Running has been one of the great passions of my life. Sometimes it is the first thing I think about when I wake up, and I am always happy when I've completed a daily run of any distance. Yes, I have my daily goals for the length I want to run, but that's beside the point. Just being able to get out there to do it is a gift.
That's not hyperbole, either. I mean it. Running is my mantra. It isn't so much as something I want to do as it is something I have to do.
And to paraphrase the great Chico Esquela, "Running has been very, very good to me." Because of running and my ability to run, I have been to parts of the country most people to get to see. My logs show that I've run in nearly half the states in the U.S. and three different countries. In 2018, I ran halfway across Bermuda when it was hot and humid. I've run in Detroit and Dallas, through Sweet Auburn in Atlanta, north out of Central Park and into Harlem, all over Washington, D.C., North Philadelphia, up the rocky mountains of Colorado, through the orange-scented neighborhoods of Pasadena, and through the desert around Las Vegas. New Orleans; Boston; Indianapolis, Milwaukee; Minneapolis; Cincinnati and Kentucky; West Virginia, Lancaster City, Lancaster County into Amish country.
The list goes on and on.
Everywhere my feet can take me, I've tried to see it and make some sort of adventure out of it.
Different runs stand out, but they were all memorable. Every single one of them. Everywhere I ran was unforgettable, and never once did I feel unsafe.
Not once. Never have I felt unsafe.
Maybe that's because I'm privileged, and perhaps it's because I look like the kind of guy that runs a lot. It could be the technical-style shirt and shorts or the colorful Nikes or Asics shoes. Perhaps it's the look of determination as I wind through those efforts. People tend to leave me alone when I'm out there. Even the people who I know and who honk their horns at me have to tell me about it later because I don't see them. I'm pretty zoned out into my own little world that cars and other moving vehicles and people are obstacles to either avoid or be on the lookout for.
Day or night – in the middle of the day or the middle of the night, it's pretty nice to be able to lose yourself in your own mind for a while. It's a blessing to be sure. A gift.
So caught up in my own world that it would never make sense to me that a person so clearly out for a run would ever be mistaken for anything else. Just like the idea of someone on the drive home from work, or to the grocery store, or anywhere else, was doing something out of the ordinary. Something someone would look at as illegal. I have never really been disturbed when running, and I have never been pulled over while driving my car for no good reason.
Some of my friends don't have it so lucky. They are questioned when they are driving or walking through a neighborhood where "they might not belong." They get pulled over in their cars while driving home from work or on a drive back from the grocery store. They have to answer questions about where they are going, what they are doing, and why they are there.
It doesn't make any sense.
Imagine what it must be like to go for a run and to not be able to get lost in your own thoughts. Imagine being a former high school football player and out for a run as a means to keep and shape and have to deal with people harassing you for doing something as simple as exercising.
What happens when you are out for a run, and two people in a pick-up truck and a shotgun imagine you are a burglar with no other proof than you are running.
Ahmaud Arbery was just running. That's it. He was 25-years old, an athlete, and was doing what 25-year-old athletes do. He was out for a run. Nothing more, nothing less.
But because he was a black man in the United States, he was killed because he was running. Just running. A white father and son in Brunswick, Ga. driving around in a pick-up, and a shotgun allegedly decided to kill Arbery because he was black and he was running. Before doing so, they reportedly chased him around, terrorized him, blocked his path, and then they shot him.
He was just out for a run. Just like thousands and thousands of people in any city do every day. The difference was Arbery was black, and that made him unsafe.
***
This Friday, May 8, would have been Ahmaud Arbery's birthday. So as a tribute on social media, runners are heading out on Friday to dedicate their efforts to Arbery. There's a hashtag -- #runforahmaud, and more information linked here. So whatever you do, whether it's a walk or a run or anything, think of Ahmaud Arbery. Then think of how lucky one must be to be able to go for a run.
Just a simple, life-affirming run.