“It hurts up to a point and then it doesn’t get any worse.” – Ann Trason

Some people dread their birthdays, but every year it happens no matter how fervently we deny the thoughts of our mortality. That fateful day comes when a person suddenly has a “4” in the first digit of their age, and there is nothing that they can do about it. So we gradually accept the pain of tired joints and the increased health problems (mostly due to our poor lifestyle choices).

Maybe it’s because I never realized that stiff knees came along with age, but I’ve always looked forward to getting older. I’m glad to be turning 35 next week. I have three decades of good and bad experience from which to draw wisdom and insight.

Unfortunately, my body doesn’t know this.

My body is drawn to the grave like a magnet, with an increasing desire to sit or lay down and be still. As time passes, I feel the growing urge to be stationary and relax my forward progression.

So I run.

On days when I can’t seem to enjoy the run, when every fiber of muscle and every joint seems to demand that I should have stayed in bed, I run to stay alive. I run to fight the grave’s power over my living days. I run for the movement of it. I want to feel the blood pumping through my veins and to know the pain of becoming stronger, even as I grow older.

On the day I die, the grave will have its say. But not yet. So I keep running skyward until I return to dust, awaiting resurrection.