Author: Sara Puotinen

nov 8/4 MILES

31 degrees
mississippi river road path, north

A great run with negative splits again. I love the colder air. It was sunny and a bit windy. Don’t remember too much. Saw only one dog. Very few bikers. No cross country skiers on skates. Less than 5 runners. Encountered one runner twice, going the opposite direction. Almost twisted my ankle on an uneven bit of the path. Sporadically practiced rhythmic breathing, in 3, out 2. Listened to headphones. Heard the Violent Femmes’ singing “Add it Up” and finally realized, after listening to this song for almost 30 years, that the lead singer says “When I take a bow and say good night.” Of course! This makes more sense than what I thought it was: “When I think about it and say goodnight.”

nov 6/5 MILES

28 degrees
the franklin hill turn around

No headphones today. Noticed that my favorite oaks, the ones that welcome me at the start of my run, lean in different ways. One leans back with its arms out, almost as if to say, “Heeeyyy!”.  Another leans in, whispering to me to have a good run. Others stand at attention, straight and perpendicular to the ground. After running through them and closer to the gorge, heard the scampering of squirrel feet on the bare branches. No rustling, just clicking. And the thumping and cracking of acorns. Busy. Preparing for winter. Cars rushed by, busy too, racing to work. About 1.5 miles in, I began chanting to keep myself going: This is the path/that I run/when I want to/have some fun. Then: This is the path/with a hill/I run down it/for a thrill. Then, running up the hill again: This is the hill/I must run up/I must go slow/or I’ll throw up. Not the most amazing chants, but they helped. A lot. Stopped once to walk for about 2 minutes near the top of the hill. Then finished with my fastest mile.

nov 4/3 MILES

37 degrees
humidity: 91%
mississippi river road path, north

Humid again. Didn’t bother me as much this time. Kept up my plan of doing each mile faster than the last. Listened to music. What do I remember from my run? Running behind someone dressed all in black. I followed him as he stayed on the bike path instead of traveling below the road on the part of the path that travels right above the gorge because I worried that it might be too slippery. Slowly creeping up on and then passing another runner dressed in black pants and white jacket.  Wondering how far ahead of her I was getting. Encountering her again, once I had turned around at the greenway trail. Feeling mostly good with only a few fleeting flashes of doubt and desire to stop.

Kept working on my sonnet assignment when I got back home. Came up with 2 versions. Don’t quite like either.

Attention

is the beginning of devotion
devotion, the beginning of prayer
prayer, undertaken while in motion
motion, gliding in and through outside air
a prayer that is given with lungs and feet
inspiring trees and absorbing the ground
a letting go to a steady beat
desiring nothing but to hear the sound
of time slowly dripping like the drops of sweat
that fall from my face and sit on my skin
cooling me down as they evaporate
counter-clockwise time, moving out, not in
I listen and imagine I can hear
my Self—a slow steady release into air.

Attention

is the beginning of devotion
devotion, the beginning of prayer
prayer, undertaken while in motion
motion, gliding in and through outside air
a prayer that is given with lungs and feet
inspiring trees and absorbing the ground
a letting go to a steady beat
desiring nothing but to look around
and count the leaves or catch a fleeting glimpse
of river, near the stand of mesic oaks
and to witness time as it slowly drips
like the sweat off my face that slowly soaks
my shirt and evaporates from my skin
my sense of Self moving out and not in.

nov 2/2 MILES

38 degrees
humidity: 96%
mississippi river road path, south

Decided to run today even though I ran yesterday because it seemed calm and dry and not too cold. It was too humid. Hard to run in such thick air. Yuck. Ran 1.5 miles, walked for a few minutes, then another half mile. Not much fun, but it was beautiful, staring across to St. Paul. A few trees left, with grainy mustard yellow leaves. The river, a blueish gray.

nov 1/3 MILES

33 degrees
mississippi river road path, north

It’s getting colder. I love it! I run so much better in the cold air. As I ran by them, I tried looking a little longer at the bare trees, the gorge slope, the floodplain forest floor and the river. Turned around at the railroad trestle. Before reaching it, realized that I wasn’t feeling the wind so I knew when I turned around that I would. And I did. But it wasn’t too bad. Encountered a woman who might have been talking to me. Not sure if she was or what she said; I had my headphones on. Listening to Sia, Loverboy, Huey Lewis and the News, Pat Benatar, Violent Femmes, Justin Bieber, Cee Lo Green and Adele. Right before running back under the Lake Street bridge noticed two trees, one was a rusty red, the other a brilliant gold.

Later, walking through the neighborhood, I marveled at the beauty of bare branches. Some trees, maybe maples, need their limbs hidden by leaves, but not oaks. Such forms! Some graceful, stretching up and out everywhere. Others awkward, gnarled and twisted toward the sky, the ground, the other side of the sidewalk. All of them interesting, demanding my attention. How do I look, I wonder, to anyone else when I stop and stare, craning my neck to take in every limb?

oct 30/3.85 MILES

37 degrees
wind: 16 mph
mississippi river road path, north

Ran for 35 minutes and 3.85 miles without stopping. Negative split each mile. My knee was sore for the first half, but it mostly felt okay. It was windy and cool with some light drizzle/snow. Checked on the progress of the leaves on my favorite part of the gorge: all gone. Now I can see the slope down to the forest floor and the Mississippi.

