A runner's every step is a leap, so that for a moment he or she is entirely off the ground. For those brief instants, shadows no longer spill out from their feet, like leaks, but hover below them like doubles, as they do with birds, whose shadows crawl below them, caressing the surface of the earth, growing and shrinking as their makers move nearer or farther from that surface. For my friends who run long distances, these tiny fragments of levitation add up to something considerable; by their own power they hover above the earth for many minutes, perhaps some significant portion of an hour or perhaps far more for the hundred-mile races. We fly; we dream in darkness; we devour heaven in bites too small to be measured.
Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
1 comment:
I met many relay racing runners yesterday on the Blue Ridge Parkway, a 200 mile relay along the roadway. As others were running apparently the teams would pile in their vans and come to the overlook where I was sitting with a friend, (probably at the end of the race.) We only met folks from NC who were in the run, but a nice Indian family (studying in Chapel Hill at UNCA) were also visiting. So in a half hour, we met 4-5 dozen runners from their dozen or so vans...and now you're mentioning how they are above the ground! Definitely.
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