48:02

Yes, that was my time for today's 5K: forty-eight minutes and two seconds – and I overheard one of the record-keepers saying that the clock was four seconds fast. Well, I'll take that oh-two anyway. I'm not embarrassed or ashamed of the time – I finished. Oh, I'd certainly like to improve it; a few years back, my time was under forty minutes. But a few years before that, I wasn't running at all. I will improve my time, which I can do by running more on these courses, and walking/trudging them less… plus more practice.

Older brother Sarge ran a 15K that started an hour after ours, and his time was ninety-something minutes (and he looked beat afterward… but he, too, had completed his run). Although I won't normally post pictures of myself or/and of other people mentioned here, I'm adding here a photo of Sarge (left, of course) and me (right) as we're about to cross the finish line.

Sarge's regular companion, Chonggun-nunim, my sister-in-law-in-law, joined me for the 5K, though once we passed the first mile-marker, I began my jogs/sprints, and she finished several minutes behind me. Now, this evening has my face and arms quite red – this early in April, there was no leaf-cover over the trail we ran, a former railroad-track now torn out and replaced with a fine gravel. I'll slather on the aloe today and the next couple days, and be fine – though I should have used the sunblock I'd brought.

I called Spartacus as we were starting out, and again when I finished, since the town where we did this is the same town where he and I attended a couple years of elementary school together, mumble years ago. On the phone, I cautioned him, "Look, just because I called you panting, doesn't mean it's a compliment!" He laughed it off. I offered him to join us sometime (we're of similar circumference), maybe even head up to his seaside state for a run; he declined for now, and insisted there'd have to be an ambulance. "Okay," I said cheerily, "you can drive the ambulance, and I'll ride in back – just keep the paddles warm and greased up, okay?"

This being lovely, bucolic, rural southern-central northeast US, it wasn't surprising that in the 5K there was a farm-figured Mennonite woman in homespun, prayer cap, and sturdy black walking shoes – and, amazingly, she pulled the event's bright orange tee shirt down over her green, feedsack-pattern dress. Here she is as she nears the finish line:

At a couple points before and after the race, we also saw some of this area's regular horse-and-sulkies (though no buggies this time). The air, too, was rather obviously that of horse- and farm-country… not extremely so, however.

Chonggun-nunim and I started out at the back, with maybe three to six people behind us, all walking (though briskly at times), and I did pass some more as the event progressed, but this wasn't an objective. I didn't quite catch up to the nun in crutches, the guy walking on his hands, and the trio of one-legged runners. Maybe next time.

Just kidding! Some folks had brought li'l ones in strollers, and ran or walked with them, others their larger dogs. In fact, even while trudging along, I managed to toss out a pun at a woman headed back the other way (we were running out just over a mile and a half, turning around, and heading back, to get the full 3.2 miles). She was running with a light-colored, sleek-looking greyhoundish dog. I greeted her with a cheery "Now, that's one way to set a target, and whippet!"

We stopped by our dad's grave, and were pleased to see a beautiful little purple-blossomed forsythia growing near his marker. This had been planted by our sister Mew on her visit a month or so ago. The cemetery asks that we not plant flowers, so eventually the mower will claim this pretty sight… but it was still sweet to see, especially with purple being Dad's favorite color. Sarge got a couple photos (I may post them later), and then got an additional photo of the steeple of Dad's church, which can be seen from his grave – which was the prime reason we chose that particular spot. And Dad loved his church (and denomination) very much, so this is just right. Here's a photo of it that Mew took last Fall:

Nearby is also visible the tall Victorian tower of the main building at the university where he taught nearly forty years. This, too, must please him. The official name of that building is Old Main (as you'll find at many universities and larger colleges); typical of him, he deliberately twisted the name – in a process he called Mangled Saxon – into "Old Pain".

Likely he's delighted by his neighbors. A nineteenth-century marker close to his commemorates a Jonathan Sebastian (Dad loved Bach); the immediate neighbor to his left is a woman with the odd name of Ditty Delilah (which I pronounce as "Dirty Delilah"), and to his right a – no kidding – David Butts… might be Seymour's brother?