I have a short life-story I’ve been meaning to share. I’ve long had the suspicion it is relevant to many others.
A year or two ago, I found myself in possession of a pair of trail running shoes, not because I had any intention of running on trails, but because they came from the same brand I usually bought and looked like the style of shoes I have always bought. I really had no idea they were trail running shoes at first. They fit wonderfully, but their soles wore out super fast, and while this bothered me, in the back of my head I kept thinking, “Hey, these are trail running shoes, right? I really like these. I should look for some new trail running shoes.”
But when I looked, all I found were cheap-o shoes or the high end $100+ ones. Bummer.
But then I discovered a little book one day in the book section at REI. It was formatted the same way all of my hiking books are formatted. It was a book of trails especially suited for running. I found myself really fascinated that such cool trails were nearby. And the thought grew: “Wouldn’t it be fun to actually run those trails?”
Now, I’ve shared elsewhere. I am horrible at running. Running represents some of the more embarrassing moments of my K-12 education. I was always one or two from the last. Marching band was hell at times. Nothing I ever did could get me to be a good runner. Some people just seemed so made for running, while I so didn’t. So I kind of grew up hating running.
But for the first time in my life, I found myself interested. Partly because I had never been good at it, I wondered, “What if I found a way to not completely suck at this?” I also thought about how nobody would be watching, there would be no clocks showing me how bad I was, and there would be no competition. <dreamy voice>Just me and the wind</dreamy voice>
It was decided.
I first took a trip to Runner’s World, which scared the heck out of me. I was practically expecting alarms to go off as I entered, warning everyone that a fraud had entered the vicinity and please evacuate immediately. At the very least, I was afraid the employees would be kind while believing I was a total chump, but I didn’t actually get that impression from them. But it was awkward. I was looking for a water vest, but they only had one, which was outrageously expensive. I quickly left.
So I went back and bought those $100+ shoes I saw before, which fit perfectly, and then found a jogging vest at REI at a much better price-point for my anticipated usage. I think I bought a few socks for that sort of thing, too. I went to Chatfield, and after a long walk, I was really feeling it, and took my first jog in over a decade. The trail wound all through the woods, and it was honestly pretty exhilarating. I had no idea it could be so fun.
Now, they shut that trail down literally the next week (fuckers…), but I quickly found some other spots that I have enjoyed since. I went maybe 10 times last year, and I’ve probably only made it 4 times this year just because of the heat and rain this summer, and my new job leaves me pretty exhausted at the end of the day. But it’s still fun.
I guess the lesson from this is that it’s easy to feel that we don’t belong at something if we don’t feel good at it. Like, the only people who can claim to be interested in something are those who are phenomenally awesome at it or otherwise super dedicated to it. But that is completely false. I still would not call myself good at running in any way, but you don’t have to worry about that if you aren’t trying to compare yourself to other people (something I need to learn in other areas of my life). I guess I’d like to get better, or at least use jogging to condition myself to handle longer hikes, but I also don’t want to succumb to the bias that all things must constantly be improving or else they are worthless. That’s patently false, too. Every time I’ve gone jogging has been fun, and that should be good enough.
(and don’t over-analyze the title. calling it ‘not-so-jogging’ is just a tongue-in-cheek way of making it my own thing)