To most people, The Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May is a quaint tradition, or an icon of a bygone era, or a party, or irrelevant.
To me, it is my backyard. I love being here. I love having been there. I love thinking about being there again.
The first car I hear after 11 months of quiet puts the hairs on the back of my neck at attention.
The first whiff of exhaust and hot, wearing tires smells better than apple pie.
Sitting, or standing, watching the cars, hearing them, feeling them as they go by, I soak it in. I savor every... single... second.
When 6p rolls around, I don't want to leave.
As I sat at work today, I felt a little empty. Qualifications are over. There's really nothing to read about, or hear about, or see, until Friday. And that's one short hour. Then race day. Then quiet again.
Imagine having a torrid love affair with someone you only got to see for two weeks, now just one week, every year.
I closed my eyes and thought about how many of those weeks I've had. And how immersed I am in them. And how fulfilling they are.
And how they are just glorious enough to hold me until next year.
I'm very fortunate to live 25 minutes from my favorite place on earth.
I'm more fortunate to have something in my life that brings me so much happiness. And the opportunity and ability to give myself permission to enjoy it.
If you don't know where your slice of heaven is, find it. If you do know it, don't ration it, get to it!
Good running,
Doug
Numbers: 7.5 miles on pavement and cart path.
In the spirit of Indy, shouldn't you be running on a high school track (preferably one you didn't scale a fence to access) instead of a road course? Go fast. Turn left.
ReplyDelete@Trena - Never occurred to me, but yes, I should be going fast and turning left. Perhaps that should be my run on Sunday morning. But I'll keep it a bit shorter than 200 laps.
ReplyDelete