Category: Uncategorized

This week was my second at fifty miles since my son was born. I came by it slowly.

I spent a lot of this week taking it easy and recovering from my self-immolation at the Mercer County Half last week. Hills were not an option. A Saturday afternoon nap, meanwhile, was very much on the menu.

I needed that nap because, despite all the writing I have done about how important sleep is to balancing my life as a runner and dad, I am not going to bed on time! This is stupid and entirely my fault, but I have had help from the low-dose dopamine machine that is my phone. I’ve probably been scrolling more miles than I’ve been running lately.

I finally deleted Instagram this week because Reels are designed to waste my time with adorable babies and animals, jokes that only occasionally rise above LQTM, and the constant churn of parental anxiety and political angst. I did not ask for any of this. I followed maybe a dozen accounts, all of them running-related, but the Algorithm does not care. I thought I could be stronger than the Algorithm this time, after deleting apps a couple times before, but it turns out I can’t.

The only app I can be trusted with, it seems, is Twitter, which for all its faults really does respect your feed by only including accounts you follow. I used to wish Threads could replace it, but it has the same Meta-scented, algorithmic stench as Instagram and a terrible community to boot. This makes sense, as most of its users found their way in through Facebook and Instagram, and neither of those places is exactly known for the written word. Anyone worth following on Threads is doing better work on Twitter; I think Brian Rock is the only exception to this. Alison Wade, of the Fast Women newsletter, was another, but she seems to have moved fully to Substack. It’s a hard time to want to read about running!

Elsewhere on the broken social media scene, Bluesky is doing a better job of recapturing the feeling of prelapsarian Twitter, but that’s cold comfort without much of a running or track presence. If Alex Predhome isn’t doing numbers there, it’s too quiet. I might delete this app too.

This has all been a long way of saying that social media is a blight on our collective intelligence and will, especially and specifically mine, and also I’m firing up The DNF on Twitter. Finally, we can answer the question of how everybody broke 2 on the 4×8 if the total time was 8:04—I was a 2:04 guy in high school.

Let’s recap this week’s training so I can call this a proper blog!

Sunday: I ran the Mercer County Half Marathon in 86:31, and I already wrote about it.

Monday: Off. I wanted to run, but felt like crap and the day got away from me. Running in the morning is essential because most of the day after my son wakes up is work and chores.

Tuesday: 7 easy.

Wednesday: 7 easy.

Thursday: 8 miles easy with a random 4 x 200 thrown in at the track: 36, 35, 34, 33. I had to pivot after my planned hill workout felt impossible; somehow running very fast on a flat surface was much easier than running somewhat fast on an incline. I’ll take what I can get!

Friday: 7 easy. Choked on a bug and threw up, but was otherwise fine.

Saturday: 3 miles at tempo pace (6:00 average). Had gas left in the tank and opened up the last 200 meters. This felt surprisingly good given Thursday, and the week as a whole.

This Week: 51 miles. I had originally planned for less, but after my half marathon blowup I tried to get more volume at every opportunity. I know I have a lot of work to do before I’m ready to build towards another BQ attempt. Still, I feel good about hitting 50 again and I know I can do even more once I get my habits sorted out.

Baby: My son is doing great! He got over his cold from the beach and is busy babbling, attempting to crawl (he’s accomplished “scooching” so far), trying new foods, and being adorable. Teething is still a wildcard from day to day, and we might be seeing the early signs of separation anxiety that ought to hit between 8 and 12 months, but we continue to figure things out as we go.

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I didn’t end up writing about it this week, but it’s worth noting that registration for the 2026 Boston Marathon is now open. Thanks to the diligent work of internet prognosticator Brian Rock, I’m not as jazzed this year knowing my 2:52 from Rehoboth is practically limping into the portal. Still, I will throw my hat in the ring before registration closes on Friday. What would this blog be if I didn’t?

Don’t answer that.

My beach vacation got better in the second half, but my half marathon on Sunday did not. In a race where I thought 85 minutes was my floor, I ran 86:31 for sixth place. I’m confused by my official place because I counted myself in fourth when I passed my wife at mile 8, and got passed by five people after that. It doesn’t really matter.

The only goal I met for this race was the implied imperative to compete for position. The field went out hot, and I went with them, splitting 6:15 through mile 1 and sitting in sixth place. I felt decent, the weather was excellent, and I had my super shoes on, so I wasn’t too concerned to be a bit quick; I expected to settle in a bit and cruise from there.

