Happy trails to me

Yesterday was such a beautiful day -- 68 and sunny! On the last day of October! In Ohio!

I have only run trails once in my life, so yesterday was my second try. My boss asked me to go run by a local dam -- for business reasons I won't bore you with -- and then we headed to a nearby trail in the woods. I'd never been there before but the fall foliage is gorgeous and I figured it'd be fun.

I've said before I'm not very good at paying attention to what's around me when I run but when you are surrounded by foliage of gold and orange and yellows and reds, you can't help but notice. Fortunately, they were all at my feet. I didn't dare take my eyes off the trail, especially not after climbing our first steep hill and a tree root rose up and tripped me. The tree roots and rocks were lethal, and these trails never saw a flat area -- just steep uphill and then steep downhill.

We enjoyed the run, but we'd probably have enjoyed it a lot more if we hadn't thought we got lost along the way. It's hard enough to run vertically up or down with slippery fallen leaves at your feet, tree roots and rocks doing their darndest to see you do a face plant but it's worse when you fear you missed the cut off for your trail and took up the trail that's 5 times longer. And in another hour the sun will start to go down. I thought the trail was 1.06 miles, so when we had hit 1.3 miles I got a little concerned.

Luckily, we were on the right trail (it was actually 1.6 milesand made it back to the car long before the sunset. As we stretched out afterward, I lay on my back and looked up to see the most beautiful blue sky framed by awesome golden leaves. Ohio may not have the mountains or the beach but wow, fall and spring rock.