Tag: morning

oct 2/RUN

5.3 miles
ford loop
64 degrees

Felt strange when I started my run and wasn’t sure how much I would be able to do. Ended up doing the ford loop. What a morning! Still too warm, but lots of color and sparkles and golden light. My left knee continues to feel strange before I start and during the first mile, like a rubber band is crossing over the kneecap. Is that a tendon or a ligament? No, looked it up: IT Band. It doesn’t hurt at all.

IT Band? Guess it’s time for some more fun with medical terms!

IT, the Halloween version: Stephen King’s IT

  • Stephen King’s Inconsistent Talent
  • Stephen King’s Iffy Takes
  • Stephen King’s Incandescent Tadpoles
  • Stephen King’s Insatiable Teacup
  • Stephen King’s Indigo Trash
  • Stephen King’s Iconic Terror
  • Stephen King’s Inedible Treats
  • Stephen King’s Irritated Throat
  • Stephen King’s Itemized Tally

My IT Band is already feeling better!

Running past the Horace Cleveland Overlook, stopping to fix my headphones, I noticed the river through the trees. Wow — a shimmering, sizzling white. Smelled something sour just south of the Monument. Heard a roller skier. Saw 5 or 6 single rowing shells on the water, encircling the coxswain’s boat below the Lake Street bridge. Greeted several people — runners and walkers. Stepped on dead leaves on the ground. Heard the St. Thomas bells and water tinkling at Shadow Falls.

Another great poem on poets.org this morning. Here are a few lines:

excerpt from This Is Not a Horse/ Blas Falconer

A hoof implies the presence of
the whole horse. A saddle implies

a horse and a rider.

How much information do we need to recognize/identify a form? Only a hoof? The curve of a back? A giant eye?

Earlier this morning, working on Girl Ghost Gorge and the idea of restlessness, I wrote:

worn out / exhausted / made still
worn down / eroded / exposed
worn in / familiar / used

worn in = an accumulation of experiences, having a context, a history, a substance/substantial presence, lasting through time, enduring

oct 1/RUN

4.2 miles
minnehaha falls and back
67 degrees

A good run! I felt strong and relaxed and able to run farther without needing to stop for a walk break. More color on the trees today, lots of orange and red, not as much yellow.

10 Things

  1. workers in bright yellow vests at the Cleveland Overlook next to a big white truck with a long arm and a bucket — trimming trees?
  2. slashes of orange everywhere, not big stretches of it, only a dot here, a dot there
  3. a fine, cool spray coming off of the falls
  4. the smell of fried something at the falls — Sea Salt?
  5. chickadeedeedeedee
  6. kids laughing and yelling on a playground hidden behind trees
  7. a woman walking over to a man near the ledge etched with “The Song of Hiawatha,” saying, I like it here
  8. that tall grass smell that reminds me of cilantro, almost — the common thread: the smell of freshness? and green?
  9. the dirt trail that winds through the small wood near the ford bridge looked muddy
  10. a roller skier on the trail — I don’t remember the click clack sound of his poles, just the fast swinging of his arms as he propelled himself forward

As I ran, I thought about water and erosion and how that might translate into a new form and/or way to play around with my already existing poems. I had a few ideas:

  • water as causing cracks, fissures, splitting words open. New breaks in the lines, in individual words? Making new words out of the already existing ones?
  • water as swirling and falling. A mixing and swirling and wheeling of words?
  • water as wearing down, peeling away layers, condensing forms to their essence

Read (and heard) an amazing poem this morning:

A Bookshelf/ Hua Xi

My father read a mountain aloud.

Opened to a page
where a green bird lands on a thunderclap.

Named for the billowing hands of
brittle blue flowers.

As if the unfinished poetry of the paraffin

is pulled aside like scenery,
so that I may write by the only light I know.

My father read only his one life and recited
the last line over and over.

The book is written in giant letters of fog
that wander like goats across the alpine pastures.

The moon is dog-eared as if the treetops looking up
have studied the idea of love too much.

On a page with some scattered pine needles,
a voice goes on calling out to me.

My father learned to read
in a one-room schoolhouse,

and never read a poem.

A little herd of lightning
gets spoken out loud in the dark.

Change
is scenic and sudden.

One year, I came home
and all the leaves fell off my father.

After that,
he was winter.