I never settled. I latched on to fifth place and hunted him through mile 2, then moved ahead and chased down fourth over the next mile. It felt good. I wasn’t sure I could hold it, but it felt like the right pace to be running. I set my sights on third place and tried to pull him in.

By mile 6 I knew I wasn’t moving up to third, and that’s when I started to consider how much farther I had to run. It was too far, but I wasn’t sure by how much. If the race were ten miles, could I hold it?

That’s a terrible thought to be having at mile 7 of a half marathon. It was also optimistic! I imploded crossing over the Turnpike as I was approaching mile 8. I knew my wife was going to be there and I thought very seriously about a DNF. I thought about how appropriate it would be, given the name of this blog.

When I got there, I couldn’t do it. I want to say that I saw my family and couldn’t quit in front of them, that I needed to fight it out for my son, and maybe that was part of it, but my foremost and most negative thought was that my mother-in-law was taking pictures, and I’d look like an idiot if my surrender was caught on camera. We fight a lot of stupid demons out on the race course.

So I gave my wife a thumbs down to signal that all was not going to plan and settled in for a long, painful cooldown—physically and psychologically. I already mentioned I got passed by five people.

There’s not much else to be said about this race. I’ll let my heart rate graph from Strava finish the story:

Last week, I wrote that I’ll know my endurance has faded if I can’t measure up to my Sunset Classic performance. I couldn’t and it has. Maybe I could have run faster with better pacing, but there’s no telling by how much. Perhaps I could’ve run 85 minutes. Would it have mattered?

The feedback this race has given me is that I’m not ready for a marathon block this fall. While my fitness over shorter distances has been remarkably stable—and perhaps even improved—since my son was born, I need a lot more miles in my diet to get back to marathon shape. So that’s the assignment.

Registration opened today for the Jersey City Marathon, and I’ve already signed up. Boston hopefuls keep raising the BQ bar; I’ll have my work cut out for me.

It’s time to stack up some serious fall mileage and hit 2026 in full stride. We’ll see what my son has to say about that. At least now he knows I won’t quit easily.

My son continues to misunderstand the point of a vacation, having brought daycare germs with him to our family trip on Long Beach Island. After dropping everything for a visit with a local pediatrician, it seems he’s dealing with a virus and we can only wait it out until he feels better. This is not very inspiring because he slept pretty poorly last night, and sounded like a pug even while asleep. Also, ominously, my throat hurts.

This is all particularly frustrating as I just wrapped up a particularly strong week of training, and my first fifty-mile week since before my son was born. This, until last night, was inspiring because my wife and I have been ironing out our daily routines to keep our household running smoothly. Being a parent means constantly making adjustments, and it seemed our adjustments were starting to work. They may yet be working, but our son is determined to confound the data for the time being. Being a parent also means being patient.

Speaking of patience, a few times this week I was tempted to do more in my training, but stopped short of any extra miles. I don’t need to rush things with a race next week; better to show up feeling good and ready to get an honest test of my fitness. Better also to kick whatever illness has befallen my noble house.

The highlight of this past week’s training was another personal-best session in my weekly hill workout. I’ve been a runner more than long enough to know that There Is No Secret, but this feels about as close to The Secret as I’ve ever seen.

Also, I was blessed with a great week of birds: multiple heron and egret sightings, as well as a white-breasted nuthatch. Another benefit of birding while running is that when you get home and your spouse politely asks how your run was, you can respond with something actually interesting instead of droning on about pace and effort and how thirsty you are—which has everything to do with the humidity and nothing at all with the fact that you don’t drink water before going outside in August. Birding can save you from confronting your bad habits! Sadly, blogging will not. Maybe you can succeed where I have failed.

Anyway, I’m racing the Mercer County Half Marathon on Sunday. This should be a low-stakes race, but I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t have any goals. To be honest, I’m not sure it makes sense to race without a goal. A race is a test. The goal is the rubric. A race without a goal is just a run.

So here are my goals for Sunday:

🟧 85:00 (2:50 marathon pace)
🟨 83:00 (VDOT equivalent to my Sunset Classic result)
🟩 81:30 (VDOT equivalent to a 2:50 marathon)
🏆 Top-5 Finish

My plan is to settle in at 85-minute pace early, unless there are people around me running a little faster. I’m hoping to run a negative split off that pace, so if I end up close to 85 minutes I’ll know my endurance has faded since my son was born. I ran 85:30 through halfway at Rehoboth.

