Friday, March 5, 2010

The Big Five-Oh

Two nights ago the streak turned over the half a century mark. I didn't want to run. I'm burned out, physically, emotionally, stressed. More bad news on the house front had made me just want to curl up in bed and hide from life's problems. Luckily i have two great women in my life that helped push me out the door. We clicked on our flashlights and headlamps and trotted out on our usual 1.1 mile loop through the neighborhood.

With a collective groan we all start working the kinks out of our joints and sore legs in the first 1/4 mile downgrade. As we turn the corner we run past our friends house and wave not knowing if they could see us. But having run this route probably 20 times in the last 2 months it's just habit. I wonder what their daughter would think seeing 3 bobbing lights run by through the darkness.



*SNARL!*


"What the hell was that!?"



I focus my mini-mag light onto the noise. It's a dog going bananas in front of someone's driveway ahead. My heart races and i slow down so the three of us can get by in a pack and not separated. Loni, who's trot is generally about 5' slower then Leah's and mine quickly catches up. I've see this dog before. Generally the owner yells at it and he runs back to the house. Tonight, not so much. As we get closer it circles back from within the driveway and straight towards me. I do what i normally do which is yell at it as if i was it's owner.

"GO HOME!"

it slows briefly and then charges. I think about John's dog story and i know what i needed to do. I planted my left foot, hauled back and punted the dog in the face. Now i've never kicked a person, nevermind a dog. The closest i've come to this was a soccer ball. For those familiar with kicking a soccer ball there is a firmness, a small amount of give as the air compresses in the ball itself, and then lift. Well a 20lb dog doesn't really have that kind of feel.


I can feel the side of my foot make contact with it's jowls, then jaw, then skull and the dog stops dead in it's lunging tracks. With a frightened yelp it turns and runs back toward the house. I can only hope the owner saw this all go down and heard me yell.


"PUT IT ON AN F-ING LEASH!!"



The ladies run quietly and quickly ahead. When i catch them the adrenalin is pumping through me like morphine. I'm high as a kite, gitty even. I spend the rest of the run laughing about it. It felt so good. To be put in the fight or flight position and for once in my life, i chose fight. There are already enough roads i can't run down in the neighborhood because of shitty owners and their shitty dogs. I'll be dammed if I'll loose another one because of a smallish one with an attitude.

Before the sad saps get all pissed, I've never been one to hurt an animal. If it was possible i would have shot the owner first. Realistically, based on the neighborhood, and the current dilapidation of the owner's house, I'll be the one that's shot on the next run.


...wonder what the kick would have felt like in my vibrams...

2 comments:

sherpajohn said...

So liberating eh? It's not about kicking the dog.. its what you learned FROM kicking the dog.

Josh said...

I dunno if "liberating" was the feeling. The last 4 months of my life i've just been shit on second after second. And i've been smart enough to not respond physically. Keep your emotions in check and act like a professional. Just fucking roll over and take it like you are expected with everything else. Just sit there, shut up, and take it.

That poor dog just caught me in the wrong point in my life. God save any other dogs that lunge at me from this point forward. I'm going to leave a wake of carcasses if i need to.