Starting

I am so proud of my little girl.

Why? you ask.
Is it because she ran over 50 miles during the school year?
Is it because she took first place in all the major running events at field day?
Is it because she's just about the best 7 year old around?

Yes - and it gets better.

But first, let me tell you a story.  A sad story.

I live about 3 miles outside of town.  One of the courses I run takes me down the highway, into town, out to a State Park and back.  It just so happened that on one of my recent runs, I employed a new tactic for pain avoidance.  Of course, when you're running, you will naturally feel some "discomfort" due to the pace, distance or other cause.  Pain avoidance is when you do something to try and take your mind (at least temporarily) off the discomfort.  Some people listen to music, chat with a friend or pretend they are running in the Olympics.  My tactic: counting garbage.  It was the last 3 miles of a 15 mile day and I was just turning onto the highway to begin the 3 mile trek back to my house when I started counting the number of beverage containers that were tossed carelessly and downright SHAMEFULLY to the side of the road by STUPID, irresponsible, and ugly people as they drove down the highway.  Please note that I counted only one side of the  highway, and only beverage containers (including water, soda and beer bottles, cans, and Styrofoam or paper cups) over the course of the 3 miles from town to my home.

How much? You ask.

Well over 100.

I was horrified to think that there are that many ugly people in this area.  I say ugly people because one can only assume that someone who attempts, who purposely makes an effort to destroy and mask the beauty of this country can only be such a soul who is so hideously ugly themselves that they feel no need to respect the beauty of the land (jerks!).

(If you are one of those ugly individuals that throws trash from your car window onto the side of road -  please accept this as an "I hate you" note and know that we can be friends again when you change your ways.)

On certain days, I do recovery runs - runs done at a slow and easy pace that serve mostly to recover from a previous work out.  Occasionally, on these runs, I'll invite my daughter to come because she will help prevent me from overdoing it on the recovery run.

On one such run, we ran and chatted casually, when suddenly she stopped (which for a moment annoyed me), turned back and bent over to pick up a crushed water bottle.  I almost cried with pride.  We spent the rest of the morning running from piece to piece of trash, picking up all we could carry and depositing the pile into an official trash can.

It was, I recognize, a small start to the much needed solution to littering -  but a small start is a good start, and you will never finish the race that you don't start.