Running 83 minutes would be a nice confirmation that my fitness from sunset is translating upwards, which would be a good sign for a future marathon. Running closer to 82 or even 81 minutes would mean I’m doing way better than I thought. The fastest I think I could run a half marathon, with a dedicated training block and peak fitness, is about 80 minutes—and I’m biased. I don’t think this will happen.

My goal of a top-5 finish for a tiny local race like this is extrinsically meaningless, but serves as a reminder that this isn’t just a time trial. I run my best when I remember to compete. I think we all do. And even though the stakes are low, I want to get my best on Sunday.

Depending on how I measure up to my goals, I may or may not add a late fall marathon to my calendar. My thinking is similar to last year when I hopped into Rehoboth: if I can get myself another crack at a BQ, I should take it. Even if it’s not my day, I’ll have Jersey City 2026 to try again.

Right now, I’m taking a slight dip in mileage and intensity to freshen up for the race, ward off illness, and rally to enjoy my last vacation for the year. Being a parent means figuring out how to get it done.

This week was the first solid seven days of running I’ve put together since June, probably. This was partly because I’ve been getting the hang of my son’s current routines, and partly because I’ve simplified my week into three essential workouts: long run (Sunday), hills (Wednesday), and tempo (Saturday). I’m betting this will be all I need to build fitness for a little while. The result is a streamlined week with no fancy sessions or hero workouts, fewer decisions to make, and more time for organizing the rest of my life.

On Wednesday I went back to my usual hill loop and put down my best set yet, then did some split squats afterward for an extra boost. These hill workouts were working really well before Sunset and while I felt a little rusty last week, I’m feeling sharper now.

Saturday was a three-mile tempo on the track. After a very late night with some friends visiting from out of town, I approached this conservatively and dialed down the pace as I went. I have some friends who like to do summer tempo runs that get longer every week. I think if I run these around half marathon pace, I can follow a similar format.

Sunday was an easy 12 with my usual long run group. It was a lot of time on my feet in some pretty sweaty conditions, so I didn’t exactly feel spectacular, but the aspect of training I am probably missing the most right now is the endurance you get from long runs. The long run is also the easiest day to add miles, in a way—what’s two or three more miles if you’re already going ten? Do you really want to turn that nice and easy half hour on Monday into something 50% longer?

Long runs, tempos, and hills attack three critical components of fitness: endurance, efficiency, and power. If I do them properly (and sleep properly!), I should be able to do them every week without burning out. Consistency gets results. If this works, I can donate my copies of Daniels Running Formula to the local library.

My goal for the upcoming Mercer County Half Marathon is to keep expectations low and get an honest appraisal of how I’m doing this year. Was Sunset a fluke, or maybe just not as big a surprise as I thought it was? Or are we still stacking bricks and ready to improve on last year’s fitness? I’m going to go out around 85-minute pace and look for the answers.

Running 2:50 full marathon pace for half the distance shouldn’t be a tall order if I’m in the shape I seem to be in; on a good day I’ll be able to finish strong and see what’s in the tank. Looking at past results for this race, there might be other people in that pace range to compete against. If I’ve got company in the later miles, I want to stick my nose in it and see what happens.

Before all that, I’ll be on vacation on LBI with my in-laws. If my son sleeps better than he did upstate, it could be the perfect way to set up the race. Either way, it will be nice to get away with family, but I’m really crossing my fingers for a restful week!

I signed up today for the Mercer County Half Marathon on August 31 because I’ve realized I’m not going to train properly if my actions don’t have consequences.

I’ve been pretty good the last few years about training regardless of whether there’s a race on the calendar, but all it took was one week of awful sleep to show me that “Maybe I’ll run a half in November and then target a BQ in 2026!” wasn’t getting me out of bed in Q3 2025. I have literally stayed in bed instead of running several times in the last two weeks.

I attribute this to having my priorities properly sorted: right now, mastering my son’s new routines is demanding a lot of my time and energy, and running while I’m already tired just isn’t as important as saving my battery for pickup and dinner and dishes and chores.

Another potential solution to my problem, you might have noticed, is not being tired—maybe a lot to ask of a new parent, but also maybe not. I’ve known for a while my bedtime habits have been slipping. I crawl into bed too late and can’t seem to resist scrolling mindlessly on my phone. I’m leaving miles in my pillow.