Thinking again about routine, rituals and habits and what is/isn’t sacred about running and preparing for running. Wrote a poem in homage to Craig Arnold’s Mediation on a Grapefruit. Towards the end of the poem he writes:

a discipline
precisely pointless       a devout
involvement of the hands and senses
a pause     a little emptiness

My homage is about coffee brewing, an essential part of my pre-race routine/ritual. note: I can’t figure out how to the spacing here. It’s supposed to have more, like Arnold’s poem.

Meditation on the Smell of Coffee Brewing

To wake when nothing is possible
before the unexpected joys of the day
have saved me
To come to the kitchen
and pull out a thin paper basket
before breakfast
To open the metal tin lid sounding
like cymbals being lightly struck
by a drum stick
metallic and sharp as a cold winter morning
To tip
each rich brown scoop into the filter
not that carefully sometimes spilling
several darkly fragrant grounds
To pour each cup of water
into a cheap black coffee maker
the water settling until the whole
carafe is emptied
and only then to breathe and to brew
who knew
this habit
seemingly not the point a repeated
performance ending with the nose
a deep inhale with no substance

each morning harder to live within
each morning harder to live without

and

Meditation on a running shoe

To wake when nothing is possible
before my morning run
has saved me
To go to the front room
and find my electric blue wings
after breakfast
To take them out of the shoe rack
light and featherless        with orange swishes
swirling on the side
vibrant and zesty as citrus
To slide
each foot in, first right then left
so mindfully     without making
my socks bunch up.
To tie each lace
into big, loopy knots
then tuck the loops    until the whole
shoelace is protected
and only then to run
more than fun
a ritual
reverently practical       a sacred
preparation for the body and spirit
a moment      a little attention

each morning more necessary to live within
each morning more impossible to live without

oct 27/3.1 MILES

32 degrees
Halloween 5K
Riverfront Minneapolis

I raced a 5K! I raced a 5K! And I didn’t stop or feel much pain. Only the second time I’ve run that much without stopping in 2 months. It wasn’t fast, but it felt good and Scott and I did negative splits on each mile. Many people were dressed up because it was a Halloween race. I saw 2 Mr. Incredibles, a bunch of Waldos, a Gilligan, a few Wonder Women, Thomas the Train, the Doodlebops, a bright blue fuzzy monster with fabulous fuzzy legwarmers, a donut, a reindeer, a mother and son as black and white striped robbers, Dwight from The Office, a few Minnie Mouses and Cruella deVille. That’s all I can remember. No zombies. No vampires. No ghosts. No homicidal maniacs. And no witches. Why no witches? Well, I did hear someone say they saw Hermione, but that doesn’t count. Scott and I agreed that this 5K was one of the easiest we’ve ever run.

A post shared by Scott Anderson 📎 (@room34) on

oct 25/3.3 MILES

41 degrees
mississippi river road path, north

My first day of running non-stop for 30 minutes! Not too bad, but I can tell that I need some more training before I’m back to my pre-injury endurance. Ran with headphones to forget about difficult mornings with middle-schoolers so I didn’t pay attention to much around me. I did notice that the leaves on the welcoming oaks are all gone and that I can see all the way to the river–sparkling in the sun–near the floodplain forest. Late fall is my favorite time of year. Seeing St. Paul on the other side of the river. Almost bare branches mixed with neon orange. The woods with its bones beginning to show. Colder air. Snow coming soon. Winter running!

oct 22/3.35 MILES

50 degrees
mississippi river road path, north

My last recovery run combining walking and running. Next week, I start running for 30 minutes without stopping! The light this morning was really cool. The entire neighborhood glowed with orange and gold and red. We are just past peak color season. I didn’t look down to check the progress of the leaves on my favorite part of the gorge because I was too busy making sure that I didn’t slip on the wet leaves or on an acorn shell hidden under them. Realized after finishing my run, while I was walking back home, that I had put my running pants on inside out. Oh well.

Here are a lune, a tanka and a haiku about my run today:

a city block
illuminated:
red gold orange.

Red, gold and orange leaves are so pretty on a tree but not on the path; they conceal debris that lies in wait, ready to twist knees.

blue pants, inside out
only noticed at the end
much too late to care.

oct 19/3.1 MILES

43 degrees
shirley theel memorial park/austin, mn

A 5K! 1 minute walking, 4 minutes running, six times. Scott and I ran it together. Felt pretty good. My knee feels okay. Looking forward to being finished with the injury recovery plan and just being able to run. Maybe then I can pay attention to things other than how my knee feels, what my pace is, when I stop walking, when I start running.

This week’s poetry assignment is haikus. Thought I’d try to do some breathing/running ones.

1.
jagged breaths
as running begins
crisp cold air.

2.
hard to speak
legs start to warm up
air is cool.

3.
nose drips
eyes weep in the wind
hood stays up

4.
zipped jacket
muscles loosen up
breathing slows

5.
longer strides
longer sentences
said out loud.

6.
unzipped shirt
hood comes off. bare skin
is exposed.

7.
a warm trunk
bent slightly foward
hands relaxed.

8.
In 2 3
out 2. rhythmic breaths
rapid pulse

9.
flashing sun
pulses through pine trees
steady feet

10.
quicker steps
sweat pools at tip of
ponytail

11.
six loops run
warmer body and
warmer air

——

12.
to run is
to stop thinking and
start flying

13.
when running
never trust a path
without trees