I’m thinking about a poem as a life and those last lines about her father and how he became winter. Wow.

sept 30/RUN

4.1 miles
river road, north/south
65 degrees
humidity: 75%

Yesterday, it was almost 90 degrees. It will be in the 80s all this week. Ugh. I’m ready for cooler weather! I felt okay during the run, but now, after it, I’m wiped out. Thankfully, the sun was hidden behind a thick layer of clouds. I ran the entire first mile, then the second with one walk break in the center, and the third: run 3 mins, walk 1 min.

10 Things

  1. 2 packs of male runners, around a dozen in each pack, a gap of 20 or 30 seconds between each — the U of M or Macalester or St. Thomas cross country team?
  2. exchanged greetings with Mr. Morning! He was wearing a bright orange t-shirt
  3. some more red leaves as I descended into the tunnel of trees
  4. 3 stones stacked on the ancient boulder
  5. a steady stream of cars on the road
  6. a man standing above the limestone steps that lead to the Winchell Trail near the trestle, waiting
  7. someone sitting at the sliding bench — have I ever sat on the bench? it looks too precarious, right on the edge of a steep slope
  8. the crack just north of the trestle is still cracking
  9. a bird: cheesburger cheeseburger cheeseburger (a black-capped chickadee)
  10. the Welcoming Oaks are still green

My mom died 16 years ago today. I wanted to think about her on the run, but I was too distracted by my effort and the humid conditions. For the second half of my run and part of my walk home, I listened to my “Doin’ Time” playlist. Some lyrics in the last song I heard made me think of my mom. Time will heal from Time Song/ the Kinks. I thought about how much time has passed since Mom died and how I feel her absence less intensely than I used to. I wouldn’t call it healing; just finding ways to live with the grief.

listing

I want to include some 10 Things lists in my Girl Ghost Gorge collection. Partly because they are part of my practice, and partly because the writing of lists, and the gathering of things noticed that listing involves, is a way to create substance to my ghost-like, untethered self. It is also a way to ease my restlessness. The idea — if I write enough lists, I’ll get tired and/or stop being so restless and unsatisfied. I’m not sure how many lists to do. Maybe 4? One for each season?

sept 28/RUN

3.6 miles
bottom of locks and dam and back
55 degrees

Yes, cooler! An easier run. Calm, sunny. Relatively uncrowded for a Sunday morning.

9* Things

  1. roller skiers
  2. squirrel shadows
    cacophony of honking geese
  3. golden light: sun filtered through light green leaves
  4. open gate — the entrance to the locks and dam no 1
  5. patches of red leaves on the trees (not the ground)
  6. smooth surface on the river near ford bridge
  7. the reflection of the bridge on the water — another portal
  8. jangling collar — someone running with 2 dogs down the wabun hill
  9. an empty bench

*I’m writing this several hours after my run, so I could only remember 8 things.

As I ran down the locks and dam hill, I chanted in threes:

softening/softening/softening/surfaces
softening/softening/softening/underground

Another riprap idea:

Make it into a triptych: 1. the original poem (rock), 2. the new poem composed of words from the old — words reordered (riprap), 3. the faint trace of the original poem with the words from the new poem in their original order

And a palimpsest idea: take one of the poems, and show the different layers or iterations of it over the years, from 2021 to now

squirrel shadow

running south
looking

to my left —
movement

thinking — my
shadow

2 squirrels
running

instead. I
choose to

imagine
believe

make real — my
shadow

burst into
squirrels

sept 26/RUN

3.5 miles
top of wabun hill and back
60 degrees
humidity: 82% / dew point: 56

Still too warm for me, but beautiful. I don’t recall seeing much color. Was it because I was too focused on my effort? I saw something that made me think, fall!, but now I can’t remember what it was. (a few minutes later: I remembered! It was all of the dead leaves on the sidewalk and a neighbor’s driveway.) Heard the rush of water out of the 42nd street sewer pipe and a coxswain talking through a bullhorn. Saw the sparkle of water between the trees. Passed 2 runners on the trail twice. Both because they stopped to walk, then I did, then they started again, and so did I. I ran up the hill that starts below the ford bridge and ends at Wabun. I remember looking out at the river, but I can’t remember if I noticed the locks and dam.

sept 25/RUN

5 miles
franklin loop
62 degrees
humidity: 80%

Not an easy run, but I kept going and was happy to be outside, above the gorge, for almost an hour. Some walking, more running. Was able to greet Dave, the Daily Walker. Noticed something sticking out in the middle of the river as I ran across the lake street bridge. People swimming across? No, tree branches stuck on the sandbar. The bridge steps were wet. Not rain, but a hose?