I made the decision to sign up a few days ago and it has already lit a fire under me. I am going to bed earlier and running more, and even running workouts again. I set a modest goal I think I can achieve with the amount of training I’ll be able to squeeze into the next three weeks. I’ll base my fall racing plans on the results.

Sometimes you can get by with the carrot, and sometimes you need a stick. As of now, I’m racing in three weeks no matter what I do; the only thing worse than racing poorly would be not racing at all. I’m not worried about this. I know how to train, and how to race. What I am still learning is how to organize, simplify, and motivate. Stick it is.

I’m not sure why I thought I could undo eight awful nights of sleep with just a few nights of slightly good sleep. I don’t think it’s right to call it optimistic; maybe aspirational, or desperate, would be better. I really wanted to get back out there.

I ran eleven miles last week and most of it felt pretty bad. I haven’t quite rebalanced the scales yet.

The good news is my son is back to his regular sleep patterns as of the end of last week. The even better news is I was able to get a long run in with the boys on Sunday.

The bad news is all that stuff I said earlier, plus I’m irritable today, plus my son has not enjoyed starting solid foods recently. I haven’t exactly been on this side of the highchair myself, so it’s new for all of us. It’s all new all the time with this guy.

It feels like ages ago when my wife and I were in a comfortable routine with the baby, and things were clicking, and yet it was only a month ago. That’s comforting and maddening in equal turns, though not as maddening as realizing USA 800-meter silver medalist Cooper Lutkenhaus wasn’t even alive when Obama was elected, and now he’s run 1:42. Compared to that, I can fathom a difficult month.

Speaking of USAs, what a meet! It was certainly more interesting than the rest of my weekend of yard work and carrot puree interpretations of Jackson Pollock, and I will sound a lot more pleasant if I write about that, so here are some rapid-fire takes:

• Donovan Brazier’s comeback is the feel-good track story of the year, Cooper Lutkenhaus is the future, and you should never leave home without Bryce Hoppel. The men’s 800 meters was the highlight of the meet and one of the strongest teams we are sending to Tokyo.
• Another feel-good story in a meet full of them: Emily Infeld is my age and she just won her first national championship! I’m not saying I could be racing in Eugene next summer, but I’m not not saying that. Too bad the 10K was only on Joymo, which is a real streaming service and not something Alex Predhome made up as a joke.
• The biggest bummers of the meet were that Yared and Athing didn’t make the team, and that Shelby did. I hope Goose can sneak into Tokyo via the Diamond League final, but admittedly I have no idea what that looks like. Maybe Citius Mag can crunch those numbers now that the 10K teams are settled.
• Sydney is going to get a rare challenge in the 400 meters. It’s exciting to see her in a position where she may not win. I think the American record goes down in Tokyo no matter what happens. She always shows up for championships.
• Don’t let Cole Hocker dictate the pace in a 5K! And certainly don’t give him the inside lane with 100 to go! Unless you want me howling with excitement at my TV. Then, go right ahead, but be warned I don’t pay as well as a Nike contract bonus. Grant and Nico must be fans of the blog.
• Everybody seems to love Noah and Kenny’s spat in the 200-meter final, but I don’t. It immediately erased what I saw as the real story of the event—Noah Lyles has been injured for months, only returned to racing very recently, and just ran 19.63 looking smooth as hell! He is extremely talented, and in far better position than we might have thought to defend his title next month, but instead of getting excited about that everyone is focused on the pro wrestling of it all—including Noah! Pass.
• Melissa Jefferson-Wooden is still on a heater. She looks like a favorite in both of her events. At the very least, I think she’s my wife’s favorite runner right now; Grand Slam may be broke, but the athletes certainly got paid in exposure! Seriously, though—get these folks their money.

See you next week, when hopefully I’ll have better sleep and a happier baby at the dinner table and more miles in my legs. As always, we’ll see what happens.

Looking back at my last blog, I’m more than a little surprised at my positive outlook. I spent the second half of my vacation even deeper in the pain cave than I started. There were highlights—it was still a vacation, and my first one with my first child—but overall it was a slog. I need a vacation from my vacation, and not for any of the fun reasons.

I got my first decent night of sleep in a while last night. It was amazing to be back in my own bed. I can tell I’m on the mend, but I still skipped my run this morning.

I’ve skipped a lot of runs lately. I’ve run a grand total of two miles since my last post, and they sucked.

That really sucks.

