eBirdseed.com Wild Bird Feeding Blog

Hi Gordon,

I suppose that different people will interpret this clip in different ways...

I see a little creature with what little physical resources he has, struggling to make a beautiful little world in which to live out his fantasy of flight, knowing that that fantasy will most likely be costly in the extreme.

Years ago, I decided to start distance running... Not the brightest of ideas because I wasn't a perfect specimen and I was in my early thirties. Still, I worked like a dog and got to the point where a 5 mile jaunt was "ho hum", and half marathons were much more than "doable".

But the path to that point was nothing less than ugly... I know that I never ran a race where people didn't pull up lame, or become violently ill. In fact, I ran one race (a hot, hilly five-and-a-quarter miler) in which two runners have dropped dead.

Still, there was that night in Natick MA, (where I lived at the time)... I took off for a run and for whatever reason, I was "in the groove"... I hit Speen St. and was gone into the countryside. Granted, it was a gamble... It was almost pitch black, and I was running into unknown turf... Still the stars were so brilliant... I can see that in my mind's eye vividly over a decade later. That night, I got lost, almost got run over by a car, and was attacked by a muskrat. Seventy-five minutes of "dodging the trees" as the kiwi might say. Seventy-five minutes of hopeless beauty and peace...

But you know what, I earned that joy, and I'd take that gamble again. anytime...

Alan

Hi Gordon,

Thanks for sending the link. There are times I feel like this little guy - struggling to do something that no one else understands. At the end of the struggle is the joy and peace - worth every bit of misunderstanding by those that you count on.

Rae