It’s amazing how easy it is to shake up your perception of reality. Sometimes, you just hafta run backwards.
Tomorrow morning, I’m gonna do what I do every Saturday morning. I’m gonna run. I’m gonna run a long way, and one of the places I’m gonna run is around the Fit Strip in Marquette. In fact, I’ll probably end up running around it twice, and it’s the second time around that’s gonna help shake up my perception of reality.
Let me explain—I’ve been running around the Fit Strip since just after I moved back to Marquette three decades ago. Our first apartment was just a block away, and the Fit Strip was a way for us to enjoy nature, if only for a little bit. And even after all these years, it’s the one of the few pieces of nature I actually enjoy being in. So I run around it every chance I get.
The thing is, every time I run around the Fit Strip—and I’ve probably done it over a thousand times now—is that I always run it the same way. I start at the Ridge Street entrance, and run it counter clock-wise. I think I started doing it that way because that’s how the numbered exercise stations are laid out, and I just got to know the course that way. I know it backwards & forwards; in fact, I know the course that way so well that during winter nights when I’m trying to get to sleep, I run through the course in my mind, knowing where every curve, every hill, and every tree sits.
THAT’S how well I know the Fit Strip course.
Then a couple of weeks ago, I tried something I’d not tried in the almost three decades I’ve run the Fit Strip. The first lap around, I ran it like I normally do. But for the second lap, I turned around, and ran it backwards. Instead of running the second lap counter clock-wise, I ran it clockwise. And from the moment I started, it was like I was in a Bizarro-based alternate universe.
You know how, two paragraphs ago, I said I knew the Fit Strip backwards & forwards? Well, as it turns out, I only knew it forwards, because from the moment I started running it backwards, it was like I’d never run it before. I had no idea where on the course I was. When two trails converged, I wasn't quite sure which one to take. And the fact that I was running down hills that I usually run up (and vice versa) threw my mind (or at least what’s left of it after all these years) for one very big, Fit Strip-sized loop..
It shook up my perception of reality.
So now you know what I’ll be going through around, oh, 8:30 or 8:40 tomorrow morning. Think a kind thought for me at that time, if you would. Otherwise, have yourself a GREAT 3-day weekend (assuming, of course, you get a 3-day weekend), and see if you can shake up you perception of reality a little bit. Trust me—it’s an eye opener!
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