Cowed by Pitter-Patter of Jogging Feet

You gotta walk/bike/jog/drive that lonesome valley by yourself. And there’s a road near my house where at various times I actually do walk or bike or jog (really I slog) or drive my car. As McLuhan never said: How you go is what you know.

When I’m walking, I feel slightly superior to all the speed freaks driving, biking and jogging past me. They’re missing the markings on the hawk flying overhead. They don’t get to sample the wild berries. They don’t get to see the couple groping in the grass.

When I’m in my car, I start out being Little Ms. Gracious. I practice the Zen of yielding, letting bikers and joggers go forth, smugly knowing that one impulse from the ball of my foot could turn them into roadkill.

There’s something about horsepower without horses that brings out the beast in me. I savage the other drivers by registering my contempt for them and their bumper stickers. “Baby on Board”--and moron at the wheel! “Save the Environment”--and kill a pedestrian! “U.S. Out of El Salvador”--and Volvo outta of my way!

When I’m on my bike, the joggers seem like jerks. Why must they take up the road with their monotonous mantra--left, right, left, right.

Their refusal to pay attention seems suicidal. Plugged up with Walkman earphones, they set forth like Stepford Joggers assuming they needn’t hear the cars coming at them. Whoever they are, they count on the kindness of strangers in Porsche convertibles doing 75 m.p.h.

When I’m jogging, I notice that almost everyone who jogs these days is a professional. Knee-braced, post-op and running on empty, the apres -fad joggers continue where the amateurs have fallen by the roadside.

In the past year, following foot surgery, I have tried to resume a little non-serious jogging routine. I avoid the places where I could once do five miles easily and slog a mile or two on my favorite road. I try to go when the road is empty so I don’t have to deal with performance anxiety. And other joggers. Hell is other joggers.

Yesterday was not my day. As I rounded a corner, I saw a man who was in my literary criticism class some 20 years ago. I have seen him a few times over the years. Once, he took it upon himself to volunteer that I was “very fragmented” in college.

I needed that.

So as I slogged by him, I kept my eyes to the road, hoping he wouldn’t notice me. But the former lit-crit twit took the liberty of staring at me and shouting loudly, “All right !”

Now, would he walk into a bookstore and pick up an Amy Tan and shout: “All right ? Way to go, Amy! Not bad for a first novel. Just do it!”

If this unsolicited encouragement was annoying, worse things were coming my way.

As I slogged around the next corner, I heard the sound of loud panting behind me. I looked over my shoulder and saw an anorexic male biker pumping his mountain bike as fast as the paved road would take him.

He was clothed in a black Spandex tourniquet and the latest aerodynamic helmet. He was one lean, mean biking machine--a two-wheeled Darth Vadar.

All I did was glance his way. And he yelled out, “You better just stay right there, lady!”

God forbid I should take up a few more millimeters of his road.

Suddenly, I did not want to be a jogger. I didn’t even want to exercise in the same world as these people. I didn’t need the condescending encouragement of a jogging critic. And I didn’t want the hostile threats of a 10-speed psycho.

I thought this exercise business was supposed to be fun. Supposed to reduce stress, not create it. If it’s going to get this tense, why don’t we all just get back in our cars and kill each other?