Hurricanes and Beavers

Yesterday I ran 7 "speed work" miles because it was Thursday. My knee obeyed my mind and I felt no pain. Problem is, I did not want to leave the run and join my real life. I had this overwhelming desire to spend the entire day on the running path, but I did not do so because others depend on my getting off the running path.

I first had breakfast with my brother, where we discussed his chaos and upheaval. Out of respect for him, I will not blog our discussion, though if tit were for tat, I'd blog every word of it. You see, he has a history of writing about our intimate family of origin details and sharing them with the entire world. I will instead teach him good writing manners and a respect for personal boundaries.

It was very nice to talk to him, to his 4 recent tattoos, and to his puppy--a beagle tucked neatly inside of my brother's jacket as he pulled up to greet me on his motorcycle.

He is my older brother by 5-years. He suffers from an extreme mid-life crisis, the wake from which even Hurricane Katrina could not match. I would characterize it as a massive Tsunami, but that would imply this was an unexpected event. No, his situation is a hurricane. We monitored its progress offshore and, like Katrina, no one anticipated the shear force of its impact upon land.

Now I am looking for loved ones in the aftermath, clinging as best I can to whatever life line they throw my way. I love my sister-in-law and my nephew and two nieces. I also love my brother, and his tattoos and his little puppy.

Though not planning to have done so, I gave him my new Mother Teresa book. I read to page 8 and called my omelet friend and told her that the book was so intense that it was a difficult read for me. I am thinking Mother Teresa's power is so great that it will reach out from that book and touch my brother in a way that mortal humans cannot.

She is a saint of the abandoned (though not yet canonized). She is a saint of darkness and she saw her purpose to bring light to those in the dark. My brother is flipping around like a fish on the deck of a midnight fisherman's boat.

A little light, please, Mother, so that the fisherman can settle this fish...

And so I left Big Brother and Puppy and set off to do my run. I sped down the path as fast as possible. There was an overcast and it even sprinkled. The humidity was thick. Somewhere in mile 5 I stopped to walk a bit and a fellow path soul joined me. She is a 50-ish, dark, African American woman and I have seen her before, but not often.

Reason I remember her is she is so deep in thought as she walks. She never runs. She seems in another world as I pass her. I call her Thinking Walker.

Yesterday though, she spoke to me about a beaver in the canal that was splashing around near us. She enjoyed it. She had never seen the beaver. I told her the beaver is out often and there are more at the mile-1 marker. Then I told her about the doe and 2 fawns I saw early in the summer--how they swam across the canal (yes, they swam!) and joined me on the other side, and how the doe stopped and stared at me, as if to convey our commonalities.

Well, I didn't tell Thinking Walker about my impressions of the doe's intentions...Thinking Walker has enough on her mind. I told her about the butterflies and the birds and I asked her if she saw the young Blue Heron today, and she answered that she did. She talked more about the beaver and we stared into the water for a few moments then we parted ways.

I finished my run considering that I now have a relationship with Thinking Walker that I did not previously have, all because of a beaver, and that I now have a relationship with my brother that I did not previously have, all because of a hurricane.