Running in place

I’ve had never understood this. When I was younger, I would see people standing at crosswalks and corners to streets waiting for traffic to pass by, just running in place. I just couldn’t understand why anyone would do this. That was, until I started running, until I was no longer a passenger but a runner, someone moving at pace, keeping time, not willing to stop for cars or at corners. It wasn’t until that time in my life that running in place made sense and has now become the one thing I can’t seem to get past. 

I suppose my whole issue with running in place is the same reason I really hate treadmills: Lack of movement. Having been a child who suffered from various illnesses (sorry mom, but I got the lousy immunity gene), sitting still or being still is almost torture for me. I have no idea how to relax unless it involves some type of movement, and when I was finally healthy enough to have some semblance of a life that reflected that of everyone else’s, I did start running because of sports and because I like it. During summer break from college, after my shift at whatever part time job I was able to get the most pay and hours, I would go for runs, long ones. I’d design my route so I’d have minimal stops or crossings and make sure they were in quiet neighborhoods that weren’t known for heavy traffic flow. This constant movement helped me feel like I was progressing in my running, doing something, achieving. When it came to corners and crosswalks, I hated standing there and waiting. I’d loose my endurance and flow, so I stared doing that bouncy, runner-obnoxious, running in place thing and it actually helped.

I never really thought doing something in place could help with future movement but it did help me keep my legs warm and ready to go for when the light changed, so I kept doing it every time I had to stop and have ever since. True, it is slightly frustrating to me because I’m not technically going anywhere, but I feel that at least I’m doing something, which is better than nothing.

Same with my life. I’m not the sort of person that has to busy every moment of every day, but I like to have enough on my social schedule to keep me moving, I like to have a purpose and feel useful, I like to give and receive love. Down time is important as well, but I can’t stand feeling bored or stuck in something. Lately I’ve been seeking out the road for help dealing with the latter of the last mentioned feelings.

In the last three years, the field I work in has changed drastically–it basically looks nothing like what it did when I started and is heading in a direction I don’t want to go. The place where I work has become a toxic mixture of bitter and embattled people unsatisfied or frustrated with where they are or what they’re doing. My worst fear is becoming one of them, and last year, I felt their wear seeping in. I manage about 12 of these people, and my only allies have been able to find their way out. After really working on my resume with a friend who helps people find jobs for a living, and looking both within my field and out, and after applying to more jobs than I can count, it’s mid July and I’ve come up with nothing. Not even an interview in 6 months. 

There is a hill near where I live that is obscene. No other word for it. I honestly can never figure how the houses are built into it without them shifting drastically during every major rain storm we have. On a bad day, I round the corner, and work my way quickly as I can up that hill. I pump my arms, get on the balls of my feet, and climb the stair-like-hill swearing a blue streak all the way up audibly (so long as there are no children around). On the way down, I have to be sure not to let my legs come out from under me. I usually hit a reasonable level and use the momentum to tear down the road and round the corner. There’s a slight elevation after that, but then it builds toward a final crossing before home. If I come down at just the right time and hit my stride just right, I can clear the crosswalk under a green without stoping or even needing to think about on-coming traffic. As I turned yesterday, this was my goal. I pumped my arms, lifted my knees higher like a sprinter, clenched my teeth–I was sweating in the oppressive summer heat like an Olympian and probably looking like every pudgy American kid who ever tried to imitate one. I felt all parts of my body, every part of my flub, vibrate with every push of effort toward that corner and that light. Green, green, green … green.

It’s not as if I’ haven’t been here before. Irony of ironies, I’ve been running in place a lot in life–healthy, then not; waiting to lose weight or make  it to the next goal; finding someone to spend life with; finding a place to live; starting an adult life; the list goes on. There’s always a holding gate before  a race, a holding pattern before a flight. Each situation is frustrating, difficult, annoying, lonely, angering, maddening, and has you yearning for a tiny bag of peanuts, but it is supposed to be in preparation of something … it’s a waiting period for something, even if you have no choice but to back to the same thing.

GREEN! Green, it’s going to stay green, green, damn it. And it went from yellow to red. I had to stop. It wasn’t really my choice–no sane person runs out into traffic as cars are making left had turns. But I didn’t stand still–I ran in place, disappointed, contemplating my reflection in the bypassing cars, wondering if I should have just gone for it …