Thanks, Adam Carolla

So I am going to go running, and I’m a little jazzed. After all, I have been running for over thirty years so that’s far more of my life as a runner than a non-runner. And quite honestly, it can get a little boring. Years ago, when I started, I would pass the time talking. I would pick up my friend Arlene, from her home on 5th Avenue and we would enter Central Park and run miles and miles. One year, when we both had rented summer homes in Greenwich and we were both training for a marathon, we used to run fifteen times around a one- mile park, putting little twigs down in one spot so we would remember what number loop it was.

Anyway, all that’s to say I’ve done a LOT of miles—gone through hundreds of tapes on a Walkman and now I must have twenty different Running Playlists. But still…after all these years, and all the marathon training, I feel that I have literally run the equivalent of to the moon— and back!!! And it’s a bit of a bore.

But now I’m jazzed because for the first time, I’ve downloaded all these comedy podcasts—and I have a vision of me upping my mileage, running for hours listening to comedy routines.

I start off with Adam Carolla, and wouldn’t you know, he starts talking about exercise. And there’s a whole riff, but at the end he’s talking about how he plays little tricks to pass the time, tricks to MAKE THE TIME go faster. And then he comments, why does he want it to go faster? He says, “I’ll be on my deathbed, and all I did my whole life, was try to trick myself and make the time pass, so I could then die. Well the jokes on me.” And I thought, he hit it on the head. I am ALWAYS impatient, tapping my toe when I wait in line, thinking of all the things I have to do, impatient to finish a run, finish the newspaper, finish the what? Rush to where? What is so friggin’ important that I don’t actually exist in the moment and feel grateful for that moment? I’m waiting on line at a drive through bank— but aren’t I grateful that I HAVE a car—AND money in the bank? God knows I remember quite clearly when I had neither. The joke is going to be on all of us if we don’t slow down and literally smell the whatever- the fresh coffee wafting out of Dunkin’ Doughnuts—(that’s my nod to David!), the grass being mowed (my mother LOVED that smell) the soft leather in the car. I have to remember not only to be grateful – but also to give myself time to be grateful. I mean when you think about it—where ARE we all running?