Friday, January 16, 2015

no days off.



i am never ready to write.

i lay in bed last night, with stiff, heavy legs, thinking about all kinds of things and, eventually, resting on just a few eloquent lines for a spoken word poem about… it's left me. i came up with everything, rhymed and metered for a few perfect beats, then fell deeply asleep. i figured i could wake up in the morning and type them out and be a better person for getting something right before six a.m. this was not so.

the kids at work have been barreling through three-to-five-minute bursts of speeches through a range of topics. every time one of those shining faces opens a mouth to speak, a new idea rattles around inside my head, and i have to wrench my focus back to the evaluation at hand. nothing kills creativity like a goddam rubric. and so i want to speak. i would like to get up there, all important-like behind that lectern, and go off on some eloquent tangent like i know, and believe, what i'm saying. but i've spent days being quiet. and it's been great.

tracksmith sent me a free calendar. large and obtrusive, it dominates the wall of degrees in the office, holding its ground just above the light switch and an older work of so many crayons by the fat fingers of the big kid when she was little. the thick paper bears the grey, sans serif numbers of each day of every month for this year. underneath, in gilt bold block letters are three simple words: NO DAYS OFF. tracksmith also sent me a red sharpie. though i was hoping for a big fat marker that maybe smelled like synthetic cherries from the 80s, i use the sharpie to mark an 'X' over every day i run.

there are many Xs.

consistency being the key to mastery of so many things, i resolved to run more long before this calendar thing ever got tweeted or mailed in a real envelope to a real address. there are days off, but that only makes sense as rest days are as important as stress days. and it's fucking winter. but the main point is this: more often, i must do the right things. consistently, i must right and run and ride and grin and read more. there must be more Xs.

there will be no days off.