November 12, 2009, journal entry

Six miles.

I awake early for my run once again, and I head out the door to cold to find a heavy fog whitening predawn’s black. The fog hovers before black and grey air like my Lincoln Park hummingbird at her tubular purple flowers, the contrast of dark and light most evident in this inky hour.

Temperatures in the 20’s mean that this thick mist has probably frozen to some ground surfaces, so I must take each stride carefully. The unknown is not unfamiliar territory for me, so I know to run only the moment, the step that is just before me.

I almost slip on the street’s blacktop surface, so I move from curbside to sidewalk, its grey texture taking the freezing fog differently. It is easier to run on this sidewalk, a different kind of concrete.

Fallen maple leaves have frozen on concrete, so I still attend to my steps. Maple leaves are slippery, wet or frosty, though when dried and crushed look like piles of pencil shavings.

My pumpkin–colored pine needles frozen in place resemble the yellowish pollen-stained puddles of Spring and anchor my footing.

I jump over ice cubes on frozen mud and dirt paths like I am skipping on summertime’s sidewalk-chalk hopscotch patterns drawn on streets by playing children, and pine needles and maple leaves show their lighter side on dark gravel. I pick up my pace.

Trees’ roots counterpoise sidewalks, the height differences accentuated by frosty moss, pine needles, and leaves, their cement outcrops playing fog layers over fields.

Senescent leaves cover the ground, and trees’ buds of Spring lie dormant above. An apple falls, and harvest fields die, crushed beneath the unwavering Wheel of Seasons that sets and moves the hands of the circadian clock.

I have to admit it has not been easy for me to arise early this morning, knowing that a blast of cold is just outside the door. Still, I lace up my running shoes and am once again glad to have gone out, reminded and amazed at the variety of color, light, and shadow that exists, even within dark.

GL, 11/12/2009. Prevail.