Running Ruminations

What do you do after you’ve passed the year mark on living through a respiratory, airborne pandemic that has caused unimaginable suffering (536,000 deaths in the US; 56,700 in California; 1,876 in SCC) and profoundly disrupted everything it has touched (which is to say, everything)? 

Assuming you’ve been doing what you should have been doing all along, I think you just keep going. 

The only way out is through, y’know. 

We’re also at the point in recent history when all of our devices are reminding us where we were a year ago, in the nascency of the pandemic. Remember when we all — including the CDC! — were dubious about masks’ efficaciousness? And that we all spent so.much.time meticulously wiping down groceries, hoping that we didn’t inadvertently taint our strawberries with our lemon-scented Clorox wipes? 

For those of us lucky enough to have the choice, a year ago, many of us so sweetly thought that working, or schooling, or everything-ing from home for a couple weeks wouldn’t be so bad and hell, maybe it’d even be fun! Working from home in my underwear? Count me in! 

Immensely awful and shitty that the pandemic may be, though, I think there has been some good that has arisen from the dumpster conflagration that has been the past year. Admittedly I’m a bit torn to even bring up the subject though because I’m not sure if finding some “silver linings” in the midst of the past year, one of such immense, incalculable suffering, is toxic positivity or is, in fact, helpful and perhaps even a little grounding.

Arguably, some (or all) of these developments might have been borne more out of necessity than choice, but I nonetheless hope that these (personal and/or structural) changes will stick around in post-pandemic life. 

Off the top of my head, the banal and the massive include but aren’t limited to:

• Regular virtual hangouts with friends and family who live far from each other. That I hadn’t thought of doing this sooner is embarrassing and probably qualifies me as a bad friend/relative. 
• Running, just ‘cuz, not because a race is on the calendar. Prior to the pandemic, I was always training for a race on the horizon, with the exception being training through both pregnancies. When I ran during pregnancy, it amounted to a near-daily reminder of how freeing it is sometimes to just run for the hell of running, simply because I could. The pandemic forced my always-training-for-a-race mentality to training-for-life-because-life-is-always-enough. It’s a seismic shift and one I needed probably more than I realized.  
• Order-ahead and drive-up grocery pickup options 
• The same, but for Target. So much of my time is my own again! And I’m probably saving a lot of money! 
• Less commuting, and consequently less traffic, because more can be (possibly should be) done remotely. See above. 
• Well-orchestrated virtual opportunities for racing companies/organizations to engage community members who want to be supportive without necessarily participating in a local, large-scale, in-person race. I have zero interest in actually racing-racing the virtual stuff, but if my registration means a local race company survives, I’ll sign up for all of ‘em.
• More visible and ubiquitous hygiene practices, especially during cold and flu season. There’s nothing wrong with the birthday child blowing out a candle on an individual cupcake instead of spitting all over a massive cake. (!)
• Increased accessibility and attention paid to free, local outdoor spaces as a means of recreation and community-building. I have never seen as many people in ARP as I have in the past year. There’s growing pains with that for sure — trail etiquette, littering, that sort of thing — but overall, I think at the end of all of this, parks win.  
• Greater visibility of, and respect toward, mental health concerns. It’s shitty to think that a pandemic that has affected everyone, in some capacity or another, may have been what it took for frank conversations about people’s mental health to transpire. The pandemic has disproportionately affected some folx more than others — BIPOC and mothers come to mind right away — and I hope that the pandemic leaves in its wake better evvvvvvvvverything than we had before. BHAG, I know.  
• Greater visibility of, and respect and commitment toward, diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging initiatives at structural and organizational levels. The pandemic woke up huge segments of society who have been asleep at the wheel. It’s another BHAG on all of us, individuals and organizations alike, to be better post-pandemic than before. Ultimately, I think it comes down to this: know better; do better. 
• Basically everything the library has done for so many. Major kudos. I’m a big fan.

What comes to mind for you?