Tag: air

oct 8/RUN

6 miles
hidden falls and back
48 degrees

48 degrees! Wore shorts again with my compression socks. Wasn’t cold at all. In fact, felt warm and sweat a lot by the end. Not as easy of a run as it was yesterday. Unfinished business, tired legs. Even so, a few mental victories. Made it to Hidden Falls for the first time this year! (I checked and my last run to Hidden Falls was on 8 dec 2024).

A beautiful run along the river road, on the edge of Wabun Park, over the ford bridge, by the river again, above Hidden Falls. I stopped at the overlook there and marveled at the view. Such a view of the river valley on the way to St. Paul. I thought about the openness of this view: wide, far and also uncluttered, not much to look at, just open space. Nothing to try to see and not be able to. A chance to focus on other senses or not focus at all, but just to be.

There were a few things I saw that delighted me. My view was of the tops of trees. In the distance, some leaves silvered and shimmered in the sun light and wind. Glittering trees — I’ve written about that before. Then, a plane high overhead. At first, dull and dark, but as it hit the light, it sparkled and flashed, a shiny dot in the otherwise blue.

I listened to hammers pounding nails, kids yelling, and cars driving by until I reached Hidden Falls. Then I put in Taylor Swift’s “The Life of a Showgirl” on the way back.

today’s study of Air, before the run:

I’m thinking about how/why something becomes/is open: the planning by rich men of spaces, both as inviting — for experiencing wonder and stillness, and as buffers –protecting from the unwanted; the process of succession (see 4 may 2025) and meadow becoming thicket becoming forest becoming open/barren field; how Minneapolis Parks, National Parks, and the Longfellow Neighborhood Association work to keep spaces within the park; how the city of Minneapolis clears out encampments in the gorge. I’m thinking about my own experience with my blind spot: an opening that won’t close, that stays open to how vision really works and it limits, that opens me up and softens me, offering room to dwell in a place without judgment and enabling me to experience the world differently and outside of, or on the edge, of late capitalism and Progress! and excessive growth.

And then, a pivot. I started thinking about Canadian wildfire smoke and air quality and smells — sewer smells. I wondered, why does it sometimes smell so bad, and how do they handle those smells? Looked it up:

Sewage pipes from much of the West Metro converge at this site. Here, they drop their contents into deeper pipes that then carry the sewage under the river and on to the Metropolitan Wastewater Treatment Plant east of downtown St. Paul. When the sewage drops, sewer gasses are forced out. For years, smells were managed through use of a biofilter (a.k.a. woodchips), but results were mixed and local residents and park users requested improvements.

The new odor-control structure will house four carbon filters that should prove far more effective. Scheduled to come online in early 2017, the small building will soon be fitted with a charcoal gray metal roof along with frosted windows in the north and south roof peaks. Next spring, it will be painted more natural colors and the lot will be revegetated with grass.

source

after the run

I think I’ll leave smells and sewers for another day. Back to space-as-buffer-zone. Way back in 2017 or 18, when I first read the Gorge Management Plan from 2002, I encountered a description of the Boulevard that I’ve wanted to write about:

West River Parkway marks the transition between the natural communities of the River Gorge and the residences of the Longfellow neighborhood.

To function as an effective transitional zone, the boulevard should retain the natural character of the Gorge but also be visually acceptable to local residents and those using the boulevard and its pedestrian trails.

Gorge Management Plan, 2002

A transition zone, a threshold space between private (neighborhood) and public (park) land. Back in 2017, I imagined this transition as a way for me to prepare myself for the sacred practice of my run. A place to pass through — to leave behind the mundane world and enter the sacred. A place for getting ready to notice and slow down and let go. I think there is room to imagine that as an intent of Cleveland and early park planners. But, when I discovered the terrible history of Edmund Boulevard, named after Edmund Walton who brought red-lining and racial covenants to Minnesota, I read this buffer-zone differently. A buffer as “protection,” exclusion, denying access, keeping out, creating distance and division. And, Edmund’s white supremacist work is not in the past. These racial covenants and red-lining continue to shape the racial mapping of Minneapolis and who has access to home ownership, especially homes in places with open spaces and good air.

How do I want to reference this context in a poem? I’m not sure, but I’m thinking it will be in a poem titled, You Are There: Lena Smith Boulevard.

oct 7/RUN

3 miles
trestle turn around
51 degrees

Fall, finally! Wore my bright orange sweatshirt and black shorts with gray compression socks. Greeted Dave, the Daily Walker. Hi Dave! It’s a beautiful morning! Not too long after that I spotted an albino squirrel by the edge of the bluff. I didn’t stop, but I slowed down and took an extra glance to check that I was seeing what I thought I was. I think so, but how would I know? I saw some rowers emerging from the hill that leads down to the rowing club, but didn’t hear any of them on the river. Since I went north, I didn’t hear any kids on a school playground. Noticed lots of trash bags beside the already full trash cans. Marathon clean-up or a clearing out of camps in the gorge? Also noticed some flowers at the trestle in a makeshift vase — an open cylinder where a railing used to be attached. Orange cones were still next to the crack, warning runners and walkers — stay away. The crack looks like it hasn’t gotten any bigger or longer.

In mile 2, I started chanting a part of my poem, You Are Here: Tunnel of Trees:

Oh, where is the sky?
And where is the ground?
Neither can be seen.

Moving feet strike
only air,
and eyes see
only green.

To fly, to float,
to pass through with ease.

held up
by openness,
not hemmed in
by trees.

The last lines didn’t quite work with my movement, so I changed them slightly:

held Up by
the openness,
not hemmed In
by the trees.

Then I began repeating certain verses instead of reciting them straight through. To float, to fly/to pass through with ease//to float, to fly/to pass through with ease//to float, to fly/to pass through with ease and Held up by/the openness/not hemmed in/by the trees//Held up by/the openness/not hemmed in/by the trees.

I noticed a difference in how it felt as I switched up the lines. To float, to fly had a lot more open space around it. This is how my foot strikes matched up with the words: (x = foot strike without word)

To float x
To fly x
To pass through with ease

The silent extra beat created space and felt slower, maybe a little more labored? In contrast, the last verse was faster and easier for me to sync up my feet with lungs and brain and heart and the gorge.

Held up by
the openness
Not hemmed in
by the trees

No silent foot strikes, just one word per strike.

This experiment was fun and made the run easier, and, as a bonus, it helped me with my poem!

Air

I am little late with picking a theme for this month. I’ve been too haunted by my Girl Ghost Gorge project. Editing and adding new poems every day. Finally, a week in, it has come to me: AIR. Air is the section I am working on right now. It’s the third (love those 3s!) element of the collection: rock, river, Air.

Air as: air quality, good air, bad air, lungs, breathing, syncing up lungs with my feet and the feet and the lungs of others (human and non-human), open space, Nothingness/void, emptiness, a clear view, secrets revealed, thresholds, late October to mid-November before the snow flies, when the veil lifts or thins, boulevards and parkways, ventilation and purification, things not seen but sensed, a stillness within the flux of happenings, fleeting/ephemeral/weightless, smells, plagues, rust, erosion, fire, uncluttered and calm

Walked over to the split rail fence above the ravine and the sewer pipe that freezes in the winter and creates an icy tunnel, then drips blueish greenish water as it melts. The Winchell Trail winds around this ravine, over a steel grate and beside a wrought iron fence that once displayed dozen of keys with social justice-y messages until they were ripped out–by who and why? I wish I could remember the messages. A few: Be nice. We are One. Resist Fear. From up above, at the end of my run, I cannot see the ravine or the sewer or the keys. Sometimes I smell the sewer or hear someone talking below me, but I can’t see anything but green until the leaves fall in late October, early November. This is my favorite time at the gorge. I love being able to see deep into the gorge when its bare bones are exposed, its secrets revealed. I love the color palate of rich browns, pale blues, dull grays, rusted reds. I love the smell of mulching leaves, the sharp, crisp air, the paths that aren’t yet covered with snow but with crunching, crackling leaves.

log entry 7 oct 2019

flame and rust, flame and rust — another October poem (along with Louise Glück’s and May Swenson’s Octobers): Leaves

Today, while I ran, I thought about how chanting in the lines, held up by/the openness/not hemmed in/by the trees, made me feel how I was floating through the air. I noticed the space between foot strikes, that small instant when both of my feet are off of the ground, instead of when they’re striking it. My Apple watch measures my ground contact time while running, the time each foot is on the ground per stride (in ms), but it doesn’t measure the time you’re not on the ground. I guess I could figure it out, but couldn’t the watch do it for me? What percentage of my running is in the air versus touching ground?

With some help from Scott and AI, I determined that my stride time (60/170 — cadence) is 353 ms. Then subtracting my ground contact time from my stride time: 353 – 230 = 123 ms. To find the percentage, it’s ground contact time / total time. For me, I’m on the ground roughly 65% of the stride, and in the air 35% of the stride. It might be fun to work on increasing my cadence (time for the metronome!) and see if that makes any difference in my floating/flying time. Sounds fun!