I’m trying hard to balance running against everything else going on in my life, and for the first time in a while I can feel it going wobbly, and for the first time in even longer I’m wondering if I can do this at all.

Kid, wife, job, house. Daycare. Chores. Family obligations. Running. Running blog. Who has the time? My wife and I can barely get a minute in front of the TV together. I’m supposed to BQ?

At the same time, I ran my fastest 5 miles since college a month ago. Even last week, before daycare germs and a sleep regression and a hard foam mattress and no air conditioning left me feeling hopeless (and hopelessly tired), I was looking up. I’m still thinking about signing up for a half marathon in five weeks—as a tune-up. Somewhere under the murky surface of the present moment, something is still working.

Or I’m delusional, but you know me by now; I’m not usually confident enough to pull off delusional.

What I am is of two minds. Is running at this level at this stage in my life impossible, or is it already happening? Should I be patient, or should I be realistic?

Two wolves: determination and despair. It’s gonna be the one I feed.

Time to get some sleep.

Last week was my son’s first week at daycare, and my wife’s first week back at work, which meant new routines for all of us. For me, that meant an earlier wakeup to run and be ready in time for daycare drop-off.

Even when my wife took on drop-off duties, I still got up early. It felt good to start my day ahead of schedule, and to be available to help with the morning send-off, and to beat the summer heat. This was working great for me! I could have it all!

Or, I could have if I had slept enough. I didn’t change my bedtime to match my new morning alarm, and I paid dearly for it. Over the course of five days, I wrote a series of checks my body couldn’t cash and hit the weekend like Wile E Coyote hitting the bottom of an Arizona canyon. Yikes!

This is not my first time overtraining. It’s not even my first time overtraining since my son was born. But it sucks every time.

I’m writing this from my family vacation upstate, and I had aspirations of kick-starting my summer mileage once I got out here. Instead I’ve spent a lot of the first two days with my feet up and my nose in a John Scalzi book. I feel like a Victorian housewife convalescing in the countryside after a “nervous episode”.

And at the same time I feel so energized. Our new routine, though challenging—imagine being on an F1 pit crew for a six-month-old baby—was clicking. Work was clicking; I honestly wish I could write an explainer for the cool problem I’ve been tackling because I’m genuinely excited about it. I was so fired up to pour myself into summer. I still am. I just have to wait.

Fortunately, there are worse places to wait.

Today was my son’s first day of daycare, which you think would mean I was less busy today than normal, but you would be wrong. Thankfully, I have had a post under glass for months, for just such an occasion. Please enjoy this essay about birding while running.

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“What do you think about when you’re running?”

Anyone who runs has probably heard this question at some point in their life, and everyone has their own answer. It’s a fair question; running certainly gives you a lot of time alone with your thoughts. Everyone has their own answer for this, too.

For decades, music has been running’s favorite tandem activity, though podcasts and audiobooks have recently moved in on that turf. As long as you stay aware of your surroundings, these are all great ways to pass your time out on the roads. If you like to keep your ears open and find your thoughts getting too loud for comfort, though, you may be at a loss.

Thankfully, I have a solution: birding.

Birding is a wonderful hobby by itself, but birding while running supercharges both activities simultaneously.

My wife and I got into birds as a hobby on our honeymoon in Hawaii a few years ago. It was the longest time we had spent together outside our native Northeast US biome, and we were fascinated by all the new birds we saw. As an aside, we were also fascinated by the familiar birds we saw there—neither of us expected to see pigeons on a picturesque beach in Maui, but there they were.

My wife loved the common mynas that flocked around our hotel, with their stylish yellow eyeliner. I would go running in the mornings and share my sightings over breakfast; my favorite spot was a feeder in Lahaina that routinely attracted a flock of Java sparrows. When we drove the Road to Hana, we were greeted on the far side of the island by chestnut munias, and it felt like an extra reward for making the trip.

My wife and I came home from Hawaii as birders, and that practice has transformed my running.

The Merlin app, by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, was invaluable for learning the names of all the unfamiliar birds I saw in Hawaii. It is a Pokédex for birds. It is also Shazam for birds, identifying them by sound as well as sight. I never stopped using the app when I got home, and it felt like meeting the birds I’d known my whole life for the first time.

I’ve learned that each song sparrow interprets the music given to him a little differently, so you should listen for the voice and not the melody. Blue jays, being corvids like crows and ravens, are also surprisingly vocally versatile—and one of the few colorful birds you’ll still see in winter!

I’ve learned the difference between crows and ravens: mainly, it’s size. You know when you’ve seen a raven because it’s big. If you get to hear it, there’s no mistaking.

Unlike lots of other local birds, robins do dig for worms, though I suppose it’s the earlier ones who actually get them. I love when I spot one having a successful hunt. Good job, little guy!

Starlings sound like R2D2. Cardinals sound like sci-fi lasers. If you’re an idiot, like me, you might confuse a robin call for the less common northern flicker and get your hopes up. Catbirds are unmistakable, though—they sound like cats.

Learning your local birds brings them into focus. Suddenly that foraging flock in the park isn’t just “birds”. If you’re me at the local track in the early springtime, it’s robins and juncos. By the pond it’s  duck, duck, goose, and the anticipation that maybe I’ll see a heron or an egret too. One time I saw a double-crested cormorant. Seeing uncommon birds feels like hitting a winning lotto ticket, even if it’s a $5 scratch-off prize in the form of a red-tailed hawk flying particularly low.

From goldfinches to grackles, I could go on and on about all the birds I’ve seen running. I saw a bald eagle near my in-laws’ house in central Jersey. That was a jackpot.

It can be so easy to treat your well-worn loops and routes like a treadmill: familiar, repetitive, boring, rote. Just something you have to do while you’re waiting for your next workout. Birding lets every run surprise you—sometimes just a little, and sometimes a whole lot. Maybe you hear a mockingbird practicing its repertoire, or you see a bird you haven’t seen in a while, or you see a bird you’ve never seen in person before, or you see a bird you’ve never seen at all. Remember to look it up on Merlin when you get home!

Besides the fact that you can do both outside, running and birding have something else in common that makes them great partners. Running and birding both create pride of place. Your local birds and your local running routes are special because they’re yours. When you take the time to know them and treat them like they’re special, it feels like having a bigger house. Having lived in this corner of Essex County for ten years, I’ve run a lot of streets, seen a lot of birds, and met a lot of people. My house feels pretty big.

I’m not saying running or birding will make you a better member of your community, but they certainly could.

What I am saying is that running and birding are two great hobbies that get better together. I would even say that doing both kills two birds with one stone, but that seems against the spirit of the post.

Turn your next easy run into a bird outing. See what you find.

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The island of Maui, while beloved by honeymooners, is far more importantly home to over 160,000 people, and that home was ravaged by wildfires just a few months after my wife and I returned from our trip. Recovery is ongoing.

The Maui County government maintains a website for community organization and resources called Maui Nui Strong, and it includes a list of charitable organizations responding to the continuing needs of wildfire victims.

While I was struggling to stay on the cross country team in college, I also took a few classes in creative writing, and a couple of those were in poetry. I don’t write as much as I’d like—or, I don’t write well as often as I’d like—but every once in a while an idea pops up and I have to (pardon me) run with it.

Given that my readership is so small, and I have little else to post this week, I think I’ll share something that came to me this afternoon:

Untitled

If Boston was the cradle of our country,
it grew into her teenage bedroom:
rowdy and aspirational,
moody and cold—
a walled garden
of perfect essays and SAT scores,
an underdog,
cursed by Bambino,
redeemed by Papi,
saved by Meb,
sainted by Des.
The last stop for everyone
who will never make the Olympics,
which is everyone,
give or take.

I skip my run this morning and do the dishes,
water the plants,
fix coffee in our remodeled kitchen
(but not by us);
gray skies over Jersey.
It’s mornings like these I stop sweating
and count my luck:
a morning without Boston,
without obsession,
allowing myself to age for a moment
before I continue
the remodel of the last half-decade.
I’ve gotta get to Boston
so I can enjoy more mornings like this
in peace.

I’ve gotta get to Boston
because that’s where it started,
and that’s where it ends:

We begin again with our hero in Jersey,
the Hero’s Journey completed—
swords into plowshares
into birdhouses
and herb gardens and preschool.
A chickadee fledges,
forages, furrows its brow,
burrows into mother.
Gray skies overhead,
weather that could always be something else:
hot, humid, static.
Static on the TV screen
moving endlessly,
shifting, waiting
for the latest prestige dramedy to drop
and binge.
This one’s about family,
the one on the couch,
shoes on the rack,
medal on the mantle,
head on the pillow.
I set my alarm;
run tomorrow.

See you next week.