Over the weekend we ate pandemic pizza, quarantine cookies. If it's alliteration, it feels justified.
But today is Tuesday, the beginning of Georg's week working from home, and I am determined to not slide into stress-eating and self-pity. We agree to green smoothies, pilates, and a trip to the canyon every evening. We may not be allowed in public spaces, but we are allowed in nature, and the weather is warming.
We are lucky to be here, near nature. A ten minute drive from dramatic, wild canyons and gorgeous creeks, and every time we arrive, I can't believe it. "Heaven," is the word that rings through my head. "We have found it."
We find a secluded area where the creek is far enough that Sophie can't dash into it too quickly (she runs, squealing, every time she sees it). Then we play hide and seek, and I sprint through the pine trees as if I were ten. As I run, I wonder how why I don't run through the woods every day. I am a good runner, but I stopped jogging because I hate to run in the city. I guess it feels wrong to be jogging placidly over flat terrain, going nowhere (but going anyway). Besides, I can't take Sophie with me, and can't leave her behind.
But this feels like a new necessity: to run in the woods, to run and run until I am free of everything but the animal beating inside me. Tomorrow we will go back to the canyon, and maybe hide and seek will be my excuse to sprint through the trees. It seems we always need a guise of purpose for our gleeful running to be justified. I am no longer a toddler like Sophie, and yet I want to collapse in her joyful lack of justification, in her squealing dashes to the creek.
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