughly half tempered. More of an Ocean City in September clear but not yet the sans OxiClean™ clarity of an alpine tarn which is what I'm craving, quite desperately. Soon, soon.
My pollen strewn SUV is one of 3 vehicles in the trail-head lot. Maybe the drivers are part of this eclectic outdoor oriented tribe? or maybe the cars are spill over from the low income neighborhood juxtaposed to our parking spots. The "store your valuables out-of-sight" sign offers mixed messages. I awkwardly pull a thumb knuckle-filleted-by-inner-heel from my running shoe and begin the slog across the 4-lane highway to the physical trail. A few more scales settle.
The dirt single tracks of PA's Wissahickon Valley reach like the capillaries of a frost bitten hand, at the outer edges they dwindle into almost non-existence, overgrown and peripheral they require near absolute awareness to navigate. As the steps accumulate these constricted foot paths open, running in tangents across the forest floor. Finally, here it makes sense. I toss mental baggage like an underpaid American Airlines handler. The trail gains relief. My heart rate and spirit follow the ascent. I choke down damp air, grasping for it, needing it, a blind man in the dark. Hypoxic pain nudges out subtle but chronic psychic malaise. There is only so much room in a man's head. My breathe reverberates in that open hall between my ears. My lungs ache signaling that deep, boiling burn of lactate thresholds ignored. Finally, here it makes sense, swallowed again whole by the forest. Sand and shit settle. The office chair's carnival spin stops. The present moment has friction. I am, finally, alive once again.
With one hand on the steering wheel I hack away at the buttons on my oxford, supplanting the 80/20 cotton/polyester armor of my day job with a ratty old race shirt. It feels right, weirdly appropriate on an almost existential level... but smells slightly off. As if the accumulated miles in this half-sour/half-kraut marathon T somehow worked its way into the fabric's DNA, rendering the T now immune from discount Tide detergent and high efficiency spin cycles. The minutia of 9-5 M-F begins to settle, like particulate in a glass. The churned waters of some primordial fish tank easing off, shit and sand and old scales falling slowly and shiftily in a feather dropped from hand descent. By the time I pull the regular (and illegal) U-turn into the trail-head parking lot, my post-hurricane-waters, Ganges polluted brain is now roughly half tempered. More of an Ocean City in September clear but not yet the sans OxiClean™ clarity of an alpine tarn which is what I'm craving, quite desperately. Soon, soon.
My pollen strewn SUV is one of 3 vehicles in the trail-head lot. Maybe the drivers are part of this eclectic outdoor oriented tribe? or maybe the cars are spill over from the low income neighborhood juxtaposed to our parking spots. The "store your valuables out-of-sight" sign offers mixed messages. I awkwardly pull a thumb knuckle-filleted-by-inner-heel from my running shoe and begin the slog across the 4-lane highway to the physical trail. A few more scales settle.
The dirt single tracks of PA's Wissahickon Valley reach like the capillaries of a frost bitten hand, at the outer edges they dwindle into almost non-existence, overgrown and peripheral they require near absolute awareness to navigate. As the steps accumulate these constricted foot paths open, running in tangents across the forest floor. Finally, here it makes sense. I toss mental baggage like an underpaid American Airlines handler. The trail gains relief. My heart rate and spirit follow the ascent. I choke down damp air, grasping for it, needing it, a blind man in the dark. Hypoxic pain nudges out subtle but chronic psychic malaise. There is only so much room in a man's head. My breathe reverberates in that open hall between my ears. My lungs ache signaling that deep, boiling burn of lactate thresholds ignored. Finally, here it makes sense, swallowed again whole by the forest. Sand and shit settle. The office chair's carnival spin stops. The present moment has friction. I am, finally, alive once again.
