i half-assed this one

It’s been so hard for me to write for the past few weeks. Every blog topic I think of just evaporates when I sit down, or lasts for a couple paragraphs before I just give up in disgust. It’s been an intense month, for various reasons—not bad intense (except for that plumbing part), just a lot going on; some big decisions; a lot of working really hard at being a grown-up. I’m kind of exhausted, and my concentration is shot to hell.

This morning I went out for a run on a long, hilly stretch of main road. I have to drive to get there, but it has a good sidewalk, seemingly designed for runners, and I’m trying to get better at hills in preparation for a 5K in April. I find running on this stretch so difficult, as though three miles here is twice as long as three miles in my own neighborhood. The road cuts through what was once open prairie, a landscape so open and vast that even commercial buildings and a major thoroughfare can’t tame it down to psychologically manageably pieces. This morning I had a full-fledged misery run. Too much snot, too much spit, earbuds constantly torn out of my ears by wind, hair in the face, dry contacts, the constant and nearly overwhelming desire to give up and walk. I felt like a wretched peon in the face of the elements. By the time I got back to my car, it was all I could do not to literally stagger.

But lately my own neighborhood has been…let’s say unpleasant. Twice last week I had drivers honk and holler vulgarities at me. I also saw two enormous men yelling at each other on the sidewalk near our condo community, a scenario so intimidating I literally turned on my heel and fled in the opposite direction (dragging a friend along with me). And a few weeks ago there was a crack house bust on a residential street that I have walked or run a million times.

For all that, I know that running in this neighborhood is safe. There are way rougher neighborhoods in this town. The cops swing through fairly often (inspiring feelings of ambivalence and distrust on my part, but I suppose from a lone female runner’s perspective I should be grateful for them) and I never go out except in daylight hours. And I never run without my cell phone, and I have the police station on speed dial, listed as “A Police,” to put it at the top of the directory for handy access. But I’m sick of having these little incidents that make me feel both vulnerable and enraged. When I started thinking that castration seemed like an appropriate punishment for a male driver who yells any sentence containing the word “fuck” at a woman (or at anyone, frankly), and that I would be happy to execute that punishment myself, I decided that I needed a break from these particular streets. Violent anger is messing with my endorphin fix.

And I can’t figure out how to fix the bloody treadmill. I suppose I can’t expect too much of a treadmill I found on Craigslist for fifty bucks, but we got so reliant on that thing; neither of us has ever been in such good shape at the end of winter as we are now, thanks to it. But now it seems to be toast. And lately Eric has been plagued with chronic running injuries in his left leg (he got a third-degree sprain about nine years ago, the kind of injury that messes with you for the rest of your life), which I may use to justify buying an elliptical trainer, if I can convince him how much sense this makes.

Okay. This is why I haven’t been blogging. Because when I sit down to write, I end up talking about my desire for new exercise equipment, or something else that is about that interesting. I could pontificate on the fantastic ending of Battlestar Galactica, but I’d hate to ruin it for anyone who hasn’t seen it, or bore anyone who doesn’t care. (To BSG fans: Has anyone else had “All Along the Watchtower” stuck in your head for the past four days? How do you get it out?)

Hang in there with me, friends.

Oh, and tomorrow Suze arrives for a visit, with her kiddos in tow, and if that doesn’t cleanse me of all my mental blocks, it should at least give me something fun to write about. We’re going to dye sock yarn with Kool-Aid. So be ready for THAT.

ETA: Ahem. Battlestar Galactica spoiler alert in comments. Some people cannot restrain themselves. You have been warned.