Running in the Fall

Although some cross-country runners continued on their road to state, me, and all other JV runners, ended our season last Friday. Some look forward to the season ending, and some dread it. For me, it was a bittersweet occurrence. While I love cross-country, it is sometimes relaxing withe the ability to go home and immediately begin on school work. However, with the end of this season, I am much more disappointed than I expected I would be. While junior year comes with a lot of stress and schoolwork, the ability to go and run with friends after school is refreshing. Coming home from school right away to start working sounds nice, but I find myself not starting homework. Instead, I talk with my parents,eat, idle around the house, and eventually, muster up the strength to go workout.

When I came home today, my friend texted me and asked me to run with her. Being 100% truthful, I was not looking forward to it. I expected us to go on our mundane route, but instead we embarked on a new adventure. As we ran down Old Alabama road, we chose to run past the neighborhood we typically run in and ran into the Autrey Mill Nature Preserve. Although I was aware the Autrey Mill Nature Preserve contained trails, I had never run on them before. As we ran through, the unpaved trail was a relief from the hard sidewalk we normally run on. In addition, fall was blooming all around us--the vibrant colors on the trees were breathtaking. Towards the end of the run we could choose between a couple of ways to run home, we chose a route that would lead us to the back entrance of our neighborhood. On this route, we encountered unexpected and tremendous hills, but flew up them because we were having such a blast.

People always act amazed when I tell them I love to run, but after a run like today, I find it amazing someone could not love to run.