Sunset Running and Me On This Weekend of Mid-July

TODAY CAN BE JUST ONE OF THOSE ORDINARY WEEKENDS  which pass us by, and  you look back on the date and you say to  yourself, "What  did I do on that day ?"   "What happened with me  on that day "?  

And doesn't it always happen that  we always look forward to weekends,  and when that weekend happens,  you find out that it's just a "Bleah!"  day?
 

Well,  I'm glad this weekend  is  very much different.  Well,  not really different,  I  would say it is "disguised"  as  just another  ordinary day:   I did the laundry,  did some groceries,  went to Church ( well, now that's extra-ordinary )   , everything at a much more slow-down relaxed pace ,   and  your mind  slides through its slowed Alpha state --- more  relaxed,  more  receptive,  and open to  "signals"  and "clues".     

One of my realizations  this weekend is,  yes,  like what Aunty Acid   

has made me realize ,  you should not "wait for a ship at the airport".  It's like yearning for a dream,  or  possibly an  "impossible dream"  to happen, and today  I have made the realization  that reality bites hard.  Big slap on the face,  falling flat  on your  face.

Keep it real,  Lei, just call a spade a spade,   and  stay focused on reality, not on  far-fetched dreams and  rose-colored  clouds  which appeared like heaven but wasn't.

Truth realizations,  like face-smacking slaps  should really hit you hard in the face, and also slam  rock hard on your  intellect and your ego --  to make sure it drives home the point.  It should hurt so  good that  you get your eyeballs rolling like  crazy. The hell it should.    I am bookmarking this Day of Realization.   This is my Transition Time,  slow-down time in between my runs,  and I come across important realizations :)   

To be totally honest,  it has  been  weeks when  I have slackened from my so-called  "sunset running",  and I'm more of a Pinay Sunset Blogger  than a Pinay Sunset Runner.   Simply  because when  I'm writing,  well,  I'm not running (Hahahha) .



My  running shoes  are  "injured"  ,  now suffering from cracked soles  and seemingly  agape mouths,   and  I am  making sure that I have a lot of materials for this blog  -- reading materials  --   before I hit the road again this week.  And so I'm writing this weekend instead of running.


So while my running feet are on hiatus,  it's my fingers doing the walking through the keyboard. Let your fingers do the walking,  Sweethearts.

For the past few months and first half of this year, I've been running through sundowns and sunsets day after day and night  after night,   sometimes running through the wee hours of midnight and early morning  at the very plush Bonifacio High Street   of    Bonifacio Global City  with  the voice  of Rihanna  singing  Rude Boy to my ears,  keeping me  company.

Yes, I would run like crazy :  like it's the only good thing happening in my life that time,  like it's the only thing where I feel no one has any right to meddle with -- they can meddle with my work performance,  with the way I dress ,  with all my  apparent "boo-boos"  in life,  --  but  not with my running.  I have owned it and called it  as  my  World,  where you can watch me but not with judgment this time.    Just stand back and  don't come near,  not in this World of mine. 

I  would  run  through the streets,   passing by  midnight construction workers who are working on the high-rise buildings round the clock  --  and there are hundreds of them working  in the booming business  district of that mini-city  --    and these guys  shouting "Takbo!!  (Run!" ) at me,  so  I would dutifully   acquiesce  to  that heckling jest.  

"Surely, your wish is my command,"  I  would  whisper to myself,  running  faster than ever,   unmindful of the  stares and  looks  of  what seem  like call center employees,  smoking their hearts and lungs away,  and  wondering  what  a crazy  woman like me    -- running  at midnight ---  am doing  ,   crazily running away through the sunset,   not caring  a bit about the time.  

And  sometime  later during my  run,   I would also stop and begin  thinking to myself:  "What am I doing out here?"  

More interestingly ,  I would come across the guys -- the Smelly Runners!   Hark, it's them again!! They  would  come to the park like a  mini-platoon, catching the attention  of  people  warming the benches,   and   they would flex their biceps  and   unclothe themselves out of those sweatshirts and leaving their  black undershirts on,   unveiling their tattoos.   

The Smelly Runners, they're here!  Yes, they would surely  run past me at the park,  perspiration splishing and splashing,  sometimes  their wet yucky arms brushing past my arms and I would  wince at the  smell of the handsome and hunky yet smelly runners.  

They would look good, but they won't smell good.  Don't bet on it.   And at this time when I'm not running,  I  remember  those Handsome Smelly Runners!  

