Wet Thursday around the Pond

ERA of … WTF……………joy and resistance

We still have two more weeks of summer, but Fall came bursting through the door like, "I'm here now." It's rainy, cold, and I see leaves on the ground. Some of them have already changed color. It is not fall yet.

I was supposed to run 5 or 6 miles this morning, keeping with the Good Life Half training plan. What started as a light sprinkle turned into on-and-off downpours. When I left the house it was just a light drizzle, and I thought, I can run in this, it's not too bad. Wrong.

Since I was already in it, I wasn't going to stop. About a mile into my run along Horn Pond, the on-and-off hardcore rain started. One mile down — I could at least make it to three. This girl was not doing 5 or 6 miles today.

There were a couple of people out running, some walking with their umbrellas.

I wanted to try a new interval pattern. I normally run 3:1 — three minutes running, one minute walking. This time I tried 2/45: two minutes running, 45 seconds walking. As I ran, I found myself thinking about yesterday, my first day of teaching for the Fall 2026 semester. I had some interested, nervous, and excited students, which is to be expected. I wanted to dive right into the conversation about everything happening in the world, but I had to wait — slowly scaffold that conversation and knowledge.

I thought about Pierre Damas Bel, who died at 20 because of ICE and the racist treatment of Haitians. The article my girl Millisue wrote. The fact that there are 70,000 people in concentration camps in this country. The national parks, lands, and forests being destroyed for the sake of wealth and greed. I still can't get over the 100-year-old cherry blossoms destroyed to make way for a golf course.

I kept thinking, breathing, running. I looked up at the beauty of the trees — how tall they are, how small I am. I took in the sound of the rain, the smell of the greenery around me. I was just being.

I was doing fine with the 2/45 intervals, but I needed to fuel better. I got tired. Maybe my thoughts were weighing me down as they came out of my head. I ran 3.26 miles in 36:21, an 11:10 pace. Not bad. I think I can get a better time — this was my first time trying this interval, and it won't be the last.

I finished my run and found out that Gloria Steinem died at 92. First Dolly, now Gloria. These were some badass white women. Unfortunately, Gloria won't get the same outpouring of love and respect that Dolly did, because she was seen as a radical feminist. Both spoke truth to power.