Last Thursday, some combination of unseasonably warm weather and quarantine snacking finally propelled me off the couch and onto the Schuylkill River Trail. When I ventured outside, however, I quickly realized that I was not alone in my desire to stave off boredom and quarantine pounds with a socially distanced run. The river trail, normally crowded only on warm weekend afternoons, was teeming at 2 PM. Runners, walkers, dogs, and children on scooters battled to maintain a suggested radius of germ-free air and bikers were forced to a standstill.
I’ve been a loyal albeit casual runner since maybe the eighth grade. When I swam competitively, running was part of our pre-pool warm up and in high school, I gamely jogged five kilometers to score a few extra points for our small cross country team. Now, I just enjoy the meditative futility that comes with running slowly in a large circle.
Thursday was anything but relaxing. My boyfriend, who I had dragged with me, dutifully plowed a path through the throngs of strollers and scooters and I followed behind. Someone from the city had carefully stapled dozens of signs to the trees lining the trail reminding us to remain six feet apart. As we ran, my mind wandered to the width of the narrow trail and the volume of restless joggers. I began a series of calculations that all ended in the uncomfortable inevitability of proximity. Would holding my breath during these unhygienic encounters stave off the virus? Was my boyfriend holding his breath? Why should I run winded and breathing through my nose if he was going to contaminate the both of us anyways.
In high school, cross country was a communal endeavor. Practices were run together and finding myself alone in a race was usually a sign that I had missed a turn. We chased individual goals too, but trying to run faster wasn’t mutually exclusive of chatting with teammates between sets or even encouraging a competitor on the course. Running is generally a solitary activity for me now, but a vestige of collective spirit remains from tracing and retracing the same five miles among strangers in pursuit of a common goal
I stared down the ponytail of the jogger in front of us as I focused on maintaining our required separation. Perhaps this was our new shared goal. My mind wandered as I imagined us all taking part in a large, unusually well-organized cross country race. She paused to take a phone call, and we curved around her. Our imaginary cross-county team had disbanded.
In high school, our coaches told us to grind through difficult races by breaking them up in our heads. It wasn’t ten kilometers, it was four easy two-and-a-half kilometer pieces. We didn’t think about the imminent extra distance, the foreboding hills, or the inevitable difficulty of the sprint to the finish because a good athlete maintained the perfect balance of dissociation and focus to run piece by piece until the pieces added up.
As we moved further down the trail towards the art museum, the crowds of walkers and families thinned out. I started to see some familiar faces; the people who also seem to enjoy running this same five mile stretch of trail several times a week. I offered nods to a few, but we were all distracted by the crowded trail, the looming cyclists, and the general feeling of unease. Running on such a crowded trail was exhausting and we were almost ready to turn around when we heard shouting behind us. I turned around and saw that two cyclists had collided as one tried to merge into the flow of moving bodies. Luckily, the collision looked low impact. However, the irony of such an entanglement amidst the mandate of separation was not lost on onlookers, who seemed to shift even further apart as they observed the cleanup.
My runs bookend otherwise dull days spent on the couch, but they feel open-ended. With races cancelled and no plans to maintain, I have no goals yet plenty of time. Despite this, I remain unmotivated to adjust my training. Why start now, when this could all end in two weeks or a month. I feel unsettled. Exponential growth, by definition, feels more frantic every day. Quarantines, closures, and cancellations remain disconcertingly indefinite. This pandemic can’t be halved and quartered into manageable pieces.
We turned around and started down the hill. Initially, it had seemed like another crowded afternoon on the trail, but the façade was starting to crack. Walkers clutched cups that smelled suspiciously of wine. Harried parents juggled both excitable children and work phone calls. Rumors of where to buy toilet paper and Lysol wipes floated past. As we jogged back towards center city, a warm breeze blew my ponytail directly into my mouth. All previous efforts to remain sterile now seemed futile, and I brazenly plucked the hairs off my face.
Mia Fatuzzo is an MS1 at the Perelman School of Medicine. Mia can be reached by email at [email protected].