3 moments of color

1

Running across the Lake Street bridge, looking out through the railing, pink. Someone had spray-painted the railing with a thin line of bright pink, maybe bright green too, or was that my bad vision? Or maybe the bright sunlight doing strange things? Whatever it was, it looked magical.

2

Descending into the tunnel of trees from the north, a pool of reddish-orange light ahead of me. A wildfire sun? No, reflections from some orange paint on a nearby tree and red leaves on the ground.

3

Again on the lake street bridge: a very bright circle of light on the water, silver with streaks of orange, or an orange tone? or the idea of orange?

Found a powerful poem on Poetry Daily this morning, Schrödinger/ Katie Erbs.

excerpt from Schrödinger/ Katie Erbs

a little thought experiment
gone sideways an idea
trapped in ovum
the cedar chest the bride suffocates in
the refrigerator’s magnetic closure invented only
after one too many kids
got trapped inside leaving
little claw marks on the insides
of little coffins how I dreamed
of the little bell to ring
from inside the box
to let everyone know
I’m alive inside still

Just yesterday, I was reading a novel, Victorian Psycho, that mentioned these bells in coffins. I don’t think I had ever heard of them before.

I am convinced I can hear bells — the bells that chime from inside the safety coffins in the Hopefernon churchyard. ‘To ensure one isn’t buried alive,’ explained the Reverend when I first remarked upon them as a child. ‘They can only be rung from inside the coffin.’

‘But I hear them at night,’ I had told him, and the Reverend had sighed and shaken his face full of wrinkles . . . .

Victorian Psycho/ Virginia Feito

sept 23/RUN

4.1 miles
river road, north/south
61 degrees
humidity: 90% / dew point: 60

Yes, it was uncomfortably humid, and that’s all I’ll write about that. I memorized my rock chants before I left, then recited them as I ran. Here’s a snippet:

soft stone
shifts

hard stone
waits

sandstone
rubs

limestone
breaks

They worked pretty well, although it was hard to think of the words fast enough for my feet. Near the end of the run, I switched to some river words (3 1-syllable words):

drip drip drip
drop drop drop
stone stone stone

I was able to greet Dave, the Daily Walker — Morning Dave!, but forgot to greet the Welcoming Oaks. Saw some rowers climbing up the hill and leaving the rowing club. Noticed big bunches of purple wildflowers. Ran by the persistent crack that continues to settle and spread. Will they be able to fix it before the ground freezes? Wondered if the road closed ahead sign was because they were removing the safety fence they put in during their I-94 construction. Stopped at the top of some wooden steps leading down into the dark green of the Winchell Trail. Also stopped at the sliding bench to take a picture. A thought: what if I took a picture every week at this bench to track the slow and subtle changes?

from behind the sliding bench / 23 sept 2025

For future Sara, a brief recap: Jimmy Kimmel returns to his show tonight after being suspended/censored; Trump is claiming aspirin causes autism and that they’ve found a “cure” for it; and more leaves are turning yellow and red at the gorge.

sept 22/RUN

4.3 miles
minnehaha falls and back
61 degrees
humidity: 91% / dew point: 64

It rained last night, so everything was wet, even the air. Puddles, mud, slick leaves. Gushing sewer pipes, a roaring creek, fast-falling water.

I’m working on a series of chants for Girl Ghost Gorge. All triples. One for rock (a 2-syllable word/1 syllable word). One for river (3 1-syllable words). And one for air (1 3-syllable word).

During the first mile, I chanted for air: 

industry
convenience
resilience
persistence
underground
neighborhood

During the second mile, I chanted for rock:

paddle/wheel
roaring/creek
paving/stone

During the third mile, I chanted for water:

drip drip drip
drop drop drop
drip drop drip
drip drip drop

My plan for the chants is to use 1, 2, and 3 syllable words from my long poems for the chants. Right now I’m sorting them out.

