Thanksgiving day (from the R2W log):
Today I worked from noon until a little after seven and didn't make much money. It wasn't too busy. I guess they had a major rush at breakfast, but I obviously missed that. I ended up just walking there and back and on the way back just busted out the phone and wished a few people 'Happy Thanksgiving's'. I finally made it out the door around 9 o'clock at night and wasn't really sure where to run but then decided to head toward this street near TU/American Standard that I hadn't run on for a long time.
My sophomore year, Graber and I were roomates in Miller connected to a quad with Loramie and Yankey. Well, one night (I think it was after my first year of cross had ended) we were trying to sleep but couldn't stop talking to each other and were laughing at the dumbest stuff and decided that we were too hyper to sleep. So a logical idea came to our heads. Why not just run? So, around 1 or 2 a.m., we just headed out and ran around Tiffin aimlessly. I'm pretty sure it was around this time of year (the holidays) because I think I remember the Christmas lights around the brick sidewalk by the Sandusky bridges being up.
At any rate, tonight I just decided it was as good a night as any to run around aimlessly, and as I did I started thinking a lot about my time here at Heidelberg and how many memories I have running around this town. It's literally come to the point where every 10 seconds I run a memory pops up about something that happened at one point during my four and a half years here at that exact spot, or that exact piece of pavement I just ran by. I couldn't stop thinking about how many holidays I've spent here in Tiffin alone...working. And truthfully, it's not necessarily a sad thought--I've never been one to get homesick--it's more of one of those things when you think about how you used to react to certain situations at a certain time in your life and how you react to them now, and then see how much you've changed...or maybe the complete opposite...find that you still handle certain situations exactly the same.
I had a little daydream tonight while I was running about the drive to Georgia. I just imagined listening to a ton of my favorite albums as I headed south on the highway thinking about all of the things I'm leaving behind but at the same time excited about what's to come. And do you know what the best part of the daydream was? At the end of it, I pulled into my new garage at some random apartment (that's not quite real yet), set my keys on the counter, didn't take a SINGLE bag out of the car, laced up my shoes and went out for a run.
It wasn't until I analyzed the daydream that I realized why this sport has been such a blessing in my life. No matter what situation I'm in, as long as I have this, I'll have something familiar with me. In a few weeks I'm going to be in a new neighborhood and I'm going to have no idea where to go...or run. A few years ago, I remember Tiffin's one-way streets confusing the hell out of me. I remember thinking there was no way I was ever going to be able to learn how to get anywhere in this stupid town. Now, I know this whole city like the back of my hand and have so many bread-and-butter routes that leaving them behind is almost as sad as leaving behind a good friend. I can't help but thinking this current situation I'm facing--battling the ghosts of all the runs and memories I've been through in Tiffin--is going to repeat itself throughout my life. It happened when I left Leetonia for Tiffin, it's happening as I leave Tiffin for Augusta (hell, it happened after as I was leaving Golden after running there for only a couple of months this summer) and at some point, I'll most likely leave Augusta and go through the same thing. In a few years, I'll most likely be attached to Augusta in a very similar way to how I'm attached to Tiffin.
"Man it passes right by me,
it's behind me,
...now it's gone."
-Avey Tare
