🤩Track Joy 🥰 "The Cultivation of Gratitude and Joy is the Way Home"
My psychic says I should write more about joy
My psychic tells me that I should write more about joy. Yes I have a psychic now, and I think everyone needs either a spiritual guide or a therapist, and a psychic is the happy medium.
My psychic says when I crave an ice cream while driving, I should just pull over to a 7/11 and buy one, and savor each bite. Little did she know my vice was never the sweets... but I'll hide my garlic-flavored pita chips obsession till next time she reads my energy.
But I did go to the track on Thursday with our local GOAT, Pedro Rojas. It's been almost 3 months since my last track workout, and I needed Pedro.
We've been each other's come-back buddies throughout the years. Whenever I come back from an injury, or whenever we come back from our illnesses - his cancer, my Covid - we've always been there for each other's first baby workouts. The splits are not the point. The company is.
I had 8x800s, and Pedro had 4x800s, 4x400, 2x200. He took Lane 5, and I took Lane 1. We both started easy and ramped up efforts. A cross-fitter on the inside of the track told me, "hey you look so fast out there!" I gave both a smile and an eye roll. Hard to take in well-intentioned compliments when I'm trying to focus. But then I noticed how worn Pedro's Adidas Adizero shoes were and reminded he should wear the new pair he already bought.
Pedro is a hybrid between my running confidant and my Puerto Rican dad. My running confidant because I share deeply personal stories and secrets usually reserved for my closest girlfriends. My Puerto Rican dad because Pedro passes on wisdoms from his father to me, like "a good life is expensive. The cheap one is not worth living." He role models his rich life for me by flying himself and his wife business class to the Tokyo marathon, a dream I have to defer till my grandkids graduate from college.
When I get cheeky and pinch my mid-section roll, Pedro doesn't school me on body positivity. Pedro's daughter is a great runner and an orthodontist for me and Sam, and she hired Sam for a summer gig, creating Wordle for her office. When I'm with the Rojas family, I can't help but wonder if they're all secretly related to Yulimar Rojas, the world's greatest jumper, since all Pedro's grandchildren are athletic, bright and kind.
The track has always been a place that feels like home. It brings the same calming feeling to my restless soul, the same way the swimming pool and the ocean do. Injustice disappears. All in the world feels right.
But the track is also an unforgiving place. When you first make your return after an injury or time off, you just feel out of wack. The strides feel choppy, no matter how much you think smooth, smooth like butter. (That only happens when I'm super fit, and have been lifting my ass off.) You might also feel disconnected from your body. The days when I was able to run a precise 85-second lap was gone. You're just not that in tune with your body after time away. (Just imagine the elite runners being able to feel a 60-second lap from a 61-second one). It was also a bit hard to pace an 800 repeat. Nonetheless, I finished.
After a good track workout, or a good swim, the joy I feel isn’t thrill. It isn’t a heart-pumping rush of adrenaline (though I still get that from a hard-fought race.) It feels serene and subtle, and even blue sometimes. “The cultivation of gratitude and joy is the way home,” writes Brené Brown, though at first, it could feel terrifying. I always feel such strong gratitude, stemming from a healthy body that can pull off a workout and the deep friendship of others. Then, using BB’s language, I soften into joy. I don’t embrace it. I don’t discover it. It’s a full-on physical experience of tension leaving one’s body and feeling connected to one's soul and the rest of the world.
To joy of a great track workout, and to the gratitude behind it.