That was a blast:  running through the   Track 30th   Park of  BGC  like there's no tomorrow,  and  of course, after my run,  will be hitting the shower to go to work at  JPMorgan Chase,    and that routine  was almost a  daily occurrence  each week.  

I would reach the office  clad in my sports outfit and   rubber-shoes,  fresh-faced
and glowing  from my exhausting physical activity ,  standing quietly side by side 
at the elevator with  perfumed  office employees of the building  with their  neatly-pressed 
corporate garb and stilletto heels and  pencil-cut  mini-skirts.     

You guessed it:  of course I would get the stares,   I ,  the fitness buff woman past her prime clad in  

sports attire but  trying hard to be the expert in my  long-lost-and-now-found running sport,  reminiscent

of   '70s icon  Olivia Newton John with  leg warmers  screaming her heart out with "Let's Get Physical"  

with its double entendre innuendoes.    And,  I , the eternal  actress of the decade,  would shrug it off 

like it's the most natural thing,   going to the office in  sports attire  and ready to hit the shower, and

acting as naturally as possible.    

And if I get the  extra-extended stare, they get the  La Kalina Stare  :  right back at you. Yes. 

"Anything else that I can help you with, my dear?"  

I would  count this as a blessing:   me , with  my two good and strong legs,   running through Track 30th   with some  16 rounds around the park's block ,  

running  along  a battalion of  runners ---  beginners and longtime runners alike  

--   and  majority  possibly  younger than me.   Clutching a stopwatch on my hand 
while jogging last week,  my personal best for  the 500-meter-run around the park
is considerably a slow  3 minutes and 47 seconds,   but I believe that could be
much better compared to other "returning beginners" to the sport.


Well,  it  is a  blessing because not  everyone has the love for running,   which I have and which I enjoy ;  and  

because  not everyone has two good and strong legs , which I also have and

which help me do what I want to do .   


Further, not everyone has the ability and stamina to run,  which I have.  
Now that's something else, too.

In my  deeper love for the sport,  plus my research on parathletes  --  athletes

with disabilities as having only one leg ,or one arm,  or  some other disability --

I have learned to count my blessings ,  also learned to appreciate what I have and 

not  sulk over what I do not have.   For the things which I do not have,  

I know God  has a  plan  for  me: possibly a  much  better  life awaiting me  round 
the corner,  perhaps? 

It's a mystery,  but what I have is  only   excitement and positivity  to smell that wonderful

mystery  --  which  could only  be something good or something great.  

Early this year I went back to this sport,  which was supposed to be a teenage 

passing summer fling,  but  just like your  other Firsts,  sometimes it goes back

to you.   And it lingers.   And it stays.    

I  was once writing about it that  I am taking up the sport , possibly because I

needed to run and step up and  pick up my pace in the later years of my life,

or possibly  because I needed to hurry  and catch up with  what I have missed

in life  --  either because I may be at such a slow pace,  or was zooming too

fast that I may have missed on it.  Either it passed me by,  or  I passed it by.

Unknowingly.     

And looking back,  then looking forward,  I  see both sides now.  Yes,   whatever happened is wonderful,  whatever is happening is wonderful, and whatever  will happen will be wonderful.  That is  a saying straight from  my former sisters  at  the  Brahma Kumaris      I was a  yogi  for 5 years  doing meditations and remunerative reflections,  and am blessed with  spiritual insights such as these. Another blessing!

I  may have made a lot of mistakes in the past, and may have been doing some recent mistakes,  but it's a good thing that I  am now  wise to see them as they are,  labeling them as "mistakes"  --  meaning  I have now the ability of self-awareness in  discerning  something as a "mistake"  which should not be repeated,  and  moving on from there.  

Famous female runner  Joan Benoit Samuelson    said it best:   "Love yourself, for who and what you are; protect your dream and develop your talent to the fullest extent."  

I sure would take it from here, learning  to love myself more,  learning  to love life more,  and learning to appreciate the people around me more.  And if I  have a hard time  appreciating   the people around me,  then possibly I just needed to  try to have a better understanding of them and of life in general : understanding  life,  understanding people,  and understanding myself  better to  see  all sides  and  tread through life  in  peaceful content and  all-around state of just being  happy and just being.   Just be.  

Life is Good. No matter what.  Just have a  clear understanding of all sides and all angles.  

 And you better believe it.   :)