Morning Jogs

I have started jogging three to five mornings a week at the soccer field nearby. This addition to my routine has been really good for me in several ways. Of course physically, then thanks to the resulting endorphines I feel good emotionally. But also for language learning and motivation this trip outside gives me a good start for the day.

Every morning as I walk, I think “I should blog this walk.” I think it is partly because it is in the early morning when I tend to be at my most reflective and feeling poetic. Nevertheless, below is a fairly average account of my average morning.

Sometime between 6:30 and 7:00, about fifteen minutes after the neighbors have begun their day and accompanying noise outside my window, I get up. I shuffle into my sneakers and ridiculous running garb (this huge flowy skirt that is not hard to run in), and try unsuccessfully not to make the door squeak as I open it to the outside world.

The early mornings are always overcast. Sometimes as I walk to the field the sun will begin to peak out from a cloud, but it generally stays hidden. I pass the same people almost every morning- greet in the same way and have the same conversation many times- this is wonderful for language practice. It goes something like this:

 Me: good morning

Other: good morning Massonay! (my name)

Me: how are you?

Other: good. Where are you going?

Me: I am going to go jog at the soccer field

Other: oh you are going to go jog?

Me: yes.

Other: that is good, God bless you.

Me: amen, see you later

Other: see you later.

Sometimes the dialogue is peppered with someone telling me to show them how I run. Sometimes it is peppered with things that I don’t know yet, but will learn one of these days.

At the field I do laps, there is generally a very mean-spirited Guinea that chases me every time I pass it. At first I was scared of it, then I remembered I am a human and it is a bird, so now I chase it right back. If there are bulls there, I deviate from my normal lap if need be to avoid getting too close.

Sometimes kids sit on the wall and watch me run by, but now I think it is becoming less of a novelty and life just goes on around me. Women pass with loads of firewood on their heads, or to get water for the day, kids walk in groups to school. When I get tired or lazy, I take out my ear buds and walk home a different route to see new faces and repeat the same basic conversation.

One neighbor told me I wouldn’t have to run if I worked like the women here do. This is soo true. The women here haul water, firewood, scrub clothes, cook over open fire-they don’t need to go running, they work enough already. Another friend told me it was good that I had started running; he had noticed I was getting fat, and that is not healthy. Wow, every girl’s dream phrase, lol. But he meant it with the very best of intentions, so I took it for what it was- a well-meaning encouragement.  So there you go, a small window into my worldJ