Falling in Love

August 25, 2025

Greetings from the anniversary,

It is a thing children do, something that they cannot resist, or speak a reason for, they simply do.  It is a natural expression of their abilities, from crawling to standing to walking, and then one day the walking is not enough.

Children extend their reach, when the muscles are stronger and coordination cooperates.  They are not in a hurry, there is no pressure for them to be anywhere.  They simply feel this urge.  They don’t know how to NOT do it.  The tentative steps build momentum to confidence and then they are walking everywhere until, without being taught, something takes its place.

And then they run.

They run, perhaps stumble a few times, and fall and get up, wipe off the tears.  Armed with new courage they run again, awkward and ungainly for a while, unaware there is any other way until the synapses and tendons and tissue and the twitching response smooths out.  And they are running.

Children run for the delight of it.  It is freedom articulated, an exuberant, seemingly infinite expression of possibility.  When they begin to run, they cannot imagine that they would ever stop, ever grow tired, ever feel as though they should give up.

We are all children first, all of us have that in common. And then we have running in common. 

For many of us, maybe most, there can come a time when running just for running seems silly or boring or pointless, especially compared to whatever other choices are presented.  It no longer seems natural to do, at some point it may even seem undignified.  And maybe that’s the end of it.

When I was a little boy, I thought my superpower was running.  I couldn’t have described how it made me feel, I didn’t have the language, but I know now; it was joy. Even just getting around the neighborhood, going to the store, or the part of any sport that meant I could run.  But, like most kids I outgrew some of that and turned to other things, and the years piled up and dust gathered on my experience.

When I was in my twenties a friend asked me to try to run a ten-mile race with him.  It was like he was speaking a foreign language, so it took a beat to grasp what he was saying.  Thankfully I said yes.  I put in the miles, showed up at the starting line and finished my first Crim road race.

And I fell in love with running again.

This weekend I ran that race for the 44^th consecutive year.  That is not the important part, but it tells a little about how the first Crim changed things for me. That run, and what followed, opened a door for me, which led to adventures I never would have imagined. 

This weekend was the anniversary of possibility.  I am smiling as I write this, because I can still feel everything swirling in me as I waited at the starting line.  The same excitement, the knowing, the magic, the lightness inside me that was the same joy I’ve felt for a bazillion years.

I ran into that morning carried by thousands of miles of running, linked through countless moments of joy.  Of course there were challenges, setbacks, heartbreaks, sometimes fear.  But through all of that is this passion, the irresistible love for this thing that propels me forward.

We can draw a squiggly line from this weekend back to the time when I was a little boy, and I never imagined that I would ever stop, ever grow tired, ever feel I as though I should give up.   And so, I keep running.

There is another reason I am smiling this morning.  Only a few hours after I ran the ten miles, I stood behind my grandchildren and watched them run a race down the same road, over the same bricks that marked countless victories for me.  It was a fun thing for them, maybe a quarter of a mile, a lighthearted, joy-filled and silly run, inspired by the cheering crowds and the promise of a popsicle afterward.

They run because it is a natural expression as a little human.  I also like to think that they run, maybe, because their mom is a runner, and she ran, maybe, because I am a runner.  It delights me to think of the possibility that exists for them now, with their whole life of this ahead of them.

In all of us there is this innate essence, this part of us that wants to be in every heartbeat, in each breath, in all we do.  When we feel its presence, when it surfaces in some part of our life, we feel a light inside us.  If we pay attention to that, if we nurture it and allow it a place in our life, it will grow, and grow us into the people we were created to be.  If we are lucky, we will find many such gifts in our life, and even better, we will meet others who have found theirs too. 

Hope this finds you doing what you love,

David

Copyright © 2025 David Smith