3.2 miles
locks and dam no. 1 and back
45 degrees
Ran in the afternoon. 45 degrees and no snow. Spotted one lone chunk of ice floating in the river. Very mild. I was overheated in my layers: black tights, black shorts, long-sleeved green shirt, orange sweatshirt. For a few minutes of the run I felt good, but for most of it I felt off. Some gastro thing, I think.
In my state of discomfort and distraction, did I happen to notice 10 things?
10 Things
- overheard, one woman walker to another: It’s been five years and a lot has changed
- kids yelling on the playground
- a flash of white car up ahead — were they driving the wrong way in the parking lot? No, the car I was seeing was on the road, on the other side of the ravine
- someone roller blading — not roller skiing
- the short dirt trail where folwell climbs up to the top of the bluff then back down again was all mud
- lots of bikers on the bike path
- lots of walkers down below on winchell
- (as mentioned above) the river was open except for one big chunk of ice
- playing chicken with a walker who was walking on my side until the last minute — were they playing chicken too or just oblivious?
- no grit on the path or shadows or honking geese or regulars
today’s peripheral: just a distraction
daydreams reveries distractions
When ideas float in our mind, without any reflection or regard of the understanding, it is that which the French call reverie; our langauge has scarce a name for it.
John Locke, cited in The Plentitude of Distraction
To make a prairie/ Emily Dickinson
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
This short book takes a second look at distraction, extracting untold pleasures and insights from its alleged dangers, defending and celebrating the unfocused life for the small and great miracles it can deliver.
The Plentitude of Distraction/ Marina can Zuylen
Reverie in Open Air/ Rita Dove
I acknowledge my status as a stranger:
Inappropriate clothes, odd habits
Out of sync with wasp and wren.
I admit I don’t know how
To sit still or move without purpose.
I prefer books to moonlight, statuary to trees.
But this lawn has been leveled for looking,
So I kick off my sandals and walk its cool green.
Who claims we’re mere muscle and fluids?
My feet are the primitives here.
As for the rest—ah, the air now
Is a tonic of absence, bearing nothing
But news of a breeze.