I started running when I was twenty-three. I was living in New York, near Gramercy Park, and I ran laps around the park every afternoon. I got into the habit, and for about twenty years after that, I ran two miles every day, wherever I was. (London, easiest, Venice, hardest: ten steps and you’re lost, or in a canal.) When we moved out to the country, I went on running. Every day, in the late afternoon, I ran along our narrow dirt road, with my dog. It was our shared delight, our footsteps soft on the packed clay, running beneath the green shadows of the tall trees, through the silence of the countryside. It was my daily ribbon of solitude and exhilaration.
About a year ago I had surgery on my foot, and afterwards things got complicated. While I was recuperating at last I asked the physical therapist when I’d be able to start running again.
She shook her head. “You shouldn’t run.”
I stared at her, confused. “You mean – ”
I couldn’t get to the word “never.”
“You shouldn’t run,” she said again.
This time I heard “never.”
“I can’t give up running,” I said firmly, as though what I said made a difference.
She raised her eyebrows and said nothing.
It’s hard to have an argument with someone who doesn’t answer: I mean your foot.
We’ve left that house on the dirt road, and the new one is on a steep hillside. My lovely dog died four years ago. All that is over, which makes giving up running more tolerable. But in any case I don’t have a choice: my feet have quit. They’re finished with running. What happened to my left foot is mostly genetic, and it’s happening now to my right. It’s worsened by running. When your body makes a declaration, you can’t do much but listen.
In fact, I’ve quit arguing about running. Odd how your attitude changes when the terms of the discussion are altered: I’ve just had a second surgery, and for the moment I’m on crutches. What I’d really, really like to do is walk.