10 Things

  1. wet red leaves scattered near the trail
  2. the smell of tar as I passed a park worker patching the trail (yay! they’re fixing the terrible spot on the bike path finally!)
  3. one woman to another: my ex-husband makes over a million dollars in his new job
  4. the yellow-vested park working, leaning and looking at his phone while he waited for the tar to be ready to smooth
  5. the squeak of a bike’s brakes
  6. bare branches poking out of the top of a tree
  7. the white froth from the falls
  8. 2 people sitting on the ledge of the bridge, their feet dangling over the falls
  9. a circle of bright water and sky, made by a break in the trees
  10. the smell of almost-cilantro from the tall grass surrounding the stone etched with Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha”

sept 21/RUNBIKE

2 miles
lake street bridge and back
70 degrees

Went out for my run just before noon. Too hot! Running north, nearing the lake street bridge, I heard some chanting and drums. People marching on the lake street bridge, heading to the capital. I just back from a weekend with my college friends. Friends for 29 years. Amazing.

bike: 5 miles
minnehaha park
71 degrees

Biked to Minnehaha Park and the falls in the early evening. At some point, a downpour. Luckily we were under the awning. The falls were roaring, A busker was playing saxophone. A tiny human in a blanket, looking like a jedi, was marching. Lots of dogs. A wonderful night at the falls. Biking homd, after the rain, everything wet. Fall!

sept 17/RUNBIKESWIM

4 miles
the monument and back
72 degrees
humidity: 80% / dew point: 64

More gnats, more heat, more sweat. Ran over the lake street bridge and up the summit hill to the Monument. Ran the first mile, did 2 minutes running/ 1 minute walking for the second mile, and mostly running, some walking for the rest. My right knee was sore because the kneecap slid out last night. I had to pop it back into place by going up and down the stairs. When it slides out it rubs the tendons or ligaments or something and they’re sore the next day. No big deal.

10 Things

  1. a bunch of kids sitting on the sidewalk outside of the church with the daycare — an adult called out to some other adult, I checked the website. They should be picking them up by 9
  2. a gnat flew into my eye — all the way, now the corner of my eye is sore
  3. no rowers on the river, only small waves
  4. peering over the side on the lake street bridge, checking out the sandbar. How far below the surface is it? How deep is the water around it?
  5. the faint sound of falling water at shadow falls
  6. a railing in front of a neighbor’s house, adorned with garlands and lights
  7. several wide cracks on the trail halfway down the summit hill, outlined in orange
  8. running up the summit hill, hearing a biker slowly approaching then creeping past me
  9. checking my watch during a walk break, the numbers blurred and difficult to see — a combination of my bad vision and feeling slightly dizzy/dazed from the heat
  10. the jingling of my house key in my pack, the thudding of my pack against my shorts

I don’t remember much from the run because it was hot and tiring. What did I think about?

Listened to kids, cars, random voices, and a dog barking running to the Monument. Put in my “The Wheeling Life” playlist on the way back. First song up, “Day by Day” from Godspell. In this song., the wheel is moving forward, progressing towards a better relationship with God. Wow — Jesus-rock was a thing in the 70s. The refrain for the song:

Day by day, day by day, oh dear Lord, three things I pray, to see thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, follow thee more nearly. Day by day.

bike: 7.5 miles
lake nokomis and back
79/75 degrees

Earlier today, Scott and I drove by lake nokomis and we noticed that the buoys were still up, so we decided to bike over to the lake in the late afternoon. If the blue algae was gone, I’d swim. So we did, and it was! The bike ride was great, even if it was windy. The thing I remember most about the bike was hearing the twack of the pickle ball at a pickle court on the way there, and a tennis court on the way back. Also: someone mowing their lawn and kids playing at the lake nokomis rec center playground.

swim: 2 loops
lake nokomis main beach
76 degrees

The water was clearer and warmer and slightly less choppy than the last time I was here. Still too many vines reaching up from the bottom. I had to swim farther out in the lake to avoid them. Saw at least 2 paddle boarders, a sailboat, a kayak. No fish, but seagulls. Heard geese honking from the other shore. Some adult was playing with a kid and calling out, Nestea Plunge. Yes! I can still picture the dude standing with his back to the pool, falling back into the water.

Noticed the mucked-up underside of a once red, now pinkish orange buoy. Was fascinated by the bubbles on the otherwise smooth surface of the water. Felt some thin vine tendrils encircling my wrist, some thicker and sharper vines brushing against my leg. I don’t remember seeing any planes, but I do remember some wispy